To coincide with “Australia Day” 26 January 2009, an exhibition called “Terra Nullius” was launched in Weimar, Germany. A show of Aussie artists curated by Frank Motz and Deborah Kelly.

Squatspace's piece for the show encompasses contributions from the German students who came on our most recent Redfern Waterloo Tour of Beauty in August 2008.

The double exhibition with the name “TERRA NULLIUS - Contemporary Art from Australia” runs at ACC in Weimar (Germany) from January 26 (Australia Day) til March 22, 2009 and from May 1 til July 26, 2009, at Halle 14 in Leipzig (Germany)

Exhibition rationale

The 17th century British Crown considered Australia to be an empty, uncultivated land which could be claimed without impediment.

Indigenous peoples were denied rights to their land, using “terra nullius,” a legal principal only finally overturned in 1992. The ensuing conflicts between settler and indigenous peoples remain unresolved to this day.

When former diplomat Kevin Rudd defeated long-time conservative prime minister John Howard, an era came to an end – and with the withdrawal of troops from Iraq, ratification of the Kyoto Protocol, and the Australian government’s formal apology to the “stolen generation” a period of change began. Perhaps, even hope. Nevertheless, terms like the “stolen generations,” “the intervention,” and “mutual obligation” persist as political realities.

Art is a civilising force that negates physical and psychological boundaries, undercuts the idyllic construction of the multicultural nation, calls into question political complexities and incongruities in Australian society, interrogates social exclusion, representation of Aboriginal people and interests, historical and current immigration and refugee politics.