(Wiradjuri) Dyiramadilinya badhu Wiradjuri. Yuwin ngadhi Glenn Loughrey. I am proud to be Wiradjui and my name is Glenn Loughrey. I grew up around north of the Mudgee in New South Wales around a little town called Ulan, and I am a visual artist I'm passionate about Aboriginality and justice, about being all that I am as an Aboriginal person without the need to be anything else and about justice for our people.

In this country whose land was stolen and and those who've pinched it have no intention to give it back any time soon. So it's about the justice to deal with those, the, the trauma and the implications of losing. What is most precious to you Your country I grew up, as I said, around a little place called you live in New South Wales and my family were a family that didn't identify as Aboriginal, although it was a fairly well known face of information So out of that came a sense of identity crisis for us.

So we never talked about our Aboriginality and it remains that way for some of my family now and that's okay. That's the way the process works. And it was part of the Constitution of peoples identity, so I don't carry it. I've never been initiated into culture I live out of what is in my body and what I've learned from being with my father and I.

Therefore my art doesn't reflect traditional stories, it reflects the experience of people who were exiled from those original stories.

In practice. I think one of the things my father would say when I was a young, young boy on the farm was walk your country. And if you listen carefully, it will tell you what it needs and what you need to do. And above all else, don't make dust and this is what he was saying, was that if you're in touch with your country, which is everything within your universe, and for us as Aboriginal people, that is from horizon to horizon, sky to ground, all the creatures and all the things that are there, you will begin to hear what is required of you as a, as a, as a person, as an Aboriginal person, as a custodial person, and one of the ways that assists me in my art practice is that I approach my canvas as my country and I begin a journey across that canvas with mostly a non preconceived idea simply beginning to put marks on the canvas and seeing where those marks take me. I'm interested in things that are important for Aboriginal people, which is patterns, which is the fact that life is never linear, it is always circular or squiggly and that we don't actually follow straight lines.

We often don't go anywhere but always come back to where we where is the beginning or the of the place that is central to us. So it's about allowing the canvas to discover its own story and tell that story by following with, with the marks and its women. Guyra which is a word in our language, which means to sit, to listen to it, to listen and to hear and then to reflect and react, but not to actually do anything.

And with you, there is no other choice. So I, I sit in that space with my canvas and because of the way I work, it takes three or four months to do a piece. There are a lot of changes and shifts that comes out of that cultural thinking.

I think art is a universal language in all its various forms. And if it's, you know, art is the one thing that can explain life to you and it can explain yourself. And I think it's one of those things that brings people together. Every piece of art speaks its own own truth, but that truth is contextual to the person who's looking at it and relating to it.

So I think it's very important process to bring people together at St Oswald's. We've collaborated and invited a gallery owner to bring an art gallery into the front of the church. It's not our gallery. It belongs to the gallery owner. And that gallery opens up. It's a Aboriginal art gallery, has art from Central Australia, and it's curated to to begin the conversation about stories such as song lines, the Seven Sisters, Water Still Dreaming and all those kind of stories.

And it brings people in. And because it's right on the footpath, that they're in, in High Street, they're Ashburton, St Oswald's people just walk in and have a look and begin the conversation and people from many different backgrounds. And I think it's an important thing that I, I sit in a little space I have at the back where I do my painting and listening to those who are running the gallery, engaging with and telling stories and opening up the possibilities to people who come in.

And it's very exciting to listen to that.