Join Juno Gemes, Djon Mundine and Michael Aird, as they share their own personal histories as friends, colleagues and collaborators, telling the true history of Australia.

About Juno Gemes

Photographer and social justice activist Juno Gemes has spent much of her long career documenting the lives and struggles of First Nations people. Born in Budapest, Gemes moved to Australia with her family in 1949. She held her first solo exhibition, We Wait No More, in 1982; the same year she exhibited photographs in the group shows After the Tent Embassy and Apmira: Artists for Aboriginal Land Rights. In 2003 the National Portrait Gallery exhibited her portraits of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander reconciliation activists and personalities, Proof: Portraits from the Movement 1978–2003, and has since acquired many of her photographs. Gemes was one of ten photographers invited to document that National Apology in Canberra in 2008. The Macquarie University Art Gallery held a survey exhibition of her work, The Quiet Activist: Juno Gemes, in 2019

About Michael Aird

Michael Aird is the Director of the University of Queensland Anthropology Museum. Michael has worked in the arts and cultural heritage sector for 40 years with a focus on documenting aspects of urban Aboriginal history. Photographs taken by Michael have been included in collections such as the National Gallery of Australia, The Queensland Art Gallery/Gallery of Modern Art, the Queensland Museum and the State Library of Queensland. He has curated over 35 exhibitions and undertaken numerous research projects in the area of native title, local histories, art and photography. In 1996 he established Keeaira Press an independent publishing house. He has been published in academic journals and numerous other publications. While not holding an academic position for most of his career, Michael’s research output is significant, being recognized internationally, particularly for the study of photographs of Indigenous people.

About Djon Mundine

Djon Mundine OAM is a proud Bandjalung man from the Northern Rivers of New South Wales.

Mundine is a curator, writer, artist and activist and is celebrated as a foundational figure in the criticism and exhibition of contemporary Aboriginal art.

Mundine has held many senior curatorial positions in both national and international institutions, some of which include the National Museum of Australia, the Museum of Contemporary Art, Art Gallery of New South Wales and Campbelltown Art Centre.

Between the years 1979 and 1995, Mundine was the Art Advisor at Milingimbi and curator at Bula-bula Arts in Ramingining, Arnhem Land for sixteen years. Mundine was also the concept artist/ producer of the ‘Aboriginal Memorial’, comprising 200 painted poles by forty-three artists from Ramingining, each symbolising a year since the 1788 British invasion. The Memorial was central to the 1988 Biennale of Sydney and remains on permanent display at the National Gallery of Australia in the main entrance hall.

In 1993, Mundine received the Medal of the Order of Australia for service to the promotion and development of Aboriginal arts, crafts and culture. Between 2005 & 2006 Mundine was resident at the National Museum of Ethnology (Minpaku) in Osaka, Japan as a Research Professor in the Department of Social Research and is a PhD candidate at National College of Art and Design, University of NSW.

Djon Mundine OAM also won The Australia Council’s 2020 Red Ochre Award for Lifetime Achievement and is currently an independent curator of contemporary Indigenous art and cultural mentor.