The Flinders Library’s important Indonesian archives from the Anton Lucas Collection have become the University’s first digitised archive, while other success stories this week include an alumnus artist’s Adelaide Fringe poster, recognition for mathematics students, and a Royal Society honour for an archaeologist’s research.
Digitising the Indonesian archives
The Indonesian archives from the Anton Lucas Collection, which was donated to Flinders Library in 2016, have officially been digitised. As the first collection of archives being digitised at the University, the launch is a significant milestone for Indonesian Studies at Flinders and makes the material accessible to historians in both Australia and Indonesia.
The Anton Lucas Collection comprises letters and documents from the Japanese occupation and the Indonesian revolution, press clippings, unpublished memoirs written by former participants, and audio recordings and transcripts of interviews with participants at the local level in the revolution. It also includes photographs of the people involved in these events, plus photographs and drawings of important landmarks. These items particularly pertain to “Persitiwa Tiga Daerah”, the Three Regions Affair in 1945. The Collection topics also include democracy in Indonesia, women in the Indonesian revolution, religious movements, and agrarian and environmental protest movements that continued in later periods.
Royal Society recognition for Moffat
Flinders archaeologist Dr Ian Moffat has won the 2021 H.G. Andrewartha Medal, presented by the Royal Society of SA, for outstanding published research by a scientist in the early stages of their research career. Thanks to the initiative and generosity of Emeritus Professor P.A. Parsons, the Royal Society of South Australia decided to name this medal in honour of internationally famous ecologist Professor H.G. Andrewartha (1907-1992), past president and Vercoe Medallist of the Society. To ensure that this award recognises truly exceptional research, the Medal is awarded sparingly and not necessarily every year.
Landmark report for Royal Commission
The Royal Commission into Violence, Abuse, Neglect and Exploitation of People with Disability recently published a new report by Associate Professor Lorna Hallahan from the College of Education, Psychology and Social Work, providing historic insights into the experiences of people with disability in Australia. Her report, Disability in Australia: Shadows, struggles and successes, provides an account of the social and cultural aspects of the history of disability in Australia. Associate Professor Hallahan, who is co-director of SWIRLS (Flinders Social Work Innovation Research Living Space), says this report is the first attempt in Australia to record this history across the life of the nation and to capture diversity within the disability community.
Mathematics student successes
The College of Science and Engineering is delighted that mathematics students Jamie Keegan-Treloar and Cecilia Andersson have been awarded the highly competitive AMSI (Australian Mathematical Sciences Institute) summer vacation scholarships. The title of Jamie’s project that led to his successful scholarship is “Cellular Automata Traffic Analysis of Simple Road Networks”, while Cecilia’s project is titled “Deconvolving the Rocking Curve: Non-parametric Wavelet Approaches to Phase-Contrast Imaging.”
Indigenous artist Mali Allen-Place (Bachelor of Education (Primary R-7), Bachelor of Arts ’21) has become the youngest ever winner of the Adelaide Fringe poster design competition with her with a rainbow-coloured magical landscape inspired by the Adelaide CBD and its key locations.
Mali, a 22-year-old Arabana and Kokatha visual artist, is currently part of Carclew’s artist residency program Sharehouse and also had work shown in the STRNG WMN exhibition at The Mill as part of the recent Tarnanthi Festival. “The scattered symbols and dots throughout the painting hold meanings that will shift in the eye of the beholder,” she explained in an interview with InDaily about her poster design, titled A Whimsical World. “They represent the hundreds of gatherings, performances, venues and exhibitions that take place across the city throughout Adelaide Fringe, highlighting the many unique and fulfilling experiences available.”
Adelaide Fringe director and CEO Heather Croall says the design by Mali – the first Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander poster winner in the festival’s 62-year history – was a standout to the judging panel and “a runaway favourite in the public vote”.