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Home  Brisbane Suburbs SouthMusgrave Park Cultural Centre |
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| When did the proposal for the Cultural Centre first come about? |  |
The Aboriginal community of Brisbane has talked and dreamed about such a Centre for many years, and Musgrave Park, South Brisbane, has always been seen as the 'proper' place for it. The first proposal was submitted to State Government in 1985 and, following many years of lobbying the government, Arts Queensland gave their support with the provision of $5 million in 1999, to construct the cultural centre. Construction is due to commence in October 2002 and the Centre is scheduled to open in mid-2003.
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| Why is such as cultural centre important? | |
Cultural Centres can play an important, even developmental role in the life of any community. This is particularly true for an Aboriginal community in Australia today. Given the continuing history of colonisation, the imposed structures, laws, language, and world view, a community Cultural Centre takes on a much greater significance. It can help to provide a community with a strong core, a centre of stability, a place where Aboriginal values are validated and strengthened.
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| How will the Centre benefit the community? | |
The benefits for the wider community are the ability to participate in a broad spectrum of planned Indigenous cultural activities and events. The Centre will not only be a public face of the Murri community but it will also allow the local non-Indigenous community and tourists a focal point where they can gain knowledge about Aboriginal history and culture; view visual and performing arts. It will be a Centre for interaction between the Aboriginal community and broader arts and cultural organisations.
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| What will the Centre mean for the Murri community? | |
It will demonstrate a permanent, enduring stake in the park; it will celebrate the history and survival of people and culture (in the Park and elsewhere); it will show respect for the values and ways of relating that shape Aboriginal culture; it will honour those who have gone before; it will bring Aboriginal people together; and it will provide a strong basis from which to share Aboriginal culture, heritage and history with the broader community.
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| Why is Musgrave Park significant to the Murri community? | |
Musgrave Park 'is the proper place'. It is a place of national significance to Brisbane's Murri community as an Aboriginal place: a place that symbolises and integrates traditional and contemporary aspects of Aboriginal culture and from which people draw strength, spiritual connections, and community.
"It was ceremonial land ... a place of spirit memories."
Paddy Jerome
"...it's sacred to us - that's where our people died."
Aunty Jane Arnold
Murri people speak of the many layers of history and meaning contained in Musgrave Park for them. First, it is a Murri place, widely acknowledged by Aboriginal people from throughout Australia, and by the non-Aboriginal community of Brisbane (and perhaps further afield). Musgrave Park has always been a Murri place: its place in community life is without beginning and end. As a traditional place, Musgrave Park is recalled as a place of ritual, ceremony, dispute resolution. As a Murri place, it has continued to serve the community as a place of contact, meeting, exchange, celebration, commemoration and struggle.
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