[Transcript]
[Travis] when I get my own designs, I just start thinking like what to do and what patterns to do. I do like emu's and like Aboriginal men in the background there and Eagles and stuff.
so my name's Travis and I'm from Northern Territory and yeah I want to be an artist.
[Travis talking about his painting] Water holes with people. Emus, possums...
[Travis] When I was in Adelaide, I was getting myself into mischief with the law doing some stupid stuff.
After two or three years of that I just finally gave up and I came down here.
[Andrea - Travis’ support worker] I'm Andrea Shevlin and I'm Travis' support worker, funded through his NDIS plan.
So Travis was diagnosed with fetal alcohol syndrome, an intellectual disability.
There were a lot of dark days for Travis, and I quickly sort of identified that he needed a high level of support.
I said it would be really good if we could connect Travis to his culture because I believed that was something that was missing.
I approached Yuandamarra and Nadia and said is there any way we could get Travis into a program of some sort.
They were wonderful. They straight away said he can come out to IWS and participate here.
We all worked hard, we were able to secure funding, and that was I think the turning point for Travis.
[Yuandamarra - Elder, Lore Man, and founder Red Centre Enterprises] My name is Yuandamarra and I'm a traditional owner from the Bundjalung / Yiman communities. I'm also recognised as a Medicine and Lore Man amongst communities in Australia.
Red Centre Enterprises started about 30 years ago. It was a vision from our elders, and I use the analogy: 'it was a seed planted that would feed our future generations' - and we've watched that seed grow.
[Travis] Yuandamarra's taught me a lot of stories, a lot of bush stuff, and some culture stuff.
Yeah, I've felt like I belong here.
[Sue - Travis’ mum] We've had amazing support coordinators on our team and just the right people.
It takes a village, and it certainly has taken a village for Travis to get to where he is today.
[Andrea] There's no comparison, it is just huge.
I love it, you know, to see someone actually progressing in life, at their pace, with the support that they need, and he has so much ahead of him.
[Yuandamarra] What we found is that Travis has taken up a passion with art and he's been able to reconnect with his culture.
I feel privileged to actually see what happens behind the scenes as they say, watching Travis's Journey.
[Travis] So I'm doing arts in residence at the airport. I'll be painting the canvases, selling my paintings.
My dream is, yeah, I want to be an artist and I just want to be right out there and tell Australia that I'm out there.
And my future is teaching the kids in the right path. I just want to yeah help them out and lead them in the right pathway.
[End Transcript]
29 сен 2024
