Sunday 28 April 2013

A Convict In The Family?

On Saturday 13 April I went to the Museum of Sydney for the opening of Mine Konakci's exhibition A Convict In The Family? It was wonderful to hear Mine speak about her inspiration for the photographs, and it was fun to spot the faces in the crowd who were also featured in Mine's photos. I saw another two photos that are linked to families that I am researching for friends, the Butt(s) and Cable families, but didn't get a chance to speak to the subjects. One lady I did catch was Anne, who is descended from a convict also named Anne (there were two with matching names of the 40 images). Her ancestor was a convict of the Second Fleet's Neptune, and my 5xg-grandfather James BRACKENRIG, was a soldier on the same ship, which arrived in 1790. Anne's ancestor went on to marry another soldier off the Neptune. I wonder if there was any power imbalance in those relationships that started in such sad and possibly violent circumstances.

The exhibition is related to a previous blog post that I wrote in October 2012.

Here I am with Mine's photo of me



3 comments:

  1. Now I have another reason (apart from my 11 direct convicts) to see this exhibition - to view your picture.

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  2. Aw, thanks Jill!
    The exhibition is wonderful, with all those intriguing stories.

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  3. You know I would love to wander through something like this seeing who is there and what we can add....I am thinking seriously of writing another book after meeting Esther, there must be so many stories to tell.

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