Summary

Digital photograph depicting Aunty Jennine Armistead watering her garden at home in Frankston during the COVID-19 pandemic. This photograph was taken by Museums Victoria curator Catherine Forge after interviewing Aunty Jennine, along with Uncle Peter Aldenhoven and Anne Benton, about their experience of the COVID-19 pandemic and their involvement with the Willum Warrain Aboriginal Association.

For Aunty Jennine, gardening was an important way that she remained connected to her community, her neighbourhood and her ancestry during COVID-19 lockdowns. During this time Aunty Jennine started to give away plant cuttings, plants and weaved baskets to her neighbours and passers-by via a pink bookshelf that she placed on her front street. Giving away plants and baskets to strangers was, for Aunty Jennine, a way to lift community spirits, practice kindness and honour of own personal ancestry and story. 'In our culture, sharing is very important', she reflected in the interview: 'In the Indigenous culture, you share. And you must share.'

Aunty Jennine Armistead, a proud Yaran woman from the Padthaway region in South Australia, lived in Tennant Creek and Darwin before moving to Victoria later in life upon meeting and marrying her husband. In the interview she described feeling like a 'lost soul' until she discovered Willum Warrain Aboriginal Association: 'I'd been lost for a long time, not belonging anywhere, having been taken out of the desert and brought down here. And walking in through Willum Warrain gates, it was like, Thank god I'm home. I automatically had a sense of belonging.'

Willum Warrain, which translates to "home by the sea" in the Boon Wurrung language by Westernport, is an Aboriginal Community-controlled organisation that provides a safe cultural space for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people on the Mornington Peninsula. It officially opened in 2014, but had been in the works under various other names and operations since the late eighties. With over 450 Aboriginal members as at December 2020, it provides a range of programs for its Aboriginal community members, including a Women's group, a Men's group, a Deadly Kids group, a Bush Play group (for younger kids and toddlers) a Gardening group (open to non-Indigenous members as well) and a Welcome to Country ceremony for babies.

During COVID-19, Willum Warrain was forced to close its' gates and discontinue on-site activities, however the community remained connected via Zoom, phone and community activities such as the provision of food and medicine deliveries to Elders. Aunty Jennine Armistead, an Elder and respected community member within Willam Warrain, continued to connect with her community via gardening, cooking, sharing gifts, checking in on friends and neighbours and forging new relationships with people she met in her neighbourhood whilst exchanging plant cuttings and weaved baskets.

Physical Description

Born digital photograph, TIFF format.

Significance

This is one of a series photographs that were taken by curator Catherine Forge to document the story of Aunty Jennine Armistead and her wider connection to the Willum Warrain Aboriginal Association during COVID-19. These photographs are accompanied by an oral history interview and several items that were donated by Aunty Jennine Armistead including: 2 x handwoven baskets, a handwritten diary entry and a Willum Warrain 'Black and Deadly' T-Shirt. These were all collected with support from the Office for Suburban Development for the Museums in My Neighbourhood Project and digital exhibition, and now form part of Museums Victoria's Collecting the Curve: COVID-19 Pandemic Collection.

This collection of Willum Warrain items represent a wide range of COVID-19 related storylines including: daily life during lockdown, local neighbourhood connections, gardening, kindness and gift giving, and the emergence of new neighbourhood traditions. These items also symbolise and reflect a deeper story of First Peoples cultural knowledge and community connection, including storylines around truth telling, Stolen Generations, resilience, solidarity and intergenerational cultural exchange. These items will provide a lasting reminder of the community support activities of Willum Warrain members during COVID-19, as well as the importance of place, connection to Country and the vital role of First Peoples cultural knowledge and customs during the COVID-19 pandemic, and always.

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