I reckon it’s great to put these panels
up and let the children know what happened here because its not
taught at school or nothing - they didn’t want it to be taught

Above: comment from a community Elder of the Nyangbul people of the Bundjalung Nation in 2016 regarding the installation of signage at East Ballina Aboriginal Place - the location of a massacre of Aboriginal People in the late 1850s.

There is a single thread that runs through all of the project work we have been involved with regarding First Nations Peoples' cultural heritage interpretation.

That is the desire of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities to protect and nurture the stories that sustain their connection to Country and to ensure their children grow up strong in their culture. All other issues in relation to interpretation projects in this space run a distant second to this central premise.

A feature of First Nations Peoples' interpretation projects is the way in which teamwork is always a central ingredient to a successful outcome.

Our involvement typically comes on the back of extensive community collaborations and consultations that have brought a project to the point where both funding and a commitment to proceed have been obtained by the key stakeholders.

Our task is then to work in with these existing networks to deliver the interpretive outcomes.

This requires an ability to quickly and seemlessly integrate into the project team in a way that introduces both the required vision and expertise whilst ensuring this is always in accord with stakeholder wishes and expectations.

Artwork

Working with original First Nations Peoples' artwork to enrich interpretive designs can provide a vital way of grounding the overall message suite on its indigenous cultural heritage foundations.

Above: Three Brothers Creation Story Artwork. Mick Crook 2021.

Mount Canobolas summit redevelopment

The redevelopment of the summit precinct in the Mt Canobolas State Conservation Area at Orange in New South Wales in 2022 provides a key example of the power of artwork to inform the interpretive response.

This location is one of three pillars anchoring the Wiradjuri creation story relating to the Three Brothers and the formation of a triangle of prominent hilltops in the local region.

Given the significance of the location, the Wiradjuri community saw the summit redevelopment as a chance to share an appropriate version of this story with the public for the first time via a specially created artwork by local Wiradjuri artist Mick Crook.

This, together with a community approved description of the creation story it portrays, was featured on an interpretive sign in the precinct. The sign also features the artist’s statement describing the significance of the key elements in the artwork.

Taken in isolation, this is a fairly conventional approach to delivering interpretive content such as this. On its own however, the sign does tend to stand apart from the surrounding landscape rather than be organically linked to it.

To respond to this a major entry pavement rendition of the work was created in collaboration with the artist. It features corten steel cutouts with stainless steel inserts. This installation was positioned for people to encounter as they approached the sign. The invitation here is to first connect with the artwork at an emotional / intuitive level via its symbolic content. The literal, textual elements describing the story and the artwork itself are hence derivative, secondary elements found in the adjacent signage.

The importance of place

An important feature of the Mount Canobolas work is the way in which the Wiradjuri community saw the summit redevelopment project as an appropriate place to share the story publicly. This is a crucial element of the underlying symbolic content of the installation. It could have been told anywhere else in the reserve or its surrounds - but it wasn’t. The right place for the story was looking out over Country on the top of one of the three mountains that are the pillars of the story.

This provides a key lesson that interpretive responses can learn from indigenous cultural sharing practices. Each place has its own stories — its own significance on Country. Caring for Country includes caring for and nurturing its stories. This placemaking context is something we can directly adapt to other assessments of interpretive storytelling. What is the hidden story of this location and how can this be shared with others in a manner that invites them to make their own connections?

Mungo Meeting Place Project

In 2010 we were the interpretive consultants on a project team engaged to assist the NPWS and the Paakantji, Ngiampaa and Mutthi Mutthi Aboriginal Peoples who care for their Country at Mungo National Park in the Willandra Lakes Region World Heritage Area to create a cultural meeting place beside the park visitor centre.

The central challenge for this project was to interpret Mungo's 20,000 human fossil trackways - the world's largest collection of ice age human footprints. The project also needed to recognise the resting place of Mungo Lady and Mungo Man in the Mungo Lunette (running in a 25 km north/south sweep away to the east) and to also provide a place where Aboriginal people could gather on site.

A further issue needing to be addressed lay in the fact that the locations of all three heritage artefacts is hidden. Additionally in the case of the footprints, even culturally appropriate access is limited by the protective covering of sand secured under sheeting across the football pitch sized precinct.

