CULTURAL EXPEDITION

KUNUNURRA • BALGO • YIYILI • 22 - 30 MARCH 2023

KIAF 2023 Cultural Expedition Travel Route

Following on from the highly successful “Hand in Hand – Kidogo Irish Aboriginal Festival 2023″, Joanna Robertson (Creative Director of KIAF) organised a Cultural Expedition to visit remote aboriginal communities that she had connections with. Joanna invited Machán Magan (Author, Orator and Irish Language Expert) who was visiting Australia to speak at the festival, to join her on her travels. Together they travelled to Kununurra, Balgo and Yiyili (Mueller Ranges) located in the far north of Western Australia.

Joanna Robertson (R) with Manchán Magan (L)
Joanna Robertson (R) with Manchán Magan (L)

KUNUNURRA

Upon landing in Kununurra, Joanna and Manchán visited the Waringarri Art Centre and met with senior lore man and artist, Ben Ward.

This was followed by a one on one cultural briefing by Waringarri Arts Tour Guide, Peter Griffiths-Sebastien and cultural learning at Lake Argyle.

BALGO

After their time in Kununurra, Joanna and Manchán travelled 8 hours South to Balgo, which is located on the edge of the Tanami Desert and the Great Sandy Desert.

Balgo is now well known for their “Warlayirti Artists” community, which was established with the help of Sister Alice Dempsey (IRE) in the 1980s. The Warlayirti Artists are good friends of the Kidogo Irish Aboriginal Festival as their work was exhibited during the inaugural festival in 2021.

During their visit, Joanna and Manchán stayed at the residence of the director of  Art Centre. 

YIYILI

For their final stop, Joanna and Manchan made their way to Yiyili, which is a closed community, 6 hours north-west of Balgo. Their time in Yiyili included learning about the lore of the country, tours of the landscape, learning about bush medicine and other traditions, a class on Gooniyandi language as well as teaching special art techniques to the artists in the community and teaching bread baking and an introduction to Irish language to the children.