Volume 19: Modern Custodian Meets Modernised Custodians

G’day from the new Modern Custodian studio.

A few months ago, I received an email from a Carnaby. Her name is Cassandra Bynder, and she is a well-established Noongar artist living down south.

Divine Resonance, CB

She sings out and tells me about an art exhibition she is curating, which she wants to call Modernised Custodians. She is seeking my blessing to use the name, considering its closeness to my own brand name, Modern Custodian.

Her song:

Subject: A yarn about a name

Hi Rhys (and team),

My name is Cassandra, I am a Noongar yorga and artist living down south, and have been following your journey for quite a few years now and have always felt very resonant with your values shared through Acknowledge This and now Modern Custodian, and so firstly would love to say hi. I love your work.

I am also emailing as I wanted to have a quick yarn with you about a show Im curating, and through my own research and path came to the working title of Modernised custodians for an art show I am putting together in Northcliffe in September. As a courtesy I thought it would be right to chat to you, and let you know that I am currently using this title “modernised custodians” as it represented the themes I am opening up for discussion in my show, which is about in a very distilled nutshell, how we navigate the tension between nature and technology and how we hold space for both worlds and if it connects and disconnects people and Country in regional WA. If you feel this title is too close to your business name, please lets have a yarn, I’m not looking to cause any issues and I think I currently (because I have no other working title) would love to use ‘modernised custodians’ but can change it if its required, or add a subtitle or something.

Many thanks for your time, I hope we get to chat soon.

Cassandra Bynder

I sing back:

Kaya Cassandra,

Thanks for the email, I appreciate you reaching out in this way. It shows professionalism which I respect. And thanks for the kind words, I’m glad you enjoy my work.

Your art show sounds fun, and I have no problem with you using the name. Sounds like we work with similar themes (modern and traditional / nature and tech) so it makes sense.

Thanks again, and I wish you the best with it.

R.

This interaction leaves my mind until, about a month later, I am contacted by Fiona Sinclair, Artistic Director of Southern Forest Arts.

Fiona reaches out to invite me down to Northcliffe, on Pibulmun Noongar boodja, to be part of the wider program surrounding Modernised Custodians. She and Cassandra are exploring how I might contribute through an Acknowledge This session or another cultural experience alongside the exhibition.

I call her, and we decide instead that I will open the exhibition personally.

Modern Custodian opening Modernised Custodians.

That makes sense.

Modernised Custodians, hosted at the Painted Tree Gallery, is a group exhibition curated by Cassandra Bynder with Southern Forest Arts. Regional Western Australian artists were invited to explore the relationship between nature and technology - and, more interestingly, the tension between them.

What happens to our relationship with Country, community, knowledge and each other as technology becomes more embedded in our lives? What do we gain? What might we lose? And can ancient wisdom and modern innovation sit alongside one another without losing the things that make us human?

Before any of that, though, something happens that makes me feel welcomed.

And not in the way you’d expect.

It’s sundown and I’ve been driving for close to five hours. I check into my room and head to the pub for a feed. I decide to sit outside, positioning myself as far away as possible from the television mounted on the wall, which is tuned to the footy. I’m not a fan of television, especially while eating. I find them distracting and unnecessary.

Then I hear the announcer: “And now, an official Welcome to Country - please welcome Dr Richard Walley.”

Nothing else could have turned my attention to the screen.

I glance over and, sure enough, there’s Dr Richard standing in the middle of Optus Stadium, cloaked in a yonga booka - kangaroo skins - surrounded by a sold-out audience of close to 60,000 people.

He speaks of safety: “May the good spirits look after you and your family here and on your way home.”

He sings a small melody - one I have heard him sing often.

Kaarta koomba djinningam bo.

There is a beautiful pause, followed by a respectful round of applause.

During these few moments, from the time Richard begins speaking until the time he finishes, a male koorlbardi hops onto my table, roughly a metre away from me. He stares at me throughout the entire Welcome.

When Richard finishes, so does the koorlbardi.

This feels significant.

When moments like this occur - which is more often than not - I don’t attempt to decode them. I sit with patience and respect. Two pillars of Noongar culture that Dr Richard speaks of often.

I receive.

There is a feeling response. You feel welcomed. It feels as though Country is communicating - through Richard’s words, through the magpie’s eyes.

