Bio
Dr Julie Gough is an artist, writer and curator, First People’s Art and Culture, at the Tasmanian Museum and Art Gallery (TMAG), Australia. Gough’s multi-media art works often reveal and re-present conflicting and subsumed histories, legacies and impacts of colonization, sometimes referring to her family’s experiences as Tasmanian Aboriginal people. Her Briggs-Johnson-Gower family have lived in the Latrobe region of Lutruwita (Tasmania) since the 1840s, with Tebrikunna in north east Lutruwita their Traditional, Trawlwoolway, Country. Gough has exhibited in more than 200 exhibitions in Australia since 1994, including Shadow Spirit (2023), Biennale of Sydney (2022, 2006), Tarnanthi (2021, 2017), Adelaide Biennial (2018, 1998), Eucalyptusdom, Tense Past, Defying Empire, The National, With Secrecy and Despatch, Undisclosed, Clemenger Award, Liverpool Biennial, UK (2001), Perspecta (AGNSW, 1995). During November-December 2025 Gough is undertaking a Creative Fellowship at the National Library of Australia focussing on colonial maps, art and manuscripts from Van Diemen’s Land.
Fire with Fire
Dr Julie Gough
25 Sept. 1829, Colonial Secretary’s Office, Van Diemen’s Land
Memorandum: Immediate and urgent. Notify ordnance storekeeper to supply 150 slop jackets to 63rd Regiment. Supplies: tomahawks, blankets, Slop jackets &c to be sent to Oatlands including 2000 rounds of ball cartridges, 500 rounds to Bothwell, and New Norfolk: 500 rounds. To Chief Magistrate with Ticket of Leave men: 75 stands of arms without bayonets, 500 rounds, flints and tomahawks.
Tasmanian Archives: CSO 1-7578-317 (vol. 2), p.194
The work of a historian is to consistently, calmly, dredge and resurface what has sunk or been buried beyond sightlines, to theorise what happened then, and how it presents now. History is also the ground I tread to seek material to decipher and represent, to attempt to understand, in particular, the lives of my Tasmanian Aboriginal Ancestors, and family to this day, enmeshed in colonial policy and practices. A visual artist is not bound to such predetermined, expected modes of practice. Consistency and calmness are not how I navigate nor manage my processes for developing new work - rather, much energy is sustained from fury, driven by a desire for justice. Beset by an incapacity to otherwise express the interconnections between what is found, about what occurred, and how significantly this ‘history’ continues to impact the First People of this continent, art is my medium.
Dr Lesley Fitzpatrick is a painter who loves playing with ideas and colour, and reflecting on, and musing about our world.
Lesley’s art practice has developed since her retirement from paid employment. When she was a child she enjoyed painting and remember putting some of my works into the local agricultural show, winning several prizes which was surprising and encouraging.
Lesley enjoyed art lessons during her school years but once life was defined by parenting, earning a living and home making, there was no time for painting . At one time she took time off work and did an introductory program in drawing, painting and printmaking. She has participated in a couple of short courses run by a local artist but Lesley is primarily self-taught.
Lesley works at her easel each day and enjoys the experience of exploring ideas through art.
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