Reflecting on Aboriginal Events in Sydney: A Cultural Review

This report provides a reflection on two Aboriginal events attended in Sydney: the Blak Markets Christmas Festival and the Linear exhibition at the Powerhouse Museum. The author describes the cultural significance of these events, highlighting the art, performances, and community engagement. The Blak Markets, held at Bare Island, showcased Aboriginal crafts, art, and performances, providing an opportunity to purchase authentic gifts and support the community. The Linear exhibition explored themes of lineage and cultural legacy through the works of indigenous artists. The author reflects on the anthropological and social cognitive theories that can be applied to these events, emphasizing the positive impact and increased understanding of Aboriginal culture and the talent of the indigenous people of Australia. The report concludes with a positive view of the events and their influence on the author's perspective.

Running head: EVENT REVIEW
EVENT REVIEW
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Author Note

1EVENT REVIEW
Introduction
Events are generally defined as a planned social or public occasion. Mandarić and
Stamenković (2017) states events play an important role in the human society as they provide
a significant function for the human society as it provides the participants with an opportunity
in order to assert their own identities and also celebrate their rituals with each other and also
helps in encouraging tourism in a country. According to scholars, events have originated
from historical and cultural values and were the only form of entertainment and this has been
continuing since then (Dame, Dade and South 2018). This paper is going to reflect on two
aboriginal events in Sydney that I have attended which has helped me understand about their
culture and my experience.
I love attending events because of the experience it provides which are indispensable
especially cultural events as it helps me in gaining some insight about the culture which helps
me in developing my knowledge and helps in shaping me as a person. I have attended many
events recently and in this paper I will be reflecting on two events that I have loved attending
and have had a deep impact on me, the Blak Markets Christmas Festival and Linear, Museum
of Applied Arts and Sciences.
Blak Markets Christmas Festival
I attended the Blak Markets Christmas Festival on December 15 on a Sunday. The
event is considered to be the largest market which was held in the Bare Island in Sydney. In
this event there were about 23 stallholders who belonged from the aboriginal communities
who were selling their crafts and arts from jewelry, their native plants and silk scarves from
aboriginal designs.

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The festival not only did sell beautiful products but also had a wonderful line up
consisting of cultural as well as contemporary performances. Milan Dhiiyaan Dancers
showcased their wonderful dance performances that were extraordinary and a treat to watch.
The festival also had interactive sessions for children with the Larry Brandy Storytellers
where they engaged the children with their attractive and interesting story telling methods.
The festival also contained beautiful art workshops that created message sticks with symbols
of the aboriginal community on them.
The Blak Markets Christmas Festival is one of the greatest chances for the people to
buy authentic and unique gifts for their near and dear ones during Christmas. One of the most
interesting and positive factors of this festival was that all the profits that the festival
generates goes to the aboriginal communities which helps in developing the community and
the growth of the community.
The festival also had very nice bushfood drinks that they were selling like the Boab
Nut Iced Tea and also some non-alcoholic beers which had flavours of the native plants
which had a unique yet different flavour.
This event gave me a positive experience and also helped me understand about the
aboriginal culture which I was unaware of. I understood from the event how talented and
created the aboriginal people of our country were who hardly get any recognition. This event
can be highly related to the anthropological exchange theory where the event focuses on
providing the visitors a symbolic value of the conducted event in a culture (Picard 2016).
This event is seen to be highly symbolic as the event celebrates the aboriginal community and
is organized so that they get the exposure and the appreciation that they deserve.
Other than the beautiful pieces of artwork, the picturesque location had attracted me
very much and had given me a beautiful visual experience along with the beautiful displayed

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art. I bought many small tokens for my friends and family for Christmas which they would
like and appreciate as well. The overall experience was mesmerizing and also helped me
know about the aboriginal culture and even interact with them to understand more about their
art, their technique, the stories and many more.
Linear
Linear was an exhibition by the indigenous people of Australia which I had recently
attended on January 2. After attending many aboriginal festivals and exhibition I was slowly
getting drawn towards attending more festivals and exhibitions that are generally organized
by them or showcase their sheer talent in order to show them some support so that they can
compete in the mainstream culture and get the exposure they need and deserve.
This exhibition was taking place from November 15 to January 2020. I recently got to know
about this exhibition from my neighbours and soon planned on visiting it. This exhibition
took place in the beautiful Powerhouse Museum. When I entered the museum, I saw that the
exhibition that was held was an exploration of the great significance of lineage and line
within the practices and the narratives of the Indigenous people. The exhibition brought
together personal, diverse and unique voices of ten leading and eminent indigenous cultural
practitioners from all across Australia along with objects and artworks from their collection.
The exhibition was held by the head of the Indigenous Engagement and Strategy
named Marcus Hughes and was designed by an extremely talented and award winning, Jacob
Nash. What I had realized by visiting the exhibition is that the exhibition was exploring
themes of cultural legacy and lineage through their content, stories and the work from the
artists like Lucy Simpson, Vicki Wes, Nicole Monks and many more.

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The visual map of the lines by Ngarinyin Elder David Mowaljarlai is seen to bind the
country together physically, culturally and spiritually which according to me is the heart of
the exhibition. The lines describe the people, story and land.
The management team of the event according to me has used the social cognitive
theory to create this event as it suggests the fact that the interaction and the experiences of an
event is based on the way one analyzes, interprets and uses the information in the social
world (Torre and Durning 2015). This exhibition had given me a different experience and
feeling where I felt very connected to the indigenous people and could understand the
hardships and the pain through their work of art.
This museum was decorated beautifully and the exhibition was a treat to my eyes as I
could see the life of the indigenous people through their eyes and get the insight of the real
world and the difficulties they face. By the exhibition I was astonished about the talent the
indigenous people in the country have despite of having very limited access to the materials,
canvas and many more. I did not only gain knowledge about their lives but have also
analyzed and interpreted the stories and the artwork which has paved way for a deep
connection within me.
Conclusion
Both the aboriginal and indigenous events that I had visited were extremely beautiful,
unique and attractive. The events gave me a different experience as I had never seen the
aboriginal and the indigenous culture which was so mesmerizing and unique. Amidst all the
happy and beautiful performances, I have also witnessed the sorrow that artists depict through
their art and storytellers through their stories. This event has not only been entertaining but
highly informative where I have gained knowledge about these communities and have also
become astonished with the pool of talent of these people despite of the hardships which

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shows their resilience and their optimism towards life which has helped me in becoming
positive and hardworking. Thus, it will not be wrong if I state that the two events apart from
providing me with an exemplary experience have also had a deep impact on me.

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Reference
Dame, A.C.N., Dade, M.C. and South, V., 2018. Arts & Entertainment.
Mandarić, M. and Stamenković, I., 2017. The research of the importance of events for the
development and branding of the city of Niš as a tourism destination. Hotel and Tourism
Management, 5(1), pp.64-74.
Picard, D., 2016. The festive frame: festivals as mediators for social change. ethnos, 81(4),
pp.600-616.
Torre, D. and Durning, S.J., 2015. 10 Social cognitive theory: thinking and learning in social
settings. Researching medical education, p.105.

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Appendix
Appendix 1
Image: A painting from the Linear exhibition, Powerhouse Museum

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Appendix 2
Image: Art and objects by the aboriginal community in The Blak Markets Christmas Festival