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Join us as we bring great photography by emerging and established photographers that explores ideas and our world through an annual festival of exhibitions, workshops and conversations led by Australian and international artists and thought-leaders. Head On Photo Festival is presented by the not-for-profit Head On Foundation.
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Breaking Silent Codes is an exhibition of portraits of First Nations women from across Australian and the Pacific who came together to share stories of cultural and spiritual responses to the issue of family & domestic violence and sexual assault in communities across Australia and the Pacific. In March 2020, the women travelled to New York to share their stories with women from across the globe. provided a platform for women to discuss the ways in which community, religion, authority and family create silences around sexual assault and family & domestic violence.
In August 2018, UNSW Arts and Social Sciences, Women’s Legal Service NSW and the National Centre for Indigenous Excellence sponsored and hosted a unique forum of 42 Aboriginal, Torres Strait and Pacific Islander women intended to ‘Break Silent Codes’ and share stories of cultural and spiritual responses to the issue of sexual assault and family violence in communities across Australia and the Pacific.
The forum provided a platform for women to discuss the ways in which community, religion, authority and family create silences around sexual assault and family violence. There are many injustices experienced by Aboriginal and Torres Strait and Pacific Islander communities. For a long time, it has seemed that all other matters of injustice are more important than the sexual assault and domestic violence in communities. Women experience this as a silencing of issues important to their spiritual and physical well being.
Through this book, we share with you the stories of this gathering which has now become a movement of its own for First Nations women across Australia and the Pacific.
A multi-award-winning artist, Belinda Mason has worked with emerging artists with disability or disadvantage to create acclaimed collaborative and inclusive multimedia exhibitions for the past two decades. In 2016 & 2018, Belinda presented at a parallel event of the United Nation Commission on the Status of Women in New York, the United Nations Committee on the Rights of Persons with Disability in Geneva 2016 and World Conference on Indigenous Persons in New York in 2014, United Nations Human Rights Council in Geneva 2013.
“The blanket of colonisation has been woven on violence and oppression has denied us all a kind truth. The impact of broken culture and languages and spiritual practices has left a deafening silence around violence in our intimate relationships causing violent assaults and sexual abuse.
Kindness is a movement. Sharing it is accessing your basic human right to personal and communal safely. We need to own our stories and come together to appreciate each other and listen. Violence hurts, it hurts society, its hurts families and it hurts you and I.
My Grandmothers were stolen from their families and enslaved, their culture and language denied. As a young person who witnessed family violence, I would never have believed I would be here today.
Understand that someone may not be ready to leave, and be kind and understand, don’t carry judgement or resentment of someone else’s journey. Give them a place to speak openly without being afraid or judged.
I said to my good friend, ‘I can’t live in this oppressive state of mind and not do nothing about the violence we are experiencing, personally and in society’. So begins the change when knowledge is learned and processed. Holding onto anger and resentment isn’t worth it.
No one person can be what you need to be or feel what you need to feel. Find safety within yourself.”
Dixie Link Gordon
Adjunct Senior Lecturer, Arts and Social Sciences, UNSW Sydney
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THEN: 4 M O N T H S O L D ( 2 0 1 2 )
NOW: 5 Y E A R S O L D ( 2 0 1 8 )
HEART SURGERY“Back then Kenneth was being treated in Coffs
Harbour. He had a heart condition and doctors
were coming from Sydney to treat him. Three
weeks later it was decided he would need
surgery and so Kenneth and I travelled to
Sydney Children’s Hospital, Randwick.
It was a very hard time and looking at the
photo it reminds me how difficult it was
to see my child like that. I really relied on
friends and family at the time as my mum
was also undergoing treatment for breast
cancer – her surgery was booked for the
same day as Kenneth’s.He needed to be in the Intensive Care
Unit (ICU) before and after the operation.
Throughout all of this Kenneth was a
curious and inquisitive baby. I remember
he would always whinge when he couldn’t
see what was going on, so the nurses in ICU
always made sure his bed was raised up.
When looking at the photo with all the
tubes, monitors, and so many doctors for
that one tiny baby, I can’t believe we were
in Sydney for just two weeks and then ready
to go home.Since then he’s had check-ups along the
way, but after his five-year appointment,
doctors advised there was no need for
further treatment. He’s been so well since
that I can’t even remember the name of
the condition or the surgery! The only sign
it ever even happened is Kenneth’s big
scar. As he was so young at the time, he
has no memory of the whole ordeal, but
he knows he has his scar. When people
ask he doesn’t really know where it came
from, he just knows he has the same scar
as his uncle.Kenneth is now this happy-go-lucky kid who
loves his dad’s trucks. Life has been pretty
cruisey with Kenneth starting school and
just making friends with everyone. He has
also recently been made sandpit monitor
which he takes very seriously.It has been a very eye-opening journey and
we would love to thank all the wonderful
doctors, surgeons and nurses for all their
amazing work.”K A R I N A
K E N N E T H ’S M U M
Griffith NSW is naturally arid country but has become an oasis of commercial cropping and cloven-hoofed animal farming through the use of irrigated water within the Murray-Darling basin. While this has benefited farmers and consumers, over-allocation of water is done at the expense of important wetland habitats and the associated cultural integrity of First Nations peoples.