Initial ideas to provide the public with some experience of the footprints had revolved around a proposal to create a 3D hologram display within the visitor centre. We argued successfully that the connection with these artefacts needed to happen out in the open air amongst the Country that had nurtured countless generations of Aboriginal people here for over 50,000 years. This sense of place was crucial to the experience. If people were to encounter the footprints indoors via a museum installation they could be positioned anywhere - why come out to Mungo?

This revised approach was embraced and an amphitheatre was created to present a carefully selected 3D replica sample of the footprint tracks. The elevated viewpoint also referenced the Mungo Lunette visible across to the east where the remains of Mungo Lady and Mungo Man had been discovered in 1968 and 1974 respectively. Further works included the creation of a firepit gathering circle beside the installation and feature artworks including a stone carving and pavement art by Paakantji artist Badger Bates.

The occasion of the opening in July 2011 took place in a clear but very cold winter's day. One was left to admire the resilience of the young dancers who put down fresh footprints in the sand beside the 3D replicas of their ancestors passage across Country.

Importance of symbols

We understand that the depth and nuance of Aboriginal artworks can in some instances be appreciated differently by various viewers in accordance with the cultural appropriateness of them having access to different levels of understanding. This layering adds depth and meaning to the artwork without however impacting the ability of the casual viewer to connect and engage with them.

In effect they are four dimensional objects — the length and breadth of the artwork, the depth of meaning it conveys and the fourth dimension of time being the interpretation varying in accordance with the age and initiation/Country of the viewer. In effect the same person could understand the work differently at different times in their life in accordance with them acquiring additional cultural knowledge.

It’s useful to step back for a moment to reflect on what this observation might mean for interpretive practice more generally. The choices we make in designing and then curating the interpretive media can directly affect whether the communication is a literal 2D presentation of text and image having length and breadth but no depth, or a 3/4D creation integrating symbolic content.

Carl Jung’s work on archetypes from the early 20th century explains this. Here words stand as a sign when they refer to something concrete that is known — like a ‘cat’. A symbol however is something that is unknown and neither clear nor precise. When we understand this and consciously seek out ways to combine the utility of both these approaches into a precinct’s interpretive response some interesting opportunities arise.

Mungo's interpretive symbols

The use of symbols is evident throughout many aspects of the Mungo Meeting Place response. This helps account for the emotional and intuitive resonance some visitors experience when engaging with the precinct.

Three of the key symbolic elements are described above in relation to the use of 3D footprint replicas to represent the original paths on Country, the arc of the lunette as traced out in the viewing platform and of course the original rock carving and pavement art. There are others.

In order to give people some physical concept of what over 2,000 generations of Aboriginal life at Mungo reaching back over 50,000 years and beyond feels like, a feature 6m long display panel showing a sequence of over 200 Aboriginal figures each in themselves representing 10 generations was installed in the adjacent visitor centre upgrade that accompanied the construction of the Mungo Meeting Place.

These figures were assembled from the artwork of Aboriginal artist Tommy McRae. His work from the late 1800s records many aspects of traditional Aboriginal life at the very time people were being dispossessed of their Country by the impacts of colonial settlement.

This visual array was then incorporated into both orientation and interpretive signage to anchor this symbolic association across all park communications. An example of this comes from the three location specific signage panels erected at the three main entrances to the park. These reflect the Country people have travelled across in order to get to the park and feature a welcome statement from the appropriate Aboriginal language group.

Further symbolic elements are present in the tri-leaf entry sign to the Meeting Place. The three panel elements here reference Mungo being a gathering place on Country of the Paakantji, Mutthi Mutthi and Ngyiampaa peoples. The eucalypt-leaf shaped panels remember the smoking ceremony conducted using gum leaves to welcome visitors to Country. The wafting shapes of the lunette's sand hills are also here draped like a smoke cloud hanging across the welcome sign. Finally the sweeping arc of the lunette motif connects the separate parts of the sign array together.

An additional detail of note comes in the case of the park motif "MUNGO - strong in culture ... caring for Country" that was created to support this overall message array. On the day of the opening we were struck by how this had successfully captured the connections to Country of Aboriginal people such that they had had it embroidered onto the back of their jackets. The key point we take from this is that anchoring interpretive communications on symbolic content gives them the power to resonate beyond the immediacy of their message content.

