Words in action | First Peoples’ art shines at Melbourne Art Fair

An opportunity to see works from three Victorian Aboriginal Art Centres — including our own Kaiela Arts — along with 20 independent artists, as well as artists from The Torch, a not-for-profit arts organisation supporting First Nations people currently in or recently released from Victorian prisons.

There was excitement to be part of this special new event — an event championed by the First Peoples’ Directions Circle, a group of esteemed First Peoples’ leaders and professionals working across the creative industries, education, community and philanthropic sectors.

An event that will be a future biennial feature of the Melbourne Art Fair.

Elders, artists and staff climbed aboard, and then we were off.

Down the highway and into the city.

Pulling up at the bus bay at Melbourne Convention and Exhibition Centre, we paused to get our bearings, before negotiating our way through the cavernous spaces towards the venue.

Finally, up ahead, we could just make out the sign we were looking for: Melbourne Art Fair.

Excitement was building.

The number of people gathering was a clear indication of something about to happen.

In the crowds milling about there were familiar faces, joining us to celebrate the significance of the evening.

To acknowledge the creative work of Kaiela Arts’ artists: Jack Anselmi, Amy Briggs, Cynthia Hardie, Laurel Robinson, Norm Stewart, Lyn Thorpe, Ally Knight and board member Glennys Briggs.

All VIPs. Their named VIP passes reflecting their status.

Time to enter.

Passing through the doors was to step into another world.

Described as “Australasia’s leading forum for contemporary art and ideas”, the 2025 Melbourne Art Fair brought together 60 of Australia’s and the wider region’s top galleries and Indigenous art centres.

An overwhelming range of artworks — all mediums. Where to look?

A coffee table with a head at one end, paintings with price tags in the many thousands of dollars, commissioned works, video, photography.

So much to take in.

As we walked on, our heads swivelling from side to side, hopelessly trying to capture all on offer, there were gasps, fingers pointed and amused and, at times, puzzled looks.

Then, we moved into a different space. Right in front of us were familiar words — Kaiela Arts, Yorta Yorta Country, Shepparton. We were there: our destination.

There was a moment of taking it all in, eyes slowly moving from image to image.

A feeling of familiarity, of creations that hold significance and a sense of belonging.

Of pride — and nervousness — in seeing creations so publicly displayed.

On the wall ahead were Norm Stewart’s boomerangs, a pair of carved and painted birds — a black and a white cockatoo — and two wooden shields.

Three pairs of decorated clap sticks lay on the white shelf beneath — their distinctive markings adding to the stories they tell.

To the left, on the wall, were Jack’s collection of ceramic turtle shells, each carefully shaped, all telling part of the story about the importance of the long-necked turtle in stories from Yorta Yorta Country to the north.

Clay, wood, ceramics, grasses and feathers, all shaped with care and skill.

The long-necked turtle also reproduced in fine weaving — the skills of artist Ally Knight on display.

Her mastery again demonstrated in the larger circular weaving with its delicate ‘skirt’ of emu feathers and grasses.

On the painted white wooden plinths, the collection of ceramic vases and plates so varied in their markings, colours, shapes and sizes — again each one holding a narrative, a story.

Images of a black swan, sulphur crested cockatoo, plants, colours of the land and trees.

Lyn Thorpe’s ceramic with the words Maloga, Dungala, Kaiela, Algabonyah — words used since time immemorial — reminded us how the past, present and future stories are intertwined, each word having its own significance in the story of place, Country, survival and community.

Each creative piece — each artwork — part of the passing on of knowledge, of stories, of culture.

There was so much to see, so many different stories from the diverse First Peoples’ communities and artists across the state.

As Meriam Mir Torres Strait woman and First Peoples Art and Design Fair co-curator Janina Harding described it, “Culture is art. Art is culture.”

When speaking about the artists featured, Harding explained: “They’ve all got ancestral connections to Country in Victoria. And so, the whole show is based on culture.”

There was a calling together of the artists.

Conversations were interrupted and there was laughter as they gathered. Elders, young emerging artists — such a wide age range.

It was time for a ‘photo op’, but most importantly, time for recognition. To acknowledge their role as knowledge holders, as sharers of skills and as creatives who are all telling their stories and keeping culture alive.

Photo over, conversations resumed.

There was a drifting into the space of those who had focused on the larger Melbourne Art Fair. Checking out this other exhibition, feeling the difference in atmosphere, the sense that this was somehow different.

There were red dots appearing against artworks — sold!

Conversations continued, waiters slipped through the crowd offering delicious morsels. Connections were made and renewed.

And the stated aim of the Victorian First Peoples Art and Design Fair, of shining “a light on the diverse and rich creative practices and culture of First Peoples throughout Victoria while engaging the broader Victorian community and delivering economic benefits to First Peoples creatives”, was off to a wonderful start.

To find out more, drop in to Kaiela Arts at 530 Wyndham St, Shepparton.

Open 10am to 4pm Monday, Wednesday to Saturday and public holidays. Closed Tuesday and Sunday.

Or go to kaielaarts.org.au

Kaiela Artists will also be participating in the TarraWarra Biennial 2025: We Are Eagles, curated by Yorta Yorta writer and curator Kimberley Moulton, in Healesville, from March 29 to July 20.

For more information go to twma.com.au/exhibitions