CARROLUP ART COLLECTION EXPANDS ON 10 YEAR ANNIVERSARY

Imagined corroboree by Reynold Hart, watercolour and ink on paper, 25 x 30cm, c.1948. Donated through the Australian Government’s Cultural Gifts Program by Melvie, Stan and Gael Phillips, Berndt Museum of Anthropology, The University of Western Australia.

10 newly-discovered artworks have been added to the Herbert Mayer Collection of Carrolup Children’s Artwork, a historic collection of artwork by children from the Stolen Generations.

The works were created in the 1940s by Noongar children who were stolen and taken to the Carrolup Native Settlement in Western Australia’s Great Southern region.

This year also marks 10 years since the bulk of the collection was returned home to Noongar Boodja by a university that obtained it in the 1960s.

The John Curtin Gallery at Curtin University hosts the collection and last week opened an anniversary exhibition that includes recently added works.

Menang woman and John Curtin Gallery’s Carrolup Manager Kathleen Toomath, who is the daughter of a Carrolup artist, said the artworks on display are deeply meaningful.

“Each image that we come across presents another leaf in a story, like the hugest onion that you’re unpeeling,” she said.

“Some of those stories are extremely traumatic, some of them also have a lot of hope.”

Listen to an interview with Ms Toomath: