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By 1977, The City of Newcastle became the first council in Australia to fly the Aboriginal flag. Historical momentsįrom the time images of the flag were broadcast around the nation in 1972 a new symbol of Aboriginal identity was born. After years of massacres, slavery and the stolen generations that aimed to assimilate our cultures, the Aboriginal flag became a life raft that helped us find our feet and gave us renewed focus and reaffirmed our identities in a new world that was forced upon us. It was at this time that our cultural survival was hanging by a thread. From that time, we became united under one flag. The Embassy was campaigning for all Aboriginal people and to see those campaigners being attacked was an attack on us all. This brutality actually helped to build a connection to the flag for Aboriginal people who heard the news in other regions. By July of 1972, the Aboriginal flag was flying at the embassy and was later selected as the official flag of the Aboriginal Tent Embassy.ĭuring 1972, the members and supporters of the Aboriginal Tent Embassy were also subjected to brutal treatment from authorities. The embassy also drew in Aboriginal activists from as far away as Arnhem land. The establishment of the Aboriginal Tent Embassy made national and international headlines.
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But In 1972 a political and media storm was brewing after the Aboriginal Tent Embassy was established on January 26th. Spreading the news of the Aboriginal flag to all Aboriginal communities in the early 1970’s would have been next to impossible. The flag that he took eventually reached Canberra but the whereabouts of these flags still remain a mystery. According to Foley, he is not sure if he took the first original Aboriginal flag from Adelaide. After witnessing the symbolic power the flag had on both Aboriginal and non Aboriginal people, land rights activist Gary Foley took the Aboriginal flag to Sydney where he campaigned for the flag to be adopted in Redfern by the Black Caucus. The Aboriginal flag was first flown on the 12th of July 1971 in Adelaide as part of National Aborigines Day. Thomas has stated that all three colours (in ochre form) were consistently prominent among the Indigenous artworks he handled at the South Australian Museum. Thomas also felt it was essential to incorporate black into the flag after witnessing the power the black consciousness movement was having in America. The fact that we walk on the land was another reason why Thomas felt it was appropriate to put black above the red for his design. Yellow – The yellow represents the sun which gives us life.īlack – The black represents our people. Red – The red symbolises the land we walk on and red ochre. The flag consists of a red rectangle which sits below a black rectangle with a yellow circle in the middle. There are only three colours red, yellow and black.
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What do the colours of the Aboriginal flag mean? What do the colours of the Aboriginal flag represent? Those are some of the first questions asked by people learning about Aboriginal culture. But Harold Thomas purposely flipped the colours around to create a feeling of unsettlement. According to Thomas, having a darker colour at the bottom would be more balanced and natural, much like looking at a sunset over the horizon. Putting the black on top of the red was also a deliberate act by Thomas to create an unsettling effect on those who saw it. Thomas was careful to create a flag that all Aboriginal groups could relate to. The Aboriginal flag’s meaning became a source of pride and reinforced our identities as Aboriginal people. The Aboriginal Flag / Proportion 3:5Īlthough the design may appear simplistic, the meaning of the Aboriginal flag and Thomas’s art background helped to create one of the most powerful weapons against the governments assimilation agenda. Over the next few months while working at the Museum of South Australia, Thomas came up with a number of designs but finally (with the help of Gary Foley) chose the current Aboriginal flag. Thomas felt the need for a flag after attending the National Aborigines Day march in 1970 where the Union Jack was flying front and centre. The flag was designed in 1971 by Harold Thomas, a Luritja man from central Australia, who at the time had recently graduated with honours from the South Australian School of Art in 1969. You might be surprised to learn this didn’t happen by accident, but rather by design and perfect timing. To this day the Aboriginal flag provokes both pride and tension within Australian society. The flag has been at the centre of protests and other monumental occasions in recent history. Ever since the Aboriginal flag was first flown publicly in Adelaide’s Victoria Square in 1971, the Aboriginal flag has become arguably the most powerful symbol of resistance within the ongoing fight for land rights and basic human rights.