COOK 2014.403 2014.404

Michael Cook presents challenging retakes on Australian history from a uniquely Indigenous perspective, commonly questioning how history may have unfolded if contact between colonial powers and Aboriginal peoples had played out differently. Created in Brisbane city, Majority Rule (Bridge) and (Tunnel) depict an Aboriginal man multiplied across urban scenes. The subject’s clothing – along with the greyscale treatment of the photograph – places these imagined scenes in perhaps 1940s Australia. Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples were not granted citizenship until 1948 and still were not officially recognised as part of the population until 1967. In making his Indigenous subject the majority figure in these works, Cook addresses how race plays a role in how we think about our history and public space.