TALKING THROUGH YOUR ARTS – CORROBOREE SYDNEY 2013
Image: Photo: Tiffany Parker
The symbol comes from many sources. Automobile manufacturers appeal to status longings by showing the admirable class of people who use their products. Softness in a tissue is shown with a baby and/or a small furry animal. Wherever they come from, symbols are by definition repeating entities.
Usually there are some traditional symbols associated with our holidays. Christmas Day sees the decorated tree, the hung stocking, the mistletoe, Santa Claus, reindeer, and gifts. Heard in the background are songs of Good King Wenceslas and We Three Kings of Orient Are. Christmas is indeed the day of the mixed metaphor.
This is the part of the nature of symbols. The cultural symbol derives from our desire to preserve in concise imagery past events of special significance. It is these concise images and embedded songs that are what preserve the past. Symbols remain in the culture’s consciousness through repeated use. We learn to use them all through life.
Following recommendations contained in the Economy Taskforce Report to raise the profile of NSW Aboriginal heritage and contemporary culture, the NSW Government along with leading cultural organisations have established the inaugural Corroboree Sydney. This festival is estimated to generate $21 million within the local economy over the next three years.
Amanda Peacock, coordinator of Indigenous Art Education Programs at AGNSW on Corroborree Sydney, said in a recent interview that the working party chair Professor Michael McDaniel expressed a vision of a future time when an Indigenous festival would have no need to exist. McDaniel is a member of the Kalari Clan from the Wiradjuri nation of Central NSW and a respected educator of Indigenous Studies.
Imagine a time when Sorry Day is no longer a May-day observance, but a public holiday. A symbol of deliverance to free-dreaming that creates habit patterns in belief and actions.
The Elders Circle has five Sydney elders who have been invited to connect and exchange meanings, murmurs and conversations each at different times and locations. What is there to say? (AS)
Corroboree Sydney 2013, Until Nov 24, various Sydney locations, free-$50, corroboreesydney.com.au
BY ANGELA STRETCH
