Propositions on First Nations residencies and our autonomous futures

Facilitated by Maya Hodge, this conversation with Tarryn Love and Gabi Briggs will consider the importance of creating space for First Nations artists, especially those living in regional areas. Drawing from their experiences as artists, curators and facilitators who have been raised outside cities, Maya, Tarryn and Gabi will discuss the role of self-determined residencies in creating space and localised opportunities for First Nations artists and practitioners.

Maya Hodge is a proud Lardil and Yangkaal emerging curator, creative, violinist and writer based on the lands of the Kulin Nation. Focusing on how artistic processes act as a way of healing, her creative practice explores the power of disrupting colonial narratives through curatorial and project-based work dedicated to uplifting First Nations storytelling and artistic autonomy. She is a president artist of this mob collective’s studio space based at Collingwood Yards, and a founding member of Ensemble Dutala, Australia’s first Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander chamber ensemble.

Gabi Briggs is an Anaiwan and Gumbaynggirr gedyura (woman), a research-based artist, and a grassroots community organiser. Her work explores the intersection of land-based practices and virtual spaces, focusing on power redistribution and carving out self-determined spaces for her communities. Gabi's research seeks to interrogate the potential for Anaiwan sovereignty to exist within virtual spaces and to provide safety and healing to the Anaiwan community from colonial harm. Her work builds on the legacy of her grandmother Patsy Cohen's research into country and kinship on Anaiwan lands in her seminal text 'Ingelba and the five Black matriarchs'. Gabi is committed to using her art practice to effect positive change within Indigenous communities and prompt transformative justice. She is currently a PhD candidate in the Monash Wominjeka Djeembana Research Lab at Monash University.

Tarryn Love is a proud Gunditjmara Keerray Woorroong woman, born and raised on Wadawurrung Country. She is a koorroyarr, teenyeen ngapang, tyeentyeeyt ngapangyarr and wanoong ngeerrang – granddaughter, youngest daughter, youngest sister and Aunty. Tarryn is an emerging artist and curator, whose practice exists in the space of creative cultural expression. She creates under the collective of Koorroyarr (granddaughter), honouring her positionality as a Gunditjmara woman. Tarryn’s work represents the distinctiveness of Gunditjmara ways of Knowing, Being and Doing that is not one way but constantly happening and changing. She aims to explore identity in the here and now while centering language and carrying on the work of remembering, reclamation, regeneration, and revitalisation. Tarryn is currently the curator of Yookapa – a new First Nations creative program by mob for mob on Wadawurrung Country in Geelong.

Image courtesy Tarryn Love