This work is from a series centred around the Chinese proverb “to hold a book in one’s hand is to hold a house of gold” in which the artist positions himself within sites of colonial power. Set within the National Wool Museum gallery, the artist references the pose of an exhausted shearer after a long day of arduous labour. However he is reclining while reading The Fire Stick by Wulla Merrii, a novel set against the 1891 Queensland Shearer’s Strike, questioning cultural stereotypes and how they pertain to concepts of work and leisure. Dressed in sub fusc, his official uniform as an Oxford scholar, Thompson is a defiant intellectual challenging past and continued misperceptions of First Nations people, while embracing both the intersections of his identity and his ancestral heritage. Dr Christian Thompson AO is a Bidjara man of the Kunja Nation with Irish and Chinese heritage. His practice spans across video, photography, sculpture, textiles, performance and sound, evolving through a process of auto – ethnography. While employing various modes of research, he connects his own experience to larger social, political, cultural meanings and understandings. His doctoral research and art practice has had a critical impact on International and Australian art, making global history as one of the first Australian Indigenous students at Oxford University. In 2018 he was made an Officer of the Order of Australia for distinguished services to the visual arts and as a role model to young indigenous artists in the Queen’s Birthday honours list.Framed photograph showing a man dressed in an academic gown, laying on their back holding a book. The setting is a reconstructed shearing shed, inside the galleries of the National Wool Museum.dr christian thompson, first nations, artwork, photography, oxford, heritage, national wool museum

Typed notes mentioning the history of the Hepburn Family and Margaret Cotton McLachlan coming by sailing ship to Australia to marry her fiance who was a miner in Sandhurst and extracts from the diary of William Thompson.document, names of bendigo pioneers, bendigo historical society, settlers under sail, alexander hepburn stone, loch ard centenary commemoration committee, professor j. j. auchmuty, mr don charlwood, andrew hepburn, james hepburn, mary queen of scots, black bothwell, captain hepburn, the 'hope', george b crow, george baker, the 'marlbro', archives department of the latrobe library, mr loman, the 'david clarke', captain hepburn of the royal scots, sir john hepburn, mr howard hepburn, victoria reef lease no 60, ebenezer neill, becker, stirton, margaret cotton mclachlan, ina hepburn, the 'donald mckay', black ball line, james baines and company of liverpool, onedin line, passenger contract ticket, james mclauchlan, christian ferguson, robert miller, william thompson, mr stanwin, the 'shomberg', itchell and son, the 'dunbar', margaret stirton, canon horace stirton, dr james nish, p pentreath, jane pentreath, st andrew's presbyterian church sandhurst, james hepburn, corporate high school, bendigo high school, iron bark school of john rae, rae's hill school, mr john rae, rae anderson, bendigo branch of the royal historical society of victoria, victoria reef mine, 'gourdie farm', mr howard hepburn, john fortey, margaret cotton hepburn