‘Manifestation’ was made adjacent to the site of the ‘sod hut’ on Bruny Island. In the background is kunanyi (Mt Wellington) below which is Hobart Town. This hut, now a mound, is where George Augustus Robinson, the Van Diemen’s Land Government commissioned ‘conciliator of the natives’ set up his first ‘Aboriginal Mission’. This failed in part due to the impact and incursion of whaling crews, and resulting illness, on local Aboriginal people. Robinson however was then supported to mobilise his mission. He travelled for 5 years across lutruwita (Tasmania) to convince Aboriginal people to surrender to his final plan, which was a promised temporary exile to Flinders Island in order for Aboriginal people to escape the murderous intentions of the colonists. This promised temporary relocation that Robinson recorded in his diary on 6 August 1831 was a ploy and most who followed him never saw their home country again. ‘Manifestation’ shows the violent clash of two incommensurable cultures. The chair and the spear ablaze on the coast represent the disaster that colonization wrought upon my ancestors.

Julie’s work uncovers and re-presents historical stories, re-evaluating the
impact of the past on our present lives. Much of the work refers to her
own and her family’s experience as Tasmanian Aboriginal people and
is concerned with developing a visual language to express and engage
with conflicting and subsumed histories. A central intention of Gough’s
art is to invite a viewer to a closer understanding of our continuing roles
in, and proximity to, unresolved national stories.

Manifestation reflects on the flash point where cultures first crossed.
Australian shores were a zone for untimely meetings. The work is a
memory piece, peering, sending back a preternatural warning.