Celebrate and Buy Indigenous Art in Sydney This Weekend

It’s a long way from Australia’s remote regions to the Overseas Passenger Terminal at Circular Quay. But thanks to Blak Markets, the social enterprise arm of Sydney-based First Hand Solutions, the Terminal is the site of this year’s National Indigenous NAIDOC Art Fair on Saturday June 30 and Sunday July 1.

The art fair will kick off NAIDOC Week celebrations in Sydney, a celebration of dance, art, food and lifestyle that runs from July 8 to 15. “We've got 22 remote art centres selling alongside 30 local stallholders,” says CEO of First Hand Solutions, Peter Cooley. “While the art centres mainly focus on selling art and craft and running art workshops, our local stallholders sell everything from jewellery to body products to bushfood herbs and spices as well as mouth-watering food with a bushfood twist.”

Alongside the artwork, Blak Markets have pooled a formidable collection of talent to appear at the market, including entertainment from Indigenous folk band Stiff Gins and RnB singer Mi-kaisha, dancers from the Redfern Dance Company and the Wagana Aboriginal Dancers, and bush food cooking demonstrations from Ularai/Barkandji woman Jody Orcher.

Set up four years ago to provide economic development opportunities for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people interested in setting up a business, Blak Markets operate eight times a year at various locations around Sydney. As well as host art fairs, the market trains and employs young Aboriginal people in barista, retail, food preparation and supervision, who work in the charities pop up coffee, food and retail stores at the markets.

Cooley says the art fair at Circular Quay will be “a rare opportunity for Sydney-siders to buy high-quality Aboriginal art directly from a diverse range of artists from remote art centres across Australia.” More importantly, buyers are guaranteed authenticity, “which is crucial,” he says. “You can buy anything from a beautiful painting to a hand-woven goanna to a kangaroo burger.”

The fair is part of the Heart in Art program, which was established to provide remote artists the same opportunity to come and learn from the marketplace. The debut market last year, a one-day event held at Barangaroo, attracted 10,000 visitors and generated almost $250,000 in sales for the local stallholders and 11 remote art centres that took part. Cooley hopes to see 20,000 art enthusiasts walk through the doors in 2018.

Anyone looking for Cooley over the two-day event might find him taking a break by the water. “I have been known to throw a fishing line under the Harbour Bridge,” he laughs.

The National Indigenous NAIDOC Art Fair is on Saturday June 30 and Sunday July 1, 2018 from 10am–5pm at the Overseas Passenger Terminal, 130 Argyle St, The Rocks.

For more NAIDOC week events, try NAIDOC in the City - a free celebration of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander cultures, held in Hyde Park on Saturday July 14. For more information on the histories of Sydney's Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities, check out the Barani website.

This article is produced by Broadsheet in partnership with City of Sydney. Follow and use the hashtag #sydneylocal on Instagram for more local secrets.