8 March 2023

- 12 May 2023

Big and Deep Rivers – The Inspiring Women of Katherine

Godinymayin Announces a Celebration of Women Leaders in New Photographic Portrait Projects for International Women’s Day
Category: Photography
Registrations for this event have closed.

The team at Godinymayin are pleased to announce this new portrait project for 2023 International Women’s Day—Big and Deep Rivers: The Inspiring Women of Katherine. Over the past month, thanks to a grant from the Northern Territory Government, we’ve been taking photographs of leaders, business owners, tradespeople, artists, and community activists from across our town and region (like the six bold examples above). This exhibition is Godinymayin’s  starting point for an ongoing exploration of who we are in the 21st century—a new archive of our times.

Each portrait has its own story, a bit of local history, a glimpse of the region’s diversity and modern-day community. Every picture is also a celebration of a strong and inspiring woman who has contributed to Katherine’s identity and sense of place in our times. And thanks to a new partnership with Katherine Museum, all of the portraits and stories from this project will enter in the museum’s collection and be kept as historical material—a kind of visual time capsule made by all of us for future generations to uncover and learn from.  

As a companion to Big and Deep Rivers—with tremendous help from local journalist and project advisor Annie Hesse—the Godinymayin team have also partnered with Katherine Times to present Tributaries—a selection of feature stories from the newspaper’s Community Hero series between 2010 and 2015. The side-exhibition in  our Laneway Gallery offers a look back at women leaders and their contributions—taken directly from the Katherine Times archives. 

To expand the reach of Big and Deep Rivers even further, we’ve formed a partnership with the owners of the Oasis Katherine shopping centre and have installed a group of large-scale portraits inside a vacant commercial space—opposite the Woolworth’s checkout. This pop-up community gallery will remain after the Godinymayin exhibition—providing a passive look at our region’s inspiring women and expanding our International Women’s Day celebration to thousands of residents and visitors.  

Behind the scenes at Godinymayin, this ever-growing creative documentary initiative has been coordinated by a small team of strong women—Tilly Stanier, Jessy Moss, Annie Hesse. With a supporting role by our Gallery Coordinator Max Paez, and the participation of dozens of inspiring subjects, the Big and Deep Rivers project is our way to mark 2023 International Women’s Day—while beginning our efforts to document the wonderful people, places, and communities around us.   

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You’ve Got Questions? We’ve Got Answers!

This International Women’s Day project was inspired by all the people—many of the faces featured in this exhibition—who are doing interesting and extraordinary things in our community. It has been a labour of love for our small team—who handled everything from the photography and printing to building new partnerships with Katherine Museum, The Oasis shopping centre, Katherine Times, and others. Thanks to a grant from the Northern Territory Government—and everyone involved over the past month—the project continues to grow. 

We’ve put together the below information to help you learn more about how Big and Deep Rivers is being developed. The Godinymayin team are keen to continue documenting our sense of place and community, and invite you to join us in this and future creative projects. 

What is the Big and Deep Rivers project?

In short, it is our effort to celebrate 2023 International Women’s Day with photographs and stories. Here at Godinymayin, we have always worked to celebrate the people, places, and communities of our region. The Big and Deep Rivers project began in this same spirit and then by identifying inspiring and heroic female leaders. We then learned more about their stories, and took a series photographic portraits to become this new gallery exhibition the K Space gallery. And while the exhibition ends on 17 March, the Big and Deep Rivers project will continue as we add more portraits and grow the photographic archives for the future.

Why do this project?

The answer is pretty simple: we think that Katherine has an amazing number of interesting and community-minded women, doing all sorts of work and contributing to the life of our region. We think they are all worth celebrating, not just on International Women’s Day, and we hope that others find as much inspiration as we do! At its heart, this is a community documentary project. 

What do I have to do as a subject?

First, we schedule a short photographic session (either here at Godinymayin or at your location), and then our team do a quick interview in person or over email. Each subject gets a photographic print of their own, and then we add another—along with the short biographical story—to the archives we are building for Katherine Museum. Over the coming decades, the material we create as part of this project will live on in the museum collection for future generations to discover and reflect on. 

What if I am too shy to be photographed?

That’s perfectly fine. But perhaps you know a few extraordinary women in our region and can suggest some who might want to be part of Big and Deep Rivers. You can help Godinymayin by sharing this information and finding others who might become part of this International Women’s Day celebration and archive of our time.

How will Godinymayin use the portraits?

The primary result of this project is the gallery exhibition now on view in the K Space Gallery at Godinymayin, and (a smaller selection of portraits) on view in a temporary community gallery in the Oasis Katherine shopping centre (who have donated a vacant commercial space to support this initiative). The secondary use of the images and stories is as an ongoing archive deposited with the Katherine Museum and held in their collections. We might also use some of the portraits to promote and represent the project as part of our  as International Women’s Day celebrations. 

What if I am not a leader?

What we are really looking for are women of all ages and backgrounds who have unique biographies, lives, occupations—and are doing interesting things in Katherine and the Big Rivers region. Subjects might be business owners, tradespeople, students, educators, or community activists. And while we want to include many well known champions from our community, this project also hopes to find new subjects and stories from wide and diverse backgrounds.

How will this project create a historical archive?

Thanks to the inspiring director of Katherine Museum, Lauren Croft, we’ve formed a partnership to establish an ongoing archive in the museum collection. All of the Big and Deep Rivers portraits and stories will find their way into that and be held for posterity as a time capsule from our times. And as we continue this project after International Women’s Day, the archives and museum collection will grow.  

This sounds really interesting. How do I get involved?

Just let us know, and the Godinymayin Team will do the rest. To be part of Big and Deep Rivers project, or suggest somebody you think might want to be featured, simply contact our project coordinator Tilly Stanier by email — projects@gyracc.org.au.

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Godinymayin Yijard Rivers Arts & Culture Centre’s exhibition and gallery sales are bound by consignment agreements developed with Arts Law Centre of Australia. We follow ethical standards and practices when dealing with Aboriginal art and artists.

For more information, please contact the Centre on (08) 8972 3751 or visit https://indigenousartcode.org/how-to-buy-ethically/.

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