Celebrating success

Dr Natalie Harkin’s powerful new exhibition is being launched for TARNANTHI Festival on Sunday, while other Flinders experts have been explaining their innovative work to broad audiences – highlighting the importance of biodiverse gardening, and a cognitive training system for people with Parkinson’s disease.

Powerful examination of Aboriginal women’s domestic labour

‘Days of Our Lives (Natalie’s story)’. Credit: Natalie Harkin with Unbound Collective.

Dr Natalie Harkin’s latest exhibition APRON-SORROW / SOVEREIGN-TEA is being launched for the Tarnanthi 2021 Festival on Saturday October 16 at Vitalstatistix, Port Adelaide. The exhibition, which will run for a fortnight, will feature a performance event, symposium and artist talk.

APRON-SORROW / SOVEREIGN-TEA is a culmination of Dr Natalie Harkin’s long exploration with archival-poetics as an Australian Research Council DECRA fellow. Drawing from the state’s official archives and oral history to explore and transform Aboriginal women’s domestic labour and servitude, the installation unfolds as a powerful reckoning of South Australia’s recorded colonial history.

Through archival poetics and short video projections created with her Unbound Collective sisters – Simone Ulalka Tur, Ali Gumillya Baker and Faye Rosas Blanch – Dr Harkin hopes to correct South Australia’s colonial record. The multidisciplinary work will also feature a tryptic of leadlight windows created by her cousin, leadlight artist Sharene Vandenbroak, depicting domestic labour memory stories from their family. 

Dr Harkin is also a valuable contributor to the current FUMA exhibition Sovereign Sisters: domestic work, curated by Ali Gumillya Baker with Madeline Reece, which is also being presented in association with Tarnanthi Festival. More details about the Sovereign Sisters: domestic work exhibition can be found here.

Microbial expert helps people to imagine the microscopic

Dr Martin Breed

Dr Martin Breed, from the College of Science and Engineering, was a guest on Garden Futurist, a podcast about innovative thinkers, contributing to a climate resilient future through the power of gardens. He discussed the importance of biodiverse gardening, and helps imagine the microscopic, the microbiome inhabits, the soil, the air, and breaks each being down to connect our bodies to everything around us.

Dr Breed was also a guest panellist at a Nature Festival event, held on Saturday 4 October, where the panel shared their experiences and evidence on the benefits of taking care of nature to ensure our own wellbeing.

Explaining games for change to Asia-Pacific audience

Dr David Hobbs

Dr David Hobbs, from the College of Science and Engineering, and partners in the NeuroOrb device were invited to speak at Games for Change, a global online event to foster the development and use of games and interactive technologies that make the world a better place. Dr Hobbs and Associate Professor Lyndsey Collins-Praino from The University of Adelaide spoke to attendees about the development of NeuroOrb, and how the device serves as a cognitive training system for people with Parkinson’s disease.

National awards celebrate leading GPs

Two Flinders alumni have been recognised in the Royal Australian College of General Practitioners State Awards. Dr Penelope Steele (PhD ’88) was named SA-NT GP of the Year, and Dr Will Staridas (BMBS ’08), a GP at Regency Medical Clinic, was named as SA-NT GP Supervisor of the Year.

Dr Staridas, who has been supervising general practice registrars for the past four years, says support for junior doctors is vital to develop their success as a general practitioner.

“One of the biggest transitions that a doctor in training can make is from hospital to general practice. It is a challenging move from a highly supervised hospital environment, to sitting alone in a room with a patient. I think it is very important to support junior doctors through that transition, and in the process help them to become a well rounded general practitioner,” says Dr Staridas.

Both Dr Steele and Dr Staridas are now in the running to win National Awards, which will be announced on Saturday 20 November.

Posted in
Alumni College of Science and Engineering