Oceanic Art Society Forum XIV

Name: Oceanic Art Society Forum XIV
Start: 2026-11-14T00:00:00+11:00
End: 2026-11-14T23:59:59+11:00
Location: Burrinja Cultural Centre, Upwey, Victoria

November 14

The Oceanic Art Society will hold its Fourteenth Forum on Saturday 14 November 2026, in conjunction with the opening of Billy Missi’n Wakain Thamai. This national touring exhibition is presented by NorthSite Contemporary Arts in partnership with the Torres Strait Regional Authority’s Gab Titui Cultural Centre (TSRA), and toured by Museums & Galleries Queensland.

Forum at a glance

Theme: Art and Material Culture of the Torres Strait Islands
Date: Saturday 14 November 2026
Venue: Burrinja Cultural Centre, 351 Glenfern Road, Upwey, Victoria

Book your Forum ticket

Forum dinner

Saturday 14 November 2026, 7:00–10:00 pm
Holiday Inn Bistro, Dandenong, Victoria

Continue the conversation after the Forum and share stories from the day over a two-course meal (entrée and main), with a complimentary drink and nibbles on arrival. The dinner will also feature an auction of Oceanic art objects.

Book your Forum dinner ticket

Forum raffle

Raffle tickets are on sale now. This important fundraiser helps cover the cost of providing speakers and amenities at the OAS Forum, highlighting Torres Strait Islands arts and culture.

Ramu River mask, first prize in the Oceanic Art Society Forum XIV raffle — **First prize:** Ramu River mask, personal spirit name *Rikirmung Rempagian*, Sepik Region, Papua New Guinea. Ancient patina with bite stick showing multiple signs of use; old collection number CH256 and spirit names written in pencil on the reverse. 50 × 17 cm. Ex Richard Aldridge; collected at Nimnim Village, November 2004.

$2,000 Mark Blackburn Art gift voucher, second prize in the OAS Forum XIV raffle — **Second prize:** A $2,000 gift voucher for Mark Blackburn Art.

War Art and Ritual: Shields From the Pacific, third prize in the OAS Forum XIV raffle — **Third prize:** *War Art and Ritual: Shields From the Pacific*, two volumes by William Nathaniel Evans.

Buy Forum raffle tickets

Accommodation discounts

Two Dandenong hotels have offered discounts to OAS Forum attendees.

Holiday Inn Dandenong

Book the 20% partner rate.

When booking through the link, choose room only. Breakfast normally costs about $34; guests who add breakfast at check-in will receive the special group rate of $20.

Quest Dandenong Central

Book at Quest Dandenong Central and enter promo code QDCNOV15BB under “Have a promo or corporate code?”

Select dates between 11 and 17 November 2026.
Select your preferred room. The rate should default to “Aarons Group NOV”.
Breakfast is included and is served in the restaurant next door on the ground floor.
For a longer stay or an earlier arrival, email Aaron Rooke at [email protected] to have the discount extended.

Keynote speakers

Dr Leah Lui-Chivizhe

Dr Leah Lui-Chivizhe is a cultural historian of the Torres Strait Islands and a Scientia Senior Lecturer and researcher at UNSW. Her current research explores how nineteenth-century collections from the region can revitalise and reconnect Islanders with pre-colonial histories of human and more-than-human relations, and contribute to decolonising practices in collecting institutions. Her book, Masked Histories: Turtle Shell Masks and Torres Strait Islander People (2022), was highly commended for Australian History in the 2023 NSW Premier’s History Awards.

Meriam koskir: objects, stories and knowledge

Leah will reflect on her collaborative work with Aunty Elsa Day on “Meriam koskir: turdi a pe uridli” for Fault Lines: Imagining Indigenous Futures for Colonial Collections, held in 2024–2025 at the Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology, University of Cambridge.

Professor Ian McNiven

Professor Ian McNiven is Research Professor of Indigenous Archaeology at the Monash Indigenous Studies Centre and a Chief Investigator with the ARC Centre of Excellence for Indigenous and Environmental Histories and Futures. He has undertaken anthropologically informed archaeological research in collaboration with numerous Torres Strait Islander communities for 30 years. He is passionate about Aboriginal and Melanesian material culture and how ethnographic objects can help us understand the deep past.

Framing the history of Torres Strait art

The historical development of European artistic traditions is well understood and critical to the appreciation of associated artworks. But what do we know about the long-term historical development of Indigenous artistic traditions? How do we frame such histories in the absence of textual records? This presentation explores how museum ethnographic objects and archaeological evidence can help us understand the development of Torres Strait artistic traditions over the past 1,000 years.

Dr Jude Philp

Dr Jude Philp is Senior Curator of the Macleay Collections at the Chau Chak Wing Museum, University of Sydney. Her education from people in Zenadth Kes formed part of her PhD in social anthropology. With Anita Herle, she edited Recording Kastom (Sydney University Press, 2020), a publication of Haddon’s field diaries.

