Terminology

The term ‘blak’ was coined by artist Destiny Deacon back in 1991. The trailblazing artist from Erub/Mer (Torres Strait) and K’ua K’ua (Cape York) spent most of her life in Melbourne on Kulin Country. She wanted to take the C out of ‘black’ as a way to reclaim the derogatory and colonialist language used against First Nations peoples in Australia. Blak is now used widely across Australia to celebrate a proud urban Aboriginal identity.

C.O.R.E. is shorthand for Care of Radical Energy and encompasses the urgent need for a duty of care when generating systemic change in cultural institutions and rethinking museum practices.

The Aboriginal words in the BLAK C.O.R.E. vision statement are from the Wiradjuri language, the matrilineal kinship group of Professor Brook Andrew who devised BLAK C.O.R.E as part of his new role as Director Reimagining Museums and Collections at the University of Melbourne. yindyamarra gunhanha, meaning ongoing respect, is a term coined by Brook as an alternative word to decolonisation.