ARTWORK STORY
‘No Trees & Here Comes The Red Coats’ is a cry for the environment. Australia’s fragile ecosystem depends on a delicate balance, and the clearing of the land and decline of native wildlife disrupted the Country on which Aboriginal people depended. Syron recalled his grandmother telling him that when she grew up around Forster–Tuncurry there were emus everywhere.
The emu holds an important place in Aboriginal culture. In some traditions the Featherfoot, or Cleverfoot, could carry messages between places, while the powerful Kadaitcha man — an enforcer of tribal law — was said to wear emu feathers on his feet. In this way the emu symbolises both guardianship and the authority of Aboriginal law.
ARTWORK STORY
‘No Trees & Here Comes The Red Coats’ is a cry for the environment. Australia’s fragile ecosystem depends on a delicate balance, and the clearing of the land and decline of native wildlife disrupted the Country on which Aboriginal people depended. Syron recalled his grandmother telling him that when she grew up around Forster–Tuncurry there were emus everywhere.
The emu holds an important place in Aboriginal culture. In some traditions the Featherfoot, or Cleverfoot, could carry messages between places, while the powerful Kadaitcha man — an enforcer of tribal law — was said to wear emu feathers on his feet. In this way the emu symbolises both guardianship and the authority of Aboriginal law.