Art/History/Life: the collections of A. C. Haddon in Torres Strait

Haddon worked with the peoples of Zenadth Kes between 1888 and the 1930s. During his major fieldwork in 1888 and 1898, he collected thousands of Islanders’ belongings, commissioned objects he could not purchase and took hundreds of photographs. Stored mainly within the British Museum and the University of Cambridge’s Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology, these belongings hold stories old and new, some personal and some public. This talk focuses on the public side of the collection and the Islanders who worked closely with Haddon.

Daniel Dow

Daniel Dow is from the Komet and Peibre Tribes of Mer, Murray Island group (Kemer Kemer Meriam), and is Project Officer for the Repatriation Project at the Queensland Museum.

What’s so Secret about the Sacred?

In story and song, Daniel sheds light on some of the more mysterious aspects of working with First Nations cultural material. Gain an understanding of the spiritual challenges First Nations teams face in their work and how you can support them.

Theo Tremblay

Theo Tremblay is a master printmaker from Cairns and a pioneer of collaborative printmaking and publishing. He has mentored Aboriginal and Zenadth Kes artists in a range of print techniques over many years. After studying at the Boston Museum School, he continued his printmaking studies at the Ruskin School at Oxford University, Prahran CAE in Melbourne and the College of Fine Arts at UNSW. In 1977 he co-founded the Australian Print Workshop in Melbourne. From 1981 to 1991 he taught drawing and lithography at the Institute of the Arts in Canberra, and established No Fixed Press, printing collaboratively with artists since that time.

Going South, Looking North: Tracking Contemporary Zenadth Kes Printmaking

Theo will provide a historical overview of the evolution of contemporary printmaking as a major movement in northern Queensland from the mid-1970s to the present, examining its current scale and complexity as well as its successes, weaknesses, opportunities and threats.

Adrian Newstead

Adrian Newstead is one of Australia’s most respected authorities on Aboriginal art. He is President of the Aboriginal Art Association of Australia and has been a leading advocate for Indigenous artists and culture for more than four decades. He is a former President of the Art Consulting Association of Australia, a former Director of Aboriginal Tourism Australia and a founding member of Austrade’s Visual Art Export Panel. The author of The Dealer is the Devil: An Insider’s History of the Aboriginal Art Trade, he has written extensively on the Aboriginal art market and Indigenous cultural affairs.

The Genesis of the Contemporary Torres Strait Island Printmaking Movement

Drawing on his first involvement with regional art programs in Cairns in the mid-1980s, Adrian will discuss the initial funding of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander printmaking and the empowerment of pioneers including Dennis Nona, Alick Tipoti, Billy Missi, David Bosun and Victor Motlop. He will consider how artists preserve culture through the ancient tradition of incised mark-making in turtle shell, wood, pumice and stone, carried into contemporary printmaking. Adrian purchased the first printing press in the Torres Strait, used by Billy Missi and others in the Kubin community on Moa Island. He also initiated the Australian Art Print Network and helped art centres including Moa Arts develop business plans. In 2009 he helped revive the careers of Ken Thaiday Snr and other Far North Queensland and Torres Strait Islander artists by initiating and funding Canopy Arts, the multidisciplinary art and printmaking studios in Cairns.

Film, exhibition opening and cultural program

Waku – Minaral A Minalay

A 10-minute screening of David Bridie’s film about Christine Anu and the production of her 2024–2026 project, Waku – Minaral A Minalay, her first original album in 20 years. The project follows their collaboration on her iconic 1995 debut, Stylin’ Up.

Billy Missi’n Wakain Thamai — official exhibition opening

The exhibition honours the late Torres Strait Islander artist Billy Missi (1970–2012), born on Mabuiag Island and deeply influenced by the storytelling, song and dance traditions of his Wagadagam Tribe. Beginning in earnest in the 1990s, his artistic journey combined traditional carving techniques with modern linocut methods, creating a distinctive aesthetic that earned international recognition.

Billy Missi’n Wakain Thamai is a national touring exhibition presented by NorthSite Contemporary Arts in partnership with the Torres Strait Regional Authority’s Gab Titui Cultural Centre (TSRA), and toured by Museums & Galleries Queensland.

Welcome to Country and Smoking Ceremony
Song and dance performance by Peggy Missi and the Maluilgal Dance Troupe, comprising relatives of Billy Missi

Installation view of Billy Missi’n Wakain Thamai at NorthSite Contemporary Arts — Installation view, *Billy Missi’n Wakain Thamai*, NorthSite Contemporary Arts, Bulmba-ja, Cairns, Queensland, 2020. Photograph by Michael Marzik; courtesy of NorthSite Contemporary Arts.