In a Roper Country [Kantri] Garden!
That is a view, early morning, looking east down the bed of the Roper River in the not quite finished mosaic garden at the Ngukurr Community Education Centre, southeast Arnhem Land.
There is a wheelbarrow downstream there. It gives some sense of scale.
The project has been developed, without any special outside funding, under the design and direction of a teacher, Simon Normand, who, after some years at Ngukurr, will return at the end of 2005 to his career in Melbourne as a sculptor.
The beginning of the project was recorded in the Ngukurr School Yearbook 2004.
Simon is teaching us how to mosaic. We are making a rock garden featuring skin group mosaics for the middle of the carpark. This rock garden is going to have the Roper River, Walmaja, Burunju and other local landmarks.
At the start of the project, senior boys moved lots of heavy rocks and slate.
The 'Rainbow' class – junior girls – described:
How to make a mosaic:
1. Design your work
2. Break tiles into little pieces with a hammer and sort into different colours
3. Make the design the size you want
4. Put it on a table and cover it with contact
5. Put the tiles in your design, stuck on the contact, colour face down
6. Put a frame of concrete form around your work, lay wire mesh on the work
7. Mix up your cement
8. Pour then smooth cement over your work, about 7cm deep
9. When cement is set, turn it over and clean it
10. Put grout in the cracks of the mosaic
I asked if the grout burned their hands.
"Naah – not blakpela hands. No good for waitpela hands."
The grout is of a type that is easily removed and not uncomfortable if removed while damp.
It is good to be a part of community here.
In the web of extended kinship structure, the young lady on the left above said to me "I call you amri, that girl is your abija, that one your gagu, that one call you apunini " — all family relationships, with consequent mutual responsibility.
There is more on this subject in the next blog "End of the dry season?..." but on this page the key thing is to note that this binding of whole community by kinship extends out into nature, the people being part of nature... being in their 'country'.
Simon with Assistant Teacher Howard
The mosaic depicts the totemic geography – the country, or kantri in Kriol – of the different peoples of the Roper River region. In English, as in 'an English country garden', the notion of a country garden is particular and beloved by many. The page title above arose in lighthearted discussion with Simon – but what has been built is exactly a 'country garden'... of a very different kind.
Country, to Aboriginal people, is a profound concept:
Country in Aboriginal English is not only a common noun but also a proper noun. People talk about country in the same way that they would talk about a person: they speak to country, sing to country, visit country, worry about country, feel sorry for country, and long for country. People say that country knows, hears, smells, takes notice, takes care, is sorry or happy. Country is not a generalised or undifferentiated type of place, such as one might indicate with terms like 'spending a day in the country' or 'going up the country'. Rather, country is a living entity with a yesterday, today and tomorrow, with a consciousness, and a will toward life. Because of this richness, country is home, and peace; nourishment for body, mind, and spirit; heart's ease.
Deborah Bird Rose, Nourishing Terrains: Australian Aboriginal Views of Landscape and Wilderness, Commonwealth of Australia 1996
In this mosaic garden project, the totemic animals associated with social organisation and meaning are placed in the Roper River landscape on those parts of the landscape they protect.
Not all my photos are ideal. The mosaic of my own totem, the goanna – guyal – is still encrusted with some mortar and the name appears misspelled. Other than placing the goanna figures first, I have not attempted any order in this presentation.
I am admonished by Simon to try to make a few visits through a sunny day to avoid such shadow.
With storms beginning this week, I must also try to get there to photograph the river 'in flood'.
It had its first little runoff at dusk on 21 October 2005.
Giyirren Giyirren design by Edwina Riley
The garden will have a ceremonial opening in November 2005.
Apart from being a great result for a school community effort and a remarkable work of art
it should be an enduringly valuable teaching place and a statement, at the school entrance,
of the centrality of traditional knowledge and cosmos to the community.