Whitework
Date
2009
Authors
Lawrence, A.K.
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Creative work
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Whitework by Kay Lawrence was originally exhibited in the context of her 2008 exhibition, This Everything Water. In the exhibition, pearl shell and blankets are used to allude to the complex associations linked to trade in these artefacts for Aboriginal and white Australians.For many Aboriginal communities in North West and central Australia pearl shells were potent objects, used in ceremony and for personal adornment and traded extensively through northern Australia through traditional exchange systems. For the North West pearling industry, pearl shell was a valuable commodity exported to textile centres like Birmingham in the UK, transformed into buttons, and exported bact to Australia to be worn on the live in missions, have now become part of contemporary Aboriginal exchange systems.The installation Whitework includes a pile of blankets stitched with pearl buttons to create images of skulls, and stacked under an old school desk (out of sight out of mind) while on the desk lies a book called White: a glossary of terms. Nearby hangs a crisp, white, starched suit like those that the pearling masters wore. The work alludes in a poetic way to white complicity in the exploitation of Aboriginal labour in the early days of the pearling industry. (exhibition catalogue essay)
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Copyright 2009 Kay Lawrence