I wonder if Country speaks to you in this way, dear reader?

I have often heard of birds appearing at the “right” moment.

I retired to my room, read some Warhammer, then slept.

As the sun rises, Cassandra and I decide to synchronise. I drive to Northcliffe, about 20 minutes from Pemberton, and we dine in a country-town cafe before heading to the venue.

When we arrive, I finally get to see what Cassandra and Fiona have been building. It’s immediately obvious how much care has gone into the room - each work given space, each placement considered, the whole gallery calm and contemplative.

Each piece responds to the theme differently. Nature and technology. Connection and disconnection. Old and new.

Turns out the gallery has a backyard.

Quite a backyard.

Behind it is the Understory Art & Nature Trail.

It’s one of those walks you can properly get lost in - not because it’s particularly long, but because there is always something else asking you to stop and look. Sculptures appear from the undergrowth, enormous woven forms hang amongst the canopy, strange objects wait to be touched and spun, and little figures reveal themselves only once you’ve slowed down enough to notice them.

More than 70 works are scattered throughout the forest, alongside poetry, music and stories.

My favourites were the faces and bodies emerging from the trees.

They’re part of Kim Perrier’s Rising From the Ashes, created following the devastating 2015 Northcliffe bushfire. Local people had their faces and bodies cast, before their forms were recreated using charcoal and placed amongst burnt trees and stumps throughout the forest.

There’s something beautiful and slightly eerie about them. Sometimes you spot one immediately; sometimes you realise you’ve been standing beside a face the whole time.

The longer I walked, the more the forest itself started to feel like part of the gallery.

Special mention, too, to Richie Kuhaupt’s Forest Folk - strange, weathered human forms that look less like they’ve been placed in the forest and more like they’ve been growing there.

Moss has taken hold across their feet and shoulders. At this point, I’m not entirely convinced they aren’t alive.

After walking with Country, I return to the venue. People are arriving, coffee and snacks are out, and the space is activated.

Then, unexpectedly, I am reintroduced to an aunty of mine.

She approaches me and introduces herself. We have met before, briefly, though I couldn’t remember.

She remembered me.

It’s moments like this that warm me. Having family appear in unfamiliar places is a delightful surprise.

There are now about 40 people gathered. Fiona speaks and then passes to me.

I speak of Country as the constant.

Technology changes. The things we build change. The tools we use change. But we are, and always have been, grounded in that which is most familiar to us - the trees, the sun, the ocean.

Country.

Cassandra is then invited to speak. She tells of her journey and expresses her appreciation for the artists and their contributions.

We move from work to work, each artist given time to tell the story behind what they have made. There is laughter. There are tears. There are moments where the room becomes very quiet.

Months earlier, Cassandra had emailed me asking permission to use two words.

Now here we were - artists, family, community and Country gathered around the question those words had opened.

A healthy reflection.

Since then, I’ve found myself thinking less about what happened in Northcliffe and more about how it felt.

The feeling of knowing I was welcome.

The feeling of a koorlbardi sitting across from me while Dr Richard spoke from hundreds of kilometres away.

The feeling of walking through Country and discovering faces staring back from trees.

The feeling of meeting Cassandra properly and somehow relating to her with the ease of an old friend.

And the feeling of standing in front of a room and realising that Modern Custodian was opening Modernised Custodians.

There are moments in life that make intellectual sense, and then there are moments that simply feel right.

I’ve been speaking recently about the idea that perhaps we are moving from a culture dominated by thinking into one that makes more room for both thinking and feeling.

Not abandoning reason. Not replacing knowledge with intuition.

But remembering that feeling is also information.

Our bodies notice things before we have language for them. Country can make us feel settled, unsettled, welcome, curious, small, connected. People can feel familiar before we understand why. Art can move something in us long before we’ve decided what we think about it.

Perhaps that is part of being a modern custodian.

To think carefully, but also to notice.

To listen.

To feel.

And to resist the urge to immediately turn every feeling into an explanation.

Sometimes it may be enough simply to receive it.

I left Northcliffe feeling welcomed - by Cassandra, by community, by art, by Country.

And that feeling has stayed with me.

So I wonder, as you reach the end of this little story:

How do you feel right now, fellow custodian?

Until next,

R