Aboriginal Hive House

Yaama Friederika,

Thank you for submitting your work.

I offer the following curation to assist you with furthering your work in this space.

I appreciate your research and supported statements referencing the history of colonial violence and disposession that the first nations people of so called 'Australia' have endured as per the section in your project titled "re-learning".
However I will strongly suggest to you that the roles and responsibilities you have alloted to aboriginal people in this proposal are misguided. You simply can not superimpose projected social roles and responsibilities and outcomes without first investigating existing social and legal structure. Aboriginal law, the first law on this continent is very much alive and well, especially in the central desert. You would need to earn the trust and respect of this community before you could even find out what that was in order to compliment it with any external vision.

There are over 500 aboriginal nations on this continent with different languages, customs, diet and stories. You have selected a community comprised predominently of Warlpiri. A proposed construction or design appropriate for a community of Warlpiri must in no way be assumed as being appropriate for another community comprised of people from a different nation.

You also seem to imply that there has been a failure or inability by Aboriginal people to adapt to settler society but it is the colonial project, on going on this continent since 1788 perpetuating genocide and ecocide that is the cause of this. The two societies are fundamentally incompatible, one is capitalism based the other is not. One system exploits, the other does not. So instead of relearning i would suggest to you that you focus on the term Reviving. This will allow you to focus on the peoples, their culture and their environmental needs and assist you in steering away from eurocentricism.

It is at this point that I wish to raise with you your proposed choice of design. I commend your references to environmental sustainability, affordability and the preferred use of native resources however the architectural construct itself is european in design, similar to a lot of enviromentally concsious designs coming out of Sweeden and Germany. Do you feel that these designs are compatible with the "Australian" desert and why did you choose a european design instead of investigating traditional structures that could be enhanced ? Also taking into account that this is very much a prospectus that is dependent on enormous amounts of research and community consultation why did you feel the need to choose a final design to move forward with? Why not a series of designs that the Warlpiri could select from therefore affording you a lengthier and more inclusive consultation process.

Aboriginal people on this continent whether they live ruraly or in an urban setting face two over -arching sentiments when engaging with settler society and they are; assimilation and paternalism. Individuals, NGO'S or government orgs offering pre packaged, one size fits all , solutions to a very complex group of issues which are all by products of colonisation. It is a common and very dangerous assumption to make that people living in poverty will be appreciative of anything because they have little by capitalist standards.
You have referenced paternalism within your proposal as a dangerous and disempowering colonial attitude however there are aspects of your proposal that do not counteract this reality. For example the offering of a design concept that the inhabitants were not consulted about when consultation is the pre requisite of any successful project, design or otherwise. Given the remoteness of some of the aboriginal communities in australia I understand the difficulties present within this there is also language and cultural differences to consider. However there are ways to create a positive and informed vehicle of change in conjunction with Aboriginal people devoid of colonialism and I offer these few points to assist you in the future.

*Listen to the inhabitants
* Learn from the land
* Understand the relationship between people and place.

I see from you bio that you are Brasilian and am taking a guess that english is your second language therefore there may be specific word choices that have a more accurate meaning and association in your native tongue than in english. I reference this because of an observation I wish to make regarding the title of your work ;
"The pleasure of hospitality". Have you considered how an offer of hospitality to a sovereign of "Australia" from an international person or a settler would come across ?
This is aboriginal land it is not possible for an international person or settler to offer that which is ours to offer you. In addition to this there are problematic word choices again in the outcome section of your proposal where you state definitively that aboriginal people will react and transform in specific ways as a result of the introduction of your architectural design - how can you possibly know this when base consultation has not occurred? I caution you against making such definitive statements without having met or formed a relationship with the people you are speaking about.

Thank you again for your submission and for the concern, enthusiasm and compassion that it demonstrates.