Designing for Decolonisation

MPavilion’s seventh annual BLAKitecture forum aims to centralise Indigenous voices in conversations about architecture, the representation of histories, and the present and future states of our built environments. For MPavilion 10, BLAKitecture is curated by MPavilion’s program consultant Bradley Kerr.

This BLAKitecture series explores the purposeful ignorance towards the architecture of Country that informed Terra Nullius. First Peoples’ sophisticated understanding of place, of narrative landscapes and mnemonic memory through song, dance and story telling were ignored, dismissed and First Peoples were dispossessed. Landscapes that supported First Peoples since time immemorial made way for colonial farming, First Peoples movement paths – following the land – were straightened, Cadastral plans restricted access to Country. Cities turned their backs to rivers, using them as dumping grounds.

BLAKitecture for MPavilion 10 will focus on the custodial relationship to Country as a means of furthering the conversation around First Peoples rights and perspectives around the impact we have to the built environment. Waterways are living ecosystems, with rights and agency. There are existing architectural vernaculars that relate to material, climate, sun, wind, seasonality etc and the Architecture of Country is embedded with memory, with traditional knowledge and fundamentally based on Care.

Event 1: bloodlines of country

Wurundjeri Traditional Owner understanding of water systems are underpinned by the knowledge that these bodies are the Bloodlines of Country.  When we treat our body poorly, we suffer. When we treat our rivers and water systems poorly, our ecology and ecosystems suffer. Bloodlines of Country will explore the agency and personhood rights of water bodies, as living ecosystems, and explore how these ideas can inform culturally responsive design and urban planning.

Collaborator:

Bradley Kerr is a Quandamooka man and an architect living, working and learning on Wurundjeri Country. Bradley is Director of design studio Winsor Kerr, a member of the Australian Institute of Architects’ First Nations Advisory Working Group, Victoria Chapter Council, the AACA’s Accreditation Standing Panel and the 2023 Australian Architecture Conference Committee.

Blakitecture was created by Sarah Lynn Rees with MPavilion until last season.