The 10th Asia Pacific Triennial of Contemporary Art (APT10) Catalogue

Artists The 10th Asia Pacific Triennial of Contemporary Art 96 Grace Lillian Lee, Ken Thaiday Snr and Allan George Lee working on Suggoo Pennise 2021 in Cairns / Photographs: Henri van Noordenburg Grace Lillian Lee and Ken Thaiday Snr / Photographs: Henri van Noordenburg ‘Sit down here and I’ll show you something.’ On their very first meeting, this is how Dr Ken Thaiday Snr, one of the most venerated artists of the Torres Strait, welcomed Grace Lillian Lee into his Gimuy (Cairns) studio space. There, they got straight to work — Thaiday sharing his weaving skills with Lee, an artist some 38 years his junior, including the traditional ‘grasshopper’ technique that would soon become a crucial part of Lee’s practice. It was a three-hour weaving session —Thaiday recalls, ‘She’d done so good, I said to her, “My dear, one day you’re gonna be like me”’. 1 Since this meeting, Lee’s artistic practice has centred around weaving, particularly the creation of sculptural body adornments. Thaiday’s own career began with the creation of dance costumes — elaborate articulated headdresses and dance masks designed to be mobilised through performance. ‘He’s an incredible inspiration to me and my work’, Lee remarks. ‘Uncle Ken always encouraged me to create more pieces on the body', to be worn and activated against the skin. ‘Now, today, we come together’, says Thaiday. ‘We collaborate … do our work together.' ‘This is really exciting and special for both of us, but especially for me’, says Lee. ‘To be able to learn from Uncle Ken and to have our work stand together is going be really powerful — something I’ll never forget.’ The new collaborative work Lee and Thaiday have created for APT10 takes the form of an oversized, kinetic sculpture that combines and enhances both artists' respective practices. Standing at over three metres high, Suggoo Pennise 2021 is a uniquely created Dhari (headdress). Says Thaiday: ‘No one has this Dhari headdress, [it's the] one and only Dhari headdress for Grace’. Adorned with designs that represent the fish traps on Erub (Darnley) Island and the beizam (Torres Strait Creole for tiger shark, a significant totem of the Meriam Clan) jaw motif, Suggoo Pennise contemporises the traditional form of the Dhari , historically worn by Torres Strait warriors in battle. It is a potent symbol of the Torres Strait Island people, appearing on their flag today as an enduring sign of peace and harmony. ‘It’s going to spin around so good like this, changing the colour’, says Thaiday. The brightly coloured woodcarving designs of the Dhari are revealed as it rotates around Lee’s central woven body sculpture, using her signature ‘grasshopper’ double weave evolved from the technique Thaiday first taught her. The sculpture represents a blue-ringed octopus, explains Lee: ‘Uncle Ken talks about my weaves being a representation of the octopus and how you can find them within the fish trap’. The octopus has many layers of relational significance — its form embodies Malo- Bomai spirituality, which recognises the unification of the eight clans of Mer and the establishment of laws of the land and water by heroic beings, Malo and Bomai. Both artists agree this is a special moment in their careers. ‘This piece is really an embodiment of our ideas coming together,’ says Lee, ‘and the beauty of sculpture and body and form, but also just a really beautiful celebration of our culture and our identity. Is that right, Uncle Ken?’ ‘Yes, thank you Grace,’ says Thaiday. ‘I’m so excited, I’m so excited … You’re gonna have goosebumps.' Sophia Sambono Endnotes 1 All quotes sourced from a conversation between Grace Lillian Lee and Ken Thaiday Snr, Gimuy (Cairns), 14 May 2021. Grace Lillian Lee Meriam Mir people Born 1988, Cairns, Australia Lives and works in Cairns Ken Thaiday Snr Meriam Mir people Born 1950, Erub (Darnley) Island, Australia Lives and works in Cairns, Australia