Joanna Kitto

Moorina Bonini’s 𝘊𝘰𝘥𝘦-𝘚𝘸𝘪𝘵𝘤𝘩𝘪𝘯𝘨: 𝘊𝘳𝘦𝘢𝘵𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘚𝘱𝘢𝘤𝘦 𝘵𝘰 𝘈𝘭𝘪𝘨𝘯 𝘚𝘵𝘳𝘶𝘤𝘵𝘶𝘳𝘢𝘭 𝘝𝘢𝘭𝘶𝘦𝘴 examines the ontological design of western institutions through practice and Indigenous-led research. With this body of work, @moorinabonini reframes wooden archival boxes from the Melbourne Museum, saying,

“These boxes were created to hold Indigenous South-East cultural material collected by anthropologists, ethnographers, farmers, regular people, donated to the museum collection or acquired by the museum.
They are echoes of the violent acts of colonisation that occurred across our woka (country) and wala (water) to which we as a people are still recovering and healing from today.

The burnt markings across the surface of the wooden boxes have been Informed by embodied cultural knowledge of mark-making. The historical and signifcant cultural practice of burning is used to reposition the narrative regarding these colonial containers. Indigenous cultural practice and knowledge is centred in this work that aims to acknowledge the dark history of historical over-collecting of Indigenous cultural materials.”