Baluk Arts and Ramon Martinez Mendoza

TAPPING IDENTITES: The Way We Look Does Not Define Who We Are.

Using the building blocks of societies past and present, bricks and sand, Indigenous and immigrant artists will explore the process of our changing identities in the planned installation of Tapping Identities at Frankston Arts Centre.

Venezuelan artist Ramon Martinez Mendoza has developed this interactive installation alongside Baluk Arts – a Aboriginal community centre of the Frankston, Mornington Peninsula and wider South East Melbourne Region. Ramon and 4 senior members of Baluk Artswill work together to explore the influence of past and present cultural forces constantly morphing our world view.:

Robert Kelly - Wathaurong

Lisa Waup - Knarn Kolak

Douglas Smith - Wiradjuri

Patsy Smith – Taungurung

Where: Glass Cube gallery of the Frankston Arts Centre.

Davey Street, Frankston.

Viewable day and night.

When: 28^th February to 23^th March 2013

How: With one tonne of sand and 5000 bricks of two different clays the artists will build structures that intermingle to represent the interaction of their cultures and changing identities. The exterior Glass Cube will represent our fixed external identity, the way we look, with an ever changing interior. Volunteers and community members can enter the internal space and take part in changing the shape of the installation.

Why are we doing this:

To provide a space for artists and the community to explore their ideas about identity.

To give local Indigenous artists and immigrant artists the opportunity to share with the local community and learn together.

To promote harmony and understanding in our community.

To recognise the changing identities of us all.

To encourage Australian society to see beyond a person’s appearance.

A word from the artist Ramon Martinez Mendoza:

“What happens when a person or a group have been forced to move from their original country or region to live in a different environment? What happens to their role and how do they manage the confusion between who and what they used to be and who and what they are now?

As an immigrant, I came to Australia with specific physical features related to my background. These features are the labels that are glued to my forehead. Wherever I go people ask me: where are you from? This ever-present label marks me, it forms my External Identity, because even if I have improved my communication skills in English and have adapted well to Australian society, I will always have an accent that betrays that I was not born in this country.

Cultural assimilation is a slow process and without any resistance my behaviour has changed consciously and unconsciously and this has created a new identity that is a mixture of my past and my present - my Internal Identity. This identity is flexible and malleable when I am in touch with another group or individual. In this contact with the environment, I evaluate, assimilate and adapt to new rules and values, creating my own identity.

Aboriginal groups from Baluk Arts in the Mornington Peninsula have an external identity. Some of them have dark or white skin. Their features show their background and even though they are Australian they battle between preserving their culture and adapting to the modernity of their country. For this reason, in some point of view they could be considered as foreign in their own country in the same way that I feel in Australia as an immigrant: they ask the same question that I do: Who am I?

Based on this hypothesis, I found similarities between Indigenous Australians and myself in order to develop the concept of this project: We both come from a coastal area, surrounded by sea elements. We fight between two identities at the same time: Australian and Aboriginal, and Australian and Venezuelan. We come from colonised countries and live through a colonization process. We have an external identity that doesn’t change and an internal identity that is changing every day. Finally, we are both human and we are connected to the same planet.”

This project needs your support.

Where the Pledge Money Will Go:

Your financial support will help to fund the employment of Indigenous Artists in this cross cultural and empowering project. Support Indigenous Australian artists to lead the way in addressing the issues of identity in Australia.

Artist Ramon Martinez Mendoza, Baluk Arts, Lacey Bricks and Roofing and Frankston Arts Centre are so close to making this significant cultural project a reality.

Your support will get us across the line!

Baluk Arts is a non-profit Victorian Aboriginal arts organisation based in Mornington owned by Aboriginal artists from Frankston, the Mornington Peninsula and wider south-east Melbourne. Baluk artists are from diverse Aboriginal backgrounds from all over Australia and artworks created reflect themes of identity in a contemporary cultural context.  Link: http://balukarts.org.au/

 Ramon was born in Venezuela on 1977. He has exhibited in countries such as Venezuela, Australia and New York. His work is based on developing communities through art in a peer-to-peer experience with a non-pre-defined outcome. www.ramonmartinezmendoza.com