Contemporary Australia: Women

69 Then came Peter to him, and said, ‘Lord, how oft shall my brother sin against me, and I forgive him? till seven times?’ Jesus saith unto him, ‘I say not unto thee, Until seven times: but, Until seventy times seven.’ 1 Bindi Cole is a Melbourne-based artist of Wathaurung heritage who has often examined perceptions of identity in her works, particularly in her ‘Not Really Aboriginal’ 2008 series, in which she and members of her family posed in ‘blackface’, as a response to them looking ‘not really Aboriginal’ to others. 2 More recently, Cole’s focus has shifted from the politics of the superficial to a more introspective examination of the spiritual. Forgiveness is a deeply personal act. It is one of humankind’s most powerful tools, and one of the most difficult to wield. Cole began working with the idea of forgiveness in the video work Seventy times seven 2011 in which members of the Aboriginal community stare directly into the camera chanting, ‘I forgive you’. As they repeat these words, their focus turns inwards: they find within themselves the sources of their hurt and the reasons for its forgiveness. The camera stays with them until there is a ‘shift’ — frowns turn to smiles, then to tears — as each begins to free themselves of their internalised pain. The title of the work, Seventy times seven is taken from Matthew 18: it is the number of times Jesus says that one should forgive their brothers’ and sisters’ sins. For Cole, forgiveness is ‘the key to re-empowerment in life. It has been a huge tool for me in coming to a place of wholeness and the antidote to the resentment I had been feeling.’ 3 She has continued to explore forgiveness in her latest work, I forgive you 2012, which sees the words spelt out in large-scale bold lettering. The statement is multi-layered, reflecting on the role of forgiveness in contemporary Australian and Aboriginal society, and can be interpreted in many ways depending on the context in which it is read. I forgive you speaks about Cole’s personal trials. Due to her mixed heritage and lighter skin, she is often questioned over her Aboriginal identity. The most notable case of this made national news when conservative commentator Andrew Bolt penned a series of articles for the Herald Sun and Weekly Times and the Herald Sun blog, for which he was later found guilty of breaching the Racial Discrimination Act . In them, he criticised Cole and other ‘light-skinned Aborigines’ for ‘choosing to’ identify themselves as Aborigines, saying that they did so only for political reasons or personal gain in the arts and Aboriginal industries. Bolt singled out Cole, asserting that she had a ‘distressingly white face’. 4 He argued that she, and others, could not be Aboriginal, for they were neither dark-skinned, nor ‘victims’. 5 Through her powerful statement, Cole declares that Aboriginal people need not feel like victims, and that, for her, forgiveness was key to overcoming the hurt caused by the ignorant misgivings of those Australians with little understanding of colonisation’s legacy on Aboriginal peoples. Forgiveness for Cole is driven by exploring and reconciling incidents from her youth. At home, she encountered neglect and abuse; according to the artist, her mother was a heroin addict, a stripper and a prostitute, leaving in her wake a crushing legacy of self‑destructive behavior. But Cole learnt that forgiveness was necessary to personal fulfillment. 6 It was her most effective tool for moving on and for her ability to survive. I’d found myself in a place where I was a really broken and damaged person — that was manifesting itself in all these self-destructive ways. I had to go through a process of healing and a huge part of that healing was around forgiveness . . . As I forgave I was able to take my power back. I feel like there’s a real power in this that’s . . . unseen but it’s there. 7 In an Aboriginal context, the idea of forgiveness can be connected to the reconciliation movement, particularly in the wake of the Australian Government’s Apology to Australia’s Indigenous Peoples, with specific reference to the Stolen Generations, in 2008. 8 Cole’s Grandmother was a member of the Stolen Generations and I forgive you also appears as a personal response to the apology for past policies that directly affected her family and consequently, Bindi herself. Bindi Cole Australia b.1975 Wathaurung people I forgive you (detail) 2012 Emu feathers on MDF board 100 x 1000cm Bindi Cole Bindi Cole I forgive you