Aboriginal children (coolingah) are nurtured by our families (moort) and grow up with knowledge our ancestors have passed down from generation to generation, sustaining the oldest living culture on earth and ensuring our spiritual, physical and emotional well-being.

Noongar and other Australian First Nations communities are working with Curtin University to share stories from the Carrolup River Native Settlement and other places where Aboriginal children and families were detained against their will.

We share our experiences and histories of the impact of invasion and ongoing colonisation, including the Stolen Generations, to promote healing and find common ground on which to build a shared future.

Curtin University is committed to work with all Australians and peoples from across the world, including our First Nations peoples, reflecting its values, and affirming its role as leaders in truth-telling and to seek peace, justice and equality for all.

For more information on our ambitious project to create a permanent home for the Carrolup artworks,
please visit The Carrolup Centre for Truth-telling.

Once known child artist, The Golden Road c1949
Pastel and charcoal on paper. Curtin University Art Collection

Noongar and other Aboriginal groups have lived on this Country since the beginning of time.

We believe natural landscapes and sacred sites were created by Ancestral beings during the Creation time. Beings such as the Waugal (waa-gal) and Maajit (maa-jit), known as Rainbow Serpents, created the world and everything in it. They created the laws for humans too and have special powers.

Our cultures, wisdoms and spiritual beliefs have been passed on for thousands of generations through story, song, ceremony, and art.

Our science and knowledge have sustained our people for millennia and are still relevant today.

Kwoperdok wirn, koort, moort.
Strong spirit, heart, family.

Our Elders teach our children all the lessons of life. These are embedded in songs, languages, and rituals.

Children learn about their relationship to the environment, the six Noongar seasons, the flowering and fruiting of plants, animal behaviours and weather patterns. They are taught about the creation of rivers, hills and constellations, and to respect the geographical boundaries of other kinship and language groups.

We are the custodians of the oldest living cultures on Earth. Our cultural knowledge is linked directly to our identity and our emotional, physical, and spiritual health and well-being.

Once known child artist, The Blue of the Sky c1949
Pastel and charcoal on paper. Curtin University Art Collection

Noongar moort, Noongar coolingah.
Noongar families, Noongar children.

Our children are born into a complex social structure. They are assigned a moiety which guides them in marriage and relationships. On Whadjuk Boodja these are the wardong (raven) kin group and maanitj (white cockatoo) kin group.

Birthing, caring for, and educating children, and rites of passage are governed by strict rules and protocols. Our babies are given totems, like kaarda (blue-tongued lizard) or the chirriger (blue wren), that guide them through their physical and spiritual lives.

We all have responsibilities to care for the plants and animals which sustain us.

Vividness and Truth

Exhibition of Carrolup art at Boans department store,
The West Australian, 23rd October 1947.
Courtesy Noelene White

With care and nurturing from their teachers, the children’s confidence grew, and they became prolific artists. Exhibitions were held across the Great Southern region and in Perth.

The children’s schoolwork and overall health improved.

The boys and girls of Carrolup surprised and excited many audiences including government officials.

In 1947 many of the artworks sold during an exhibition on the third floor of the Boans Department store, Perth.

Highly acclaimed writer Dorothy Hewett described the exhibition ‘…like walking into the vigorous adventure of a child’s mind’. And she found ‘vividness and truth’ in the drawings.

Officials viewed them as the successful outcome of their assimilation policies.

Mrs Florence Rutter – International Acclaim

The story of Carrolup’s child artists attracted the attention of English philanthropist Mrs Florence Rutter, who became pivotal in the Carrolup story.

Whilst visiting her sister in Perth in 1949, Florence came across an article about the Carrolup artists in a local fashion and social commentary magazine, Milady. She caught a train 300km south to Katanning and travelled to the Settlement to meet the artists and their teachers. Her visit boosted the children’s enthusiasm and passion for art making.

Mrs Rutter became a strong advocate of the Carrolup artists and publicly applauded Noel White’s teaching methods. She arranged exhibitions across Australia and New Zealand, as well as the Netherlands, and the UK where she sold many works. In 1951 in Manchester, Mrs Rutter visited the Cotton Board, presenting designs for print. She opened a trust account for the school. She sent art supplies and introduced the children to new techniques such as oil painting

Mrs Florence Rutter at the 45th Annual Exhibtion of the Royal London Pastel Society in London, 1951
discussing Parnell Dempster’s artwork, ‘Down to Drink’ with Mr and Mrs Richter. Courtesy Noelene White

Once known child artist, Shades of Night c1949 (reproduction)
Pastel and charcoal on paper. Curtin University Art Collection

Impact of Colonisation

Since initial contact between Australia’s First Peoples and the British invaders, consecutive governments have created laws to criminalise and control Aboriginal people.

Colonisation was enshrined in a series of racist Parliamentary Acts and legislation. These policies were administered under the premise of white superiority.

In Western Australia, A.O. Neville was appointed Chief Protector of Aborigines at the Department of Aborigines and Fisheries in 1915. He ruthlessly administered the 1905 Act which deemed all Aboriginal children ‘Wards of the State.’

This resulted in the segregation, dislocation, and total control of Aboriginal people. It followed the forced removal of thousands of children across generations, in an attempt to force assimilation.

Across Australia, Aboriginal families were forced from their traditional lands. Many lived in poverty on the outskirts of towns.

In the early 1900s in Katanning, Noongar children attended the local State school. But the town’s white residents pressured A.O. Neville to segregate Aboriginal families. In 1915, he established the Carrolup Native Settlement 20 km from town.

