Exhibition dedicated to Lugger Bort life opens at Tanks

BY CHRISTINE HOWES

Lugger Bort, curated by Nerelle Nicol, opened at the Tanks Arts Centre in Cairns last weekend, as a previewed satellite exhibition of the forthcoming Cairns Indigenous Art Fair (CIAF).

The exhibition was dedicated to the seafaring lives of Aboriginal, Torres Strait and South Sea Islanders who lived aboard “pearl luggers” to work the pearling, beche-de-mer and trochus industries from the 1840s to the mid-1900s.

Nerelle said the past 18 months of putting together the exhibition had been very intense.

“But it’s also been good to bring something like this,” she said. “The way I set up my process was to try to identify and bring people, mainly old men, coming together and talking, which was really good for their health and wellbeing too.

“It was always really lovely sitting in their company and watching them reminisce and talk abut situations and bring back memories about certain things, and laugh.

“I really enjoyed that, and I tried to get a few young people into it too, which has been good, it gives them the opportunity to listen and hear directly to their old people.”

Jeffrey (Jeff) Bob and George Mosby from the central Torres Strait Islands took part in the process of putting the exhibition together.

Both started work in the pearling and trochus industries as teenagers aboard lugger vessels, of which there were around 100, during the late 1950s and 60s.

Jeff was a diver’s lifeline who operated from a tender and signalled to the divers using a rope for around 10 years.

George started work as a cook on his father’s vessel at the age of 15 before becoming a deckhand and engineer.

“I think what they’ve come to realise is that people are interested in their story but, more importantly, that someone is hearing them,” Nerelle said.

“With the exhibition, they had told their stories, but they weren’t familiar with the way it’s put together, so I think they may have been a bit overwhelmed.

“When we went out the back to where we have an impression of a diver, they just stood and looked at it, and they were really quiet.

“I think it took them back into that space.

“We also had a smokehouse that was built by some Meriam men, and they were very impressed with the way that structure was built.

“The whole exhibition was brought together thanks to CIAF, of course, and the Healing Foundation, the National Library and the Queensland State Archives, the Cairns Museum and Historical Society, and in-kind contributions from the Gab Titui Cultural Centre, as well as the many creatives who have given of themselves to see this exhibition come to life

“It really was a community collaboration.”

Lugger Bort will be officially launched at 4pm on Friday 14 July featuring a dance team from Tagai Secondary College.

Lugger Bort is open from 24 June to 23 July from 9am to 4.30pm on weekdays and 10am to 2pm, at weekends