#naidoc2024

Condoman

In 1987, Indigenous sexual health worker Aunty Gracelyn Smallwood and her team felt that safe sex advertising wasn’t effectively targeting people in Australia’s remote Indigenous communities. In response, they created Condoman - “The Deadly Predator of Sexual Health” - who spoke to Indigenous people in language they could relate to, and removed stigma from conversations about sexual health. 

Condoman became something of a cult figure in Australia, and in 2009 he was relaunched with a suite of comics, animations, and merch, including branded condoms. He was also joined by his “deadly, slippery sister” Lubelicious, who promoted consent, the use of water based lube, and women’s health, for her sisters and sistergirls (an Indigenous term analogous to trans women).

We covered Condoman in our podcast on the AIDS epidemic in Australia.

Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander musicians featured in this post: DENNI, Craig Everett, Thelma Plum, Miss Kaninna, Barkaa, Miiesha, JK-47, DOBBY, Sycco, Emily Wurramara, Baker Boy, and Kaiit.

Uncle Jack Charles

“...there are many Aboriginal people who are gay, both men and women, and ... we’re so proud we’ve made our mark and stamped our ground. ... us gay and Indigenous mob, we’re fringe dwellers twice over, and that’s what gives us great strength.”

Bunurong and Wiradjuri man Uncle Jack Charles was taken from his mother at just four months old as part of the Australian government policy of forcibly assimilating Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children. These children are now known as the Stolen Generation.

Raised in a Salvation Army boys’ home, and then by a white foster family, Jack grew up believing he was an orphan, and had no idea he was Aboriginal until he was 17. When he left his foster home at 17 to seek out his birth family, his foster mother called the police. When Jack was finally able to connect with his family, he described himself as being born again in his Aboriginality.

Uncle Jack had his first acting role at 17, in a community production of African-American playwright Lorraine Hansberry’s Raisin in the Sun. He went on the become a stalwart of Indigenous theatre in Australia, and in 1971, co-founded the country’s first Indigenous theatre group, Nindethana, which achieved international acclaim.

Throughout his life, Uncle Jack dealt with homelessness and heroin addiction, and spent time in jail for theft. As a burglar, he deliberated targeted wealthy Melbourne neighbourhoods, saying later "I robbed as rent collection for stolen Aboriginal land!"

Having experienced the prison system himself, Uncle Jack became a tireless advocate for young incarcerated men, especially Indigenous men. In 2010, he starred in a one-man show called Jack Charlves v The Crown, where he explored his life, and his struggles with a government bureaucracy that said a man with a criminal record couldn’t be allowed to mentor prisoners.

Uncle Jack was openly gay, although romance was never a big part of his life. He described giving the Welcome to Country at Melbourne’s pride event, Midsumma, as one of his most cherished duties.

Uncle Jack passed away on 13 September 2022.

Keep an eye on this blog throughout the week as we continue highlighting queer Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander history and culture for NAIDOC Week.

Muru-ba

Muru-ba is a physical and online exhibition showcasing the faces and stories of First Nations LGBTQIA+ Elders involved with the LGBTQIA+ rights and First Nations community movements since the 1970s from across Australia.

Muru-ba is a Dharug word gifted to the project by Aunty Julie Jones, that means trail blazer, or path maker.

This online exhibition showcases newly produced portraits taken in February 2023 by renowned Sydney-based photographer Joseph Mayers (Yorta Yorta), which are accompanied by an online exhibition that features newly recorded interviews by Daniel Browning (Bundjalung / Kullilli), ABC journalist and radio broadcaster.

The exhibition is currently on display at the Victorian Pride Centre from 3 July 2024 to 21 July 2024, or you can check it out online here.

Keep an eye on this blog throughout the week as we continue highlighting queer Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander history and culture for NAIDOC Week.

NAIDOC Week wrap up

Thanks for joining us throughout NAIDOC Week to learn more about queer Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander history and culture! We thought we'd finish the week off with a wrap-up. If you missed any of our posts, check out the links below:

Visit Muru-ba, an online exhibition showcasing the faces and stories of First Nations LGBTQIA+ Elders.

Read Colouring the Rainbow, featuring essays and memoirs from twenty-two queer First Nations people.

Learn about gay Bunurong and Wiradjuri man Uncle Jack Charles, who cofounded Australia's first Indigenous theatre company, and campaigned tirelessly for Indigenous men in incarceration.

Discover the Blak superhero Condoman, who educated First Nations people about safe sex during the AIDS epidemic.

Read about Lookin' Good, one of Australia's first queer First Nations art exhibitions.

Malcolm Cole's "Captain Cook"

On 26 January 1988, Australia officially celebrated its bicentenary, marking 200 years since the arrival of the First Fleet of British convicts in the continent. For First Nations people, this meant 200 years of colonisation, dispossession, and the destruction of land and culture.

In response to public celebrations of the anniversary, gay Aboriginal and South Sea Islander man Malcolm Cole and artist Panos Couros came up their own way to mark the occasion – a float in Sydney’s Mardi Gras parade.

The float, known as the “Aboriginal Boat”, took the form of a sailing ship manned by Malcolm, dressed as Captain Cook, the British man who “claimed” the lands of First Nations people along Australia’s east coast for Britain. Narungga and Kaurna man Rodney Junga-Williams played botanist Joseph Banks, who was also instrumental in the decision to colonise the continent. The float was pulled by their white friends. It is now customary for the First Nations float to lead Sydney’s Mardi Gras, but this wasn’t the case in 1988. The “Aboriginal Boat” was the first official Indigenous community float in the parade.

Malcolm, a dancer, teacher, and counsellor, was openly gay, and in 1988 was diagnosed with AIDS. His twin brother Robert nursed him in the years leading up to his death in 1995. In 2024 Robert attended his first Mardi Gras, where he commemorated his brother by marching in a recreation of his Captain Cook costume.

Lookin' Good

Lookin’ Good was one of Australia’s first queer First Nations art exhibitions. Hosted in at Boomalli Aboriginal Artists Cooperative in Sydney during Mardi Gras in 1994, the exhibition was curated by Gamilaraay, Wailwan and Biripi artist r e a, Bundjalung artist Matthew Cook, and Wiradjuri and Ngunnawal artist Brook Andrew. To quote Matthew:

The aim of the exhibition is to project a positive image of gays and lesbians within the Koori [south-eastern Australian Aboriginal] community and similarly projecting a positive image of Kooris within the Sydney gay and lesbian community.

The exhibition featured various works by queer Indigenous artists, including Matthew’s jeans (which he’s wearing in the picture), covered with various patches including the Aboriginal flag, and posters by Bundjalung artist Bronwyn Bancroft, exploring Queer Blak men’s experience during the AIDS crisis.

Boomalli has continued to host a queer exhibition as part of Mardi Gras each year, and this year celebrated 30 years of sharing queer, Indigenous art.

Keep an eye on this blog throughout the week as we continue highlighting queer Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander history and culture for NAIDOC Week.

Colouring the Rainbow

Colouring the Rainbow uncovers the often hidden world of Queer and Trans Blak Australia and tells it like it is.

Twenty-two First Nations people reveal their inner reflections and outlooks on family and culture, identity and respect, homophobia, transphobia, racism and decolonisation, activism, art, performance and more, through life stories and essays. The contributors to this ground-breaking book not only record the continuing relevance of traditional culture and practices, they also explain the emergence of homonormativity within the context of contemporary settler colonialism.

Colouring the Rainbow is a real, searing and celebratory exploration of modern culture in post-apology Australia.