In 1922, the Settlement was forced to close after reports of child neglect and abuse perpetrated by officials. The families were relocated to the Moore River Native Settlement.When Carrolup reopened in 1939 under the policy of assimilation, many children from surrounding districts were detained there. The story of abuse and constant disruption is common amongst Stolen Generations.

Carrolup was one of nearly 100 Government sanctioned institutions involved in the segregation and assimilation of Aboriginal people in Western Australia.

Click on the map above to view an interactive map showing the extent of Aboriginal ‘Missions’ in Western Australia.

Cultural Genocide

In 1946, at age 6, Bigali, was arrested and forcibly removed from her family. Along with a group of other children stolen from the district, she was jailed at Roebourne Prison for a week.

The children were then transported to Perth, and Bigali was detained at Sister Kate’s Children’s Cottage Home, Queens Park, ‘The Home for lighter-skinned children’. As part of the assimilation process, she was renamed Sudan Raymond.

Copy of the form for Bigali’s arrest from Bigali’s personal file.
Courtesy Bigali Hanlon

Bigali Hanlon c1942 at Mulga Downs Station homestead in the Pilbara where her Mother Eijit was a domestic slave.
Photographer unknown, Courtesy Bigali Hanlon

Courtesy Elliot family

1. Revel Cooper; 2. Claude Kelly; 3. Parnell Dempster. 4. Once known 5. Once known; 6. Reynold Hart; 7. Ross Jones; 8. Mervyn Smith; 9. Angelo Ugle; 10. Once known; 11. Once known; 12. Olive Elliot; 13. Alan Loo ; 14. Once known; 15. Once known; 16. Once known; 17. Lindsay Wallam; 18. Once known; 19. Once known; 20. Ken Sutherland; 21. Once known; 22. Once known; 23. Once known; 24. Dulcie Penny; 25. Once known; 26. Once known; 27. Once known; 28. Mildred Jones; 29. Once known; 30. Once known; 31. Once known; 32. Raphael Edgill; 33. Once known; 34. Caroline Moses; 35. Once known ; 36. Rosemary Cuttabutt; 37. Inis Smith; 38. Breely Bennell; 39. Once known; 40. Alma Cuttabutt; 41. Once known; 42. Once known; 43. John Cuttabutt; 44. Bernard Smith; 45. Once known; 46. Jean Sutherland; 47. Once known; 48. Barry Loo; 49. Once known; 50. Once known.

Aboriginal children were trained to become domestic slaves and farm hands.

Young teenagers were used as cheap labour by farmers, pastoralists, and the gentry. There were many reports of physical abuse.

Many young people had no means of support and ended up in prison. This cycle of incarceration continues today with Aboriginal people suffering the highest rates of death in custody in Australia.

Currently the age of criminal responsibility in Australia is only 10 years old which contravenes the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child. The “Raise the Age” campaign is led nationally and internationally by Dr. Hannah McGlade and others who work tirelessly for the rights of children.

A number of Carrolup artists continued their art practice into adulthood.

Alma Toomath (Cuttabutt) began her art career at Carrolup at age five. She was the first Aboriginal women in Western Australia

to complete a Diploma in Fine Arts and majored in sculpture.

Alma participated in many solo and group exhibitions. In 1996, she was awarded NAIDOC Artist of the Year, and Senior

Artist of the Year in 2001. Her daughter and granddaughter continue her legacy through their work in culture and the

arts. Alma passed away in early 2021.

Chirriger Dreaming

From Left: Peter Farmer Junior (held), Miranda Farmer (nee Yarran) and Peter Farmer, 1999.
Courtesy Peter Farmer and Miranda Farmer

Peter Farmer is a Noongar man born in Gnowangerup near Katanning in 1971. He is part of a large cultural group representing Whadjuk, Minang, Wilman and Wardandi peoples.

At birth, Peter was given his totem, the chirriger (blue wren) which was passed down from his great-grandmother on his father’s side. Chirriger guides Peter spiritually and connects him to country. In 1952 Marribank was established by the Baptist Union on the site of the old Carrolup Native Settlement. Peter lived there for 9 years with other family members during the 1980s. His Mother Fay and his Aunties were part of the Marribank Artists Cooperative. They are widely known for their ceramics and batiks on silk.

With inspiration from his Nyoongar culture and family, including the child artists of Carrolup, Peter has forged a highly successful arts career. In 2001, Peter graduated from Curtin University with a BA in Fine Arts. He has participated in many group exhibitions and had several solo exhibitions. He is represented in public and private collections and at the Western Australian Museum Boola Bardip.

His most recent artworks are large scale public art installations, including digital works. The tiny chirriger, its brilliant blue flashing as it dances and hops through the bush, continues to inspire him.

Truth, Justice and Healing

Our communities have fought to keep our cultures and families strong and connected.

Programs such as Link-up are designed to reconnect survivors of the Stolen Generations. In WA this service is delivered through Yorgum and supported by the Family History Unit of AIATSIS, Canberra. It helps survivors navigate government agencies, decipher records and provides emotional support.

In 2008 Prime Minister Kevin Rudd delivered the National Apology to Indigenous Australians, particularly the Stolen Generations. A fund was established for The Healing Foundation to support the survivors and descendants of the harmful legacies of colonisation. It undertakes research, provides a platform for sharing stories, and resources for healing programs.

Yokai, a local initiative, advocates for the delivery of the 54 recommendations of the Bringing Them Home Report (1997). It aims to achieve truth, justice and healing for the survivors of the Stolen Generation and their families.

The Carrolup project builds on this important community led work by sharing the artworks and stories of the child artists of Carrolup.