Interpretive use of contemporary Aboriginal art

A feature of modern Aboriginal art is the way it has expanded beyond the presentation of culturally appropriate forms of dreaming stories to embrace everyday personal expressions of the artist's links to their Country. These personal/secular artworks may, with the artists permission, be suitable for creative re-adaptation into the broader interpretive communications.

This occcurred in the case of our work for Purnululu National Park in 2006. As part of this project work, the Western Australian park agency commissioned a local artist to create a visual motif for use in the national park logo. Incorporated into this brief was the request to be able to adapt and use elements of the logo in related interpretive materials throughout the park. This was granted and an example of one of our resulting signs is shown here.

Coomee Nulunga Trail

A striking example of how indigenous artworks can provide a foundation for culturally appropriate interpretive responses comes from a two stage project we assisted the Ulladulla Aboriginal Land Council with over 2023-26.

The trail is part of a traditional Aboriginal campground at what is now known as Warden Head. It's name recalls the life of Marramarang woman Coomee Nulunga who was widely known amongst the local community around the turn of the 20th century.

For many decades it featured a major entry archway and was the focus of cultural walks and tours. When a boardwalk section was installed along the trail by the local shire council in 2023, the Land Council renewed this entry sculpture and engaged in a process to install interpretive signage along its length. We were privileged to be able to help the land council in their work on this project.

The Ulladulla Aboriginal Land Council wanted this signage to celebrate the vitality of their connections to Country while at the same time ensuring it did not compete with the tour guide for visitors' attention on the tour.

To achieve this the primary point of connection was via the artwork created by Marramarang artist Leanne Brook. It was supported by bespoke custom designed signage units that we worked with our signage subcontractors Screenmakers to create. QR codes on the signs also provide links to supporting video content featuring a welcome to Country and an account of local cultural weaving projects.

Alongside this work a special signage node was devoted to the remarkable work of Mickey of Ulladulla — a respected Aboriginal artist and community member from the Ulladulla region. In the late nineteenth century, he lived at the traditional Aboriginal campground at what is now known as Warden Head.

His drawings and stories provide valuable insights into the cultural practices, daily life, and traditions of his people. Mickey's legacy continues to inspire and educate, highlighting the enduring connection of Aboriginal people to their land and heritage.

Voices on Country

For locations with either internet coverage or a remote area wi-fi hub powered by Starlink there is a very simple and powerful way of allowing visitors to connect with traditional custodians on Country. Web apps powered by static web page designs can be easily hosted within an existing website after the manner of uploading and storing PDF files to an assets folder. There they can sit with no recurrent costs indefinitely. This provides a practical and nuanced means of allowing community Elders the chance to speak directly to visitors via either audio or video links.

We commonly use this approach to include welcome to Country messaging in our First Nations projects. It proved crucial to successfully resolving the technical challenges facing the Ghungalu Nunee Gardens and Parkland project at Blackwater in the Queensland Central Highlands.

Ghungalu Nunee project at Blackwater

The gardens are a collaboration between the Elders from the Ghungalu People and the Central Highlands Regional Council. The signage was essentially an invitation to visitors to link into the various stories on Country as told by two community Elders.

The challenge lay in the fact that these audio recordings for various reasons needed to be held on two different websites. Thanks to the utility of static webpage coding it was fairly simple for us to construct two parallel web apps hosted on the two different websites according to which of the two Elders stories was in play at that point. To do this many of the signs have twin QR codes acting as the portal to the correct landing page. The visitor is otherwise not aware of switching from one hosting environment to another as the travel along the path.

Truth telling and reconciliation

We have been privileged to help Aboriginal communities give voice to their stories now for the last two decades of our company's 28+ years of operations.

Across this period, two projects in particular stand out as being of special sensitivity in dealing with events of great sadness and loss in either the recent or slightly more distant past.

The East Ballina project traverses the ground which was a site of a massacre of Nyangbul people in the 1850s. The Gully at Katoomba was a special place of refuge for local Aboriginal people displaced from their Country in the late 1800s. The tragic decision to in the late 1950s to evict these people and create a short lived, dangerous 1.1km motor racing circuit was devastating for both the Gundungurra community and the other Aboriginal people who comprised the Gully community.

We became involved with both these projects at the culmination of long running and nuanced processes of consultation run by the respective local government shires. This embodied for us the optimal team process required to complete such challenging projects in a manner that allows for a process of truth telling and reconciliation to be progressed in relation to these places.

