Lambing Flat, 2018

Digital print on paper, chalk on blackboard-painted archival cotton paper

27 works, 320 x 710 cm total

THE BURRANGONG AFFRAY
The Burrangong Affray, 4A Centre for Contemporary Asian Art, Sydney, 29 June-12 August 2018
The Lives of Celestials: John Young Zerunge, Town Hall Gallery, Hawthorn Arts Centre, Boroondara, 31 August - 20 October 2019

Between November 1860 and September 1861 the New South Wales goldfields of Burrangong, near the present day township of Young, was the site of Australia’s largest racially motivated riot. Rising antagonism over gold mining disparities and cultural habits saw trivial misunderstandings intensify into racial tensions that erupted into violence across the goldfields. Over 10 months, Chinese miners were subjected to threats, robbery and sustained acts of violence. This anti-Chinese sentiment had swept through the goldfields of Victoria in the 1850s and by the early 1860s had reached a flashpoint in New South Wales, provoking public opinion and debate. In Sydney, the NSW Parliament responded to the contention by passing legislation to restrict Chinese immigration and began, alongside Victoria and South Australia, to write the prelude to the White Australia Policy.

The works are the result of 18-months of research undertaken by the artist in and around the town of Young, New South Wales, conducting interviews, collecting oral histories and photographs, and combing through local archives. The collective works emerge from the omitted pages of Australian history, transformed by Young into a reminder of the continuing legacy of cultural othering, notably missing from our public memory. This project was commissioned and developed by the 4A Centre for Contemporary Asian Art, Sydney, with the support of curators Mikala Tai and Micheal Do.