Forbidden Australia

Ken Duncan’s Panorama: For­bid­den Aus­tralia — As the lines of reg­u­la­tion are drawn and redrawn across the coun­try, deter­min­ing exactly what you can and can­not see of our most impor­tant national mon­u­ments, pho­tog­ra­pher Ken Dun­can feels com­pelled to speak out.

I have never made a secret of the fact I’m a Christian – it’s the thing I am most proud of. However, I also respect each individual’s right to believe what they like. For me, the whole reason I do what I do is “to show the beauty of creation”. And when I started out trying to get my photographic career off the ground, it was easy to achieve this vision. I sold all my worldly possessions, jumped in my old Austin Lancer and took off around Australia, free and easy and able to go wherever I liked, whenever I liked. How times have changed.

Where is this headed, you might be wondering? I don’t want to get too heavy – but my point is that these days, vast tracts of our nation are practically off-limits to you and me. These areas are growing by the minute. And one of the biggest chunks of all looms large in Central Australia: Uluru, the Olgas, and the surrounding Uluru-Kata Tjuta National Park. And there is a religious significance of sorts here. But I’ll come to that shortly.

One of my images that you see here (Olgas Sunrise) was shot prior to access restrictions coming in, but these days this amazing view is no longer able to be witnessed.

In my last column I touched on the increasing amount of red tape and bureaucracy stifling photographers who want to show the world our nation’s immense beauty. At around the same time, the Director of National Parks announced the release of a Draft Plan of Management for the Uluru-Kata Tjuta National Park and called for public submissions. This plan is intended to guide park management over the next decade – and the big bouncing ball that has been paraded before the media in this whole spectacle is the fact they’re considering banning people from climbing the Rock. Yet there is so much more to the draft plan than that; this is just one of many freedoms that will be lost if this document is passed.

Before I go any further, I need to preface what I’m about to say by telling you that this is one of the hardest things I have ever written. The instant response to anyone with an opinion on Indigenous issues seems to be that you are branded a redneck. However, I’ve spent a lifetime working with Indigenous Australians, and I have great respect for them and for many of their beliefs. Many Aboriginal people have been very important to me personally on my journey. This has left me reticent about speaking out – but I feel that someone has to, or we will lose so many of the freedoms we once took for granted.

What is frus­trat­ing me so much is that the foun­da­tion of the whole Uluru-Kata Tjuta Draft Man­age­ment Plan is a com­plex Indige­nous reli­gious con­cept called Tjukurpa. This is acknowl­edged on the Fed­eral Government’s Depart­ment of Envi­ron­ment, Water, Her­itage and the Arts web­site (www.environment.gov.au). This eso­teric belief sys­tem, which the draft plan states is recog­nised as the “fun­da­men­tal guide to man­age­ment” of the park, is the foun­da­tion of life for the tra­di­tional landown­ers, the Anangu, yet it is a con­cept that changes con­stantly between peo­ple and gen­er­a­tions. The department’s web­site also declares that “Tjukurpa is not writ­ten down, but is an oral culture”.

In effect, we have highly trained park rangers, who have spent years study­ing land­care man­age­ment, yet they are at the mercy of this fluid and extremely com­pli­cated con­cept. Over the years I have seen areas that are sacred one minute become not sacred the next, and vice versa, to the point that nowa­days 98 per­cent of Kata Tjuta is restricted and inac­ces­si­ble. In fact, one of my images that you see here (Olgas Sun­rise) was shot prior to access restric­tions com­ing in, but these days this amaz­ing view is no longer able to be wit­nessed. In a coun­try that prides itself on the reli­gious free­dom afforded to its cit­i­zens, I find it incom­pre­hen­si­ble that a World Heritage-listed Com­mon­wealth national park can be run based on a reli­gious con­cept. Per­son­ally, as a Chris­t­ian I believe God cre­ated the whole area – but if I was to try and force every­one to believe that, I would never get away with it. And if I tried to col­lect roy­al­ties for own­er­ship in the name of God I think peo­ple would start laugh­ing at me.

One of the key areas of this 186-page Draft Man­age­ment Plan that has me so annoyed is the issue of Indige­nous Cul­ture and Intel­lec­tual Prop­erty (ICIP). Accord­ing to the draft plan, the Anangu regard all images of the land­scape – pho­tographs, films or art­works – as Indige­nous cul­tural prop­erty. The plan also notes that the Anangu want appro­pri­ate con­trol over how ICIP is used, includ­ing: recog­nis­ing Anangu as the own­ers; Anangu shar­ing in the ben­e­fits (mon­e­tary and non-monetary) from the use of ICIP; and Anangu hav­ing the capac­ity to mon­i­tor use. This astounds me. No-one owns the copy­right on nat­ural for­ma­tions. Even though the Indige­nous peo­ple have been here 20,000 years, that’s a sec­ond on the clock com­pared to how long the Rock has existed.