This for us is the essence of how interpretation can optimally serve community needs and aspirations in a modern context. Interpretation is not the project owner - it is the servant of the placemaking and ground up community processes that got to a point where they were ready to reach out and tell their stories. The interpretation project hence needs to listen and embody these stories whereupon it departs to leave the placemaking process to continue to evolve and nurture the local community.

In this interpretation is being afforded a position of trust that it must respect as a foundational element. People are handing the interpretive team their stories and aspirations to translate into a concrete form such as can be shared with others. The only yardstick for success here is the extent to which the community itself accepts the outcomes as a true and valid rendering of their ongoing connections to Country and one which hopefully can then be used to help their children grow up strong in their culture.

The Gully Aboriginal Place

In 2012 we undertook the interpretive concept planning and signage design for the walk around the Gully Aboriginal Place at Katoomba, NSW. The project was undertaken as part of a team assembled by Blue Mountains City Council and included strong and ongoing input from the Gully Traditional Owners into both the sign content and designs. These works were very much a collaborative enterprise.

A feature of the walk was that it was accompanied by very significant landscape intervention to create both the pathway and visitor nodes along its length. The entry node is shown below. The dotted design motif that underpins the layouts of all the signs was provided by a local indigenous artist. The Gully community were adamant that strong vibrant colours be used across the sign set and this worked to the project's advantage.

Signs were intentionally clustered into nodes where the visitor was invited to step aside from their journey and enter a place of repose where they could appreciate the stories on offer. The devastating impacts of the arrival of European settlement on Aboriginal culture was established as a backdrop against which to present the way in which the Gully provided a place of refuge where the community could survive.

The positive story of how the community survived and maintained its own identity and cultural connections with the land is a feature of the signage. The central node of the Gully Walk provides an "inner sanctum" where the detailed personal stories and memories of the Gully community are presented to visitors.

These detailed stories were separated out from the more generic narrative that underpins the overall trail so as to give them their own special place and ensure that Gully families today can easily go and share their Gully heritage with their children.

Ballina Cultural Ways Project

The opening of the Ballina Aboriginal Cultural Ways project in February 2017 represented the remarkable culmination of a decade's work on the part of the local Aboriginal community working in conjunction with Ballina Shire Council to find a culturally acceptable means of communicating the tragedy of the 1850s massacre at the East Ballina Aboriginal Place while celebrating the strength and diversity of present day First Nations Peoples' connections to Country.

The catalyst for the solution came with the development of the Coastal Recreational Path through the Aboriginal Place connecting East Ballina with Lennox Head some 10km to the north. This project formed part of the the stage 1 roll out of the path's construction. It received notable innovative input and support from the Council engineering team involved in the path's construction.

Nature Tourism Services was employed to undertake the interpretation planning and signage/graphic design for the path. Part of our strategic input involved the inclusion of 'step-aside' nodes along the path, where people could engage with the surrounding environment free from the distraction of passing cyclists.

A wonderful asset for the project was the vibrant artwork that was contributed by a number of local First Nations Peoples' artists. These art resources were both used in their entirety as well as being accessed to derive motifs such as could be cut out of material like Corten steel.

A major feature of the trail was the creation of an entry node, 'gateway'"' precinct. At this point visitors are invited to use their mobile phones to access a series of audio recordings of the community elders talking about the project and other matters of cultural relevance. These recordings are carefully hosted such that they are listened to when people are actually there on Country.

The inclusion of these recordings in the platform represents a remarkable achievement on the part of the shire council, project archaeologist and Aboriginal liaison officer team. Their work involved not just undertaking the recordings, but rather earning the trust of the local community to ensure that this material would be used in a culturally appropriate manner over which the Elders would have full control.

A key part of the liaison work undertaken by the Council / Aboriginal liaison team was to ensure that creation stories were presented in a very qualified and culturally considered manner. Again - the wishes of the community Elders were central in determining that the communication of this material was appropriate.

Stage 2

In 2022 Stage 2 of the Cultural Ways project was implemented as part of the completion of the shared use pathway project up from Sharpes Beach to Lennox Head.

A feature of this project extension was the decision to only include text on the orientation signage at either end of the track extensions. Therafter the signage features design motifs as derived from artworks with a prominent link to the supporting web page. Here the artworks relevant to the location are shown in their entirety together with supported audio narratives.