Tracing his Aboriginal relations back 65,000 years, Indigenous artist Archie Moore has drawn on his "connection to place" in his winning entry at a major European art exhibition. Moore designed the Australian pavilion, called "kith and kin" at the Venice Biennale and took out the Golden Lion award for best national contribution. He is the first Australian to take the gong.
"When I went to school there was nothing mentioned about Indigenous history, it was all about the colonial project, agriculture, those kind of things and nothing about my own Indigenous history," he said. Federal Arts Minister Tony Burke said Moore's work showed the power of Australian art and storytelling "going right back to the first sunrise".