Join us at John Curtin Gallery for a Lunchtime Talk with Associate Professor Vannessa Hearman.

Looking both ways: The Timor Sea and Australia’s entanglements with Asia

What insights do oceans and seas offer us in understanding Australia’s entanglements with Asia? While living in Darwin (Garramilla) and witnessing the changing colours of the Timor Sea throughout the seasons, historian Vannessa Hearman became intrigued by historical voyages between Northern Australia, Indonesia and Timor-Leste, including those by traders, fishers and refugees. This talk focuses on her place-based research practices in both northern Australia and Timor-Leste, involving coastlines, lagoons, mangroves, ports, roads, and other built environments, to reflect on colonisation and state regulation of aquatic spaces. She demonstrates how thinking about (and feeling) place, along with archival and life-history research, can attune us to the challenges people and communities face in remembering and memorialising the past.

About the speaker

Vannessa Hearman is Associate Professor of History at Curtin University. Specialising in research on political violence, human rights, and historical memory in Indonesia and Timor-Leste, she is the author of the critically acclaimed Unmarked Graves: Death and Survival in the Anti-Communist Violence in East Java, Indonesia (NUS Press, 2018). Her second monograph, The Good Sea: The Journey of the Tasi Diak and the Politics of Refugee Protection in Australia (Melbourne University Publishing, May 2026), is a study of the only group of East Timorese ‘boat people’ who sailed to Australia. Her research on the history of East Timorese migration to Australia and the politics of art in Timor-Leste has been supported by the Australian Research Council and other grants.

The JCG Lunchtime Talks is a mid-week series that invites speakers from diverse disciplines to share their research, practices, and perspectives in response to the gallery’s exhibition programming. These informal sessions offer a welcoming, collegial space to explore ideas, spark dialogue, and engage with the themes and questions shaping contemporary visual culture and artistic practice.

Light refreshments provided.

The Gallery’s public opening hours during exhibitions are Monday to Friday 10am to 5pm and Sunday 12pm to 4pm. Closed Saturdays and Public Holidays.

For more information, please visit our website: https://www.curtin.edu.au/jcg/

Photography

This event will be photographed and/or videoed and images will occasionally be used for promotional and marketing purposes, including social media. If you do not wish to be photographed or videoed, please notify staff at event registration.

Accessibility

Everyone is welcome at the John Curtin Gallery. Plan your visit to the John Curtin Gallery.

Banner image: Portrait of Vannessa Hearman by Jose da Costa. Abdi Karya, Hail the Sail (detail), 2026, hand-woven palm fibre, silk, cotton, polyester, and various Bugis hand-woven sarungs from Wajo Regency, South Sulawesi, 280 × 490 cm. Photo by Gaylene Galardi.

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