PM Transcripts

PRIME MINISTER May 1974
AUSTRALIA'S BLACK CULTURE FOR NIGERIA
Australia is to send up to 100 Aboriginals to Lagos next
year to take part in the Second World Black and African Festival
of Arts and Culture, the Prime Minister announced today.
The Festival will be held in and around Lagos in
November/ December, 1975.
Australian participation was invited after a meeting of
the planning committee in Lagos earlier this year.
A committee drawn from the Department of Aboriginal and
Foreign Affairs, the Australian Council for the Arts and the
National Aboriginal Consultative Committee chose four Aboriginals
to attend a planning meeting in Lagos. The four will leave
Australia on 17 May. They are Aboriginal Liaison officers,
Vincent Copley, Gordon Briscoe and Charles Dixon together with
Wandjuk Marika of Yirrkala.
The Festival aims at bringing together Black culture and
the cultures of other nations which affect it throughout the
world. Over 20,000 people from all parts of Africa, North and
South America, the Carribean, Europe, India, Papua New Guinea
and Australasia are expected to take part in the month-long visit.
Australia will be represented by Aboriginal art ranging from
music and dancing to painting, sculpture, drama, writing and
film making. Traditional crafts such as weaving, carving, basket
making and body painting will also be demonstrated at the Festival.
The Nigerian Government will build a theatre and cultural
complex costing $ US36 million, together with a festival village
designed to house 100,000 participants and visitors.
Visitors to the Festival will attend exhibitions of all
aspects of Black culture throughout the world. Seminars will
also be held on the preservation and development of Black
civilisation.
CANBERRA. A. C. T.