I realise I’m pushing the same point over and over, but the fact is that I am so fed up with all the ridiculous rules and restrictions that exist, and Uluru is a prime example of a place where things are out of hand. There is not enough distinction about what is deemed commercial image usage, either. Under the proposed rules, if I go to Uluru-Kata Tjuta and take a wonderful photo, or paint a beautiful painting, or record some beautiful sounds to put into a musical piece, or write a poem about the place, then return home and someone offers me money for what I’ve done creatively, I become a criminal for accepting it – even if financial gain was not my original intent. Look, fair enough if a giant film crew were to come traipsing in to take over for weeks at a time – by all means, there need to be some guidelines there. But when it comes to you and me, making no more of an impact than the general visitor and in fact abiding by that old national parks motto, take only photographs and leave only footprints, I don’t understand the need for permits and permissions. We should be embracing exposure of our natural formations wherever possible, because it is going to help promote tourism worldwide and bring dollars to our country for all people. If we continue to make it hard for artistic people to tell their stories or share their feelings, it is seriously going to affect things in the long term.

One of the most important points highlighted in the Draft Plan of Management is the need for the conservation and protection of Uluru-Kata Tjuta, yet the very principles proposed under this so-called Tjukurpa management concept are quite the opposite, and they’re having a detrimental effect. For example, the excessive restrictions in place mean there are currently only two areas of Kata Tjuta that are publicly accessible. This is creating incredible environmental pressure on those two areas. There should be other areas opened up so the traffic can be dispersed and the two areas given time to rest. That is sound environmental management. Also, I wonder how many people realise that more than 1000 Desert Oaks were destroyed when they realigned the road from Uluru to Kata Tjuta so that visitors would be diverted from seeing one particular sacred area.

By the time you read this, the deadline for public submissions to the draft management plan will be well and truly over – and the final decision on the future of Uluru-Kata Tjuta will rest with Federal Environment Minister Peter Garrett and the Australian Parliament. Frankly, I am so over “Ulurules” and all the hoops I have to jump through to pull out my camera that I almost don’t want to go back there and put myself through the sanitised experience. The concerning thing is, it seems this style of management is slowly being rolled out on whatever parks the government can manage.

Unless we vow to watch this issue with eyes like hawks, it won’t be long before we’ve been locked out of our wonderful national parks altogether. The very areas which were originally annexed for the benefit of all Australians – both now and future generations.

Photo tips // Shoot­ing the Red Centre

1. When you’re shoot­ing Uluru or The Olgas, some of the best shots you’ll get are after the sun has set or before the sun has risen. Just after sun­set, you get a beau­ti­ful after­glow. Often, many peo­ple pack up their gear and think the sun­set is all over, and they end up miss­ing the great­est shot of all. For shots like this you need a tri­pod, because gen­er­ally you’ll end up doing long exposures.

2. Try to find some good fore­ground inter­est, because often with iconic loca­tions you can tend to focus too much on the icon with­out plac­ing it in its envi­ron­ment. Avoid being over­whelmed and try to find some­thing to lead you in. A good sun­set on its own can be rather boring.

3. If you have a car with a roof rack, stand­ing on it can really help you at the sun­set view­ing spots, and it helps you get more per­spec­tive because you’re shoot­ing from a higher angle. If you’re doing long expo­sures, be very care­ful of move­ment of the car; make sure no-one is even lean­ing against it.

4. If you’re shoot­ing land­scape aeri­als, it’s a good idea to put your cam­era on man­ual focus if pos­si­ble and focus on infin­ity, then put a piece of gaffer tape on the lens to hold it in place so every shot is pin sharp. If you’re shoot­ing out of a heli­copter, be sure to keep the hori­zon level. And if you have to shoot through Per­spex or glass, make sure you put the lens as close to it as pos­si­ble to min­imise reflections.

Ken Dun­can is one of Aus­tralia most iconic panoramic land­scape pho­tog­ra­phers and is truly world renound for his work and con­tri­bu­tion to the world of pho­tog­ra­phy and his char­ity work. Ken’s work can be found on his web­site or in one of his beau­ti­ful gallery’s around Australia.

This arti­cle is repro­duced with writ­ten con­sent from the Ken Dun­can Group and all text and images are copy­righted to Ken Duncan.