Jackey, Joey, Johnnie and Chockey

Curator Clinton Nain asked four Indigenous artists to respond to the reality of being indigenous men during this period of change in Australia’s history. It is the era of the government intervention in the Northern Territory and Australia’s first female Prime Minister has been elected who has pledged to continue the National Emergency Response. The exhibition takes its title from the exhibiting artists names altered to double as belittling titles for Australian Indigenous men.

All involved artists, better known for their work in theatre, music and the traditional art of carving have presented works outside of their artistic comfort zones. Uncle Jack Charles has produced pottery that is also being used in his current one man show; Joe Geia has produced paintings; Talgium Edwards references his cultural lineage of emu egg carvings using contemporary materials; and John Harding paints poems on the gallery wall, also duplicating these poems on tea-towels as metaphors for domestic life.