The Flash of Recognition

As a student, Jane Lydon was shocked by the photograph on the cover of Charles Rowley’s 1970 classic, The Destruction of Aboriginal Society, which showed two Aboriginal men in neck-chains. In this original and highly illustrated book she uses photography to tell a bigger story of the struggle for Aboriginal rights in Australia. While many of the images are confronting, the book tells the positive story of the way in which photography has been used as a tool for change and to argue for recognition of our shared humanity. Starting at the turn of the twentieth century and continuing to the NT Intervention in the present, the book includes more than 60 images taken from newspapers and journals, as well as the work of contemporary artists.