Come along to the official launch of No Longer a Wandering Spirit - Family and kin reclaiming the memory of Minang woman Bessy Flowers by Dr Sharon Huebner & Ezzard Flowers on April 5.
The book launch will feature talks from authors Dr Sharon Huebner and Ezzard Flowers, and Yokai Founder Jim Morrison.
Key details:
- Wednesday April 5 2023
- 4.30pm to 6.30pm (Guests to arrive at 3.50pm for refreshments & snack)
- Albany Entertainment Centre, 2 Toll Place (off Princess Royal Drive) Albany, Western Australia
- Free Event - registration essential via Eventbrite
‘Bessy Flowers is a hero of mine, and I’m very glad she’s at the centre of a book that features her images and writing, along with the remarkable journey to situate her in family and Country’ - Kim Scott
In June 1867, Bessy Flowers was sent away from Minang Country, never to return.
She was a young woman, educated, musical, confident and hopeful.
Bessy was educated at Annesfield in Albany, showing strong aptitude in writing, reading and the piano. She became a teacher herself.
But like generations of Aboriginal children to follow, Bessy was separated from those she cared for and often longed for home.
Often and often my thoughts fly to Albany she wrote from a Mission in Victoria on August 16 1867.
More than ten years in the making No Longer a Wandering Spirit is a remarkable story that offers a unique insight into Aboriginal connections between family and country and the harm when this contact is lost.
Readers are invited to follow Bessy’s family from both sides of the country as they unite and fulfil on their own terms Bessy’s spiritual return home.
‘This is a story told through the experience and emotions of my family. It’s our journey of reconnecting and of discovering a stronger sense of who we are’ – Ezzard Flowers
Order your copy of No longer a wandering spirit here.
No Longer a Wandering Spirit - Family and kin reclaiming the memory of Minang woman Bessy Flowers by Dr Sharon Huebner & Ezzard Flowers is proudly published by UWA Publishing for the Charles and Joy Staples South West Region Publications Fund.
ABOUT THE AUTHORS
Dr Sharon Huebner is a multi-disciplinary academic in the complex spaces of relational collaborations, politics of agency, applied ethics and Indigenous principles, practices and governance. She is a recipient of an Australian Research Council (ARC), Discovery Early Career Researcher Award (DECRA) at the Australian National University and holds a PhD from Monash University, Australia, 2016. Sharon is a cross media artist and the co-writer and director of the short film No Longer a Wandering Spirit – Imaginaries of Bessy Flowers (2016) – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l1dAynpp9R4&t=100s
Ezzard Flowers is a Goreng/Wirlomin man who also has connections into Minang country of the Great Southern region of Western Australia. He was born on the United Aborigines Mission Gnowangerup in 1958.
In 2015 Ezzard was awarded the John Curtin Medal at Curtin University in Western Australia. This award acknowledged Ezzard’s contribution to the “Koorah Coolingah” (Children Long Time Ago) exhibition, a major arts project held in the regional town of Katanning in the Great Southern of Western Australia, which showcased a collection of Children’s drawings, the Herbert A. Meyer Collection that had been discovered at Colgate University, in Hamilton, New York.
Ezzard is an ambassador for the Badjebup Aboriginal Corporation and senior cultural advisor to the John Curtin Gallery. Ezzard is also an advisor of the Cultural Elders Reference Group to the Wirlomin Stories and Language Project, and an important contributor to the Dwoort Baal Kaat Songlines Project, and the Songlines and Sustainability Project.
Ezzard co-developed the script for No Longer a Wandering Spirit—Imaginaries of Bessy Flowers (2016) and is the short film’s narrator.
