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Censorship, Media Proprietors
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To scale archival portraiture, audio installation, sound shower, holographic clearview film projection
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Who determines what information is in the ‘public interest’ has always been contested and is a debate that is central to democracy and the public’s ability to be able to participate in it - What are the origins of censorship, how did this play out in the Press Gallery in practice?
How did the Press Gallery's acceptance and understanding of censorship evolve over the decades?
Where does real power lie, with the media barons or the political leaders?
Is it a symbiotic relationship and when do these relationships harm democracy?
How did these hidden forces sustain themselves over time?
How did they operate in the shadows?
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The exhibition starts at the top of the stairs [UH ST2, Lift] leading from the Representatives Opposition Lobby at the press boxes. We plan to integrate archival portraiture, text and imagery into the grid pattern created by the press boxes that introduces us to some of the most prolific journalists who worked in the gallery across the period 1930s to 1980s. This also functions as a ‘title card’ for the entire exhibition. Animated text that ‘types’ onto the wall above the press boxes using video projection explains the importance of the press box system. We propose to keep elements from the previous exhibition like the press box bell. Visitors are directed to their left down the corridor [U502] and into rooms [U86/ U85] where they encounter an audio-visual feast of storytelling. An installation featuring large scale projection and custom LED screens with personalised listening devices introduces an intimate experience that sets up the intrigue and plot for the more shared and immersive sound shower about to gently rain on visitors in the gallery overlooking the House of Representatives Chamber [H EAST PG].
Important to note that there should be allocation of wall space in the corridor [U502] for a text based introduction to the exhibition.
Because of the unusual shape and size of [U86/ U85] and the limitations around noise spill into the chamber [H EAST PG] spaces, we could also look at an alternative concept. We could consider moving the sound showers to [U86/ U85] and make these human activated using foot sensors, rather than touch screens. We could then lean into the existing architecture of [H EAST PG] using the long desk that runs along the balcony. An alternative installation here could be installing analogue audio devices on the desk that are picked up by visitors and placed on the ear to ‘activate’ audio. Visuals and imagery could be installed underneath the perspex layer over the desk (see 3D drawings).
The opportunity to gain a ‘journalist’s-eye-view’ over the Chamber is a very powerful moment in this part of the exhibition space. Visitors can access a space and view; they would never have had the opportunity to see when the building was a working parliament. We want to emphasise this ‘exclusive access’, giving visitors a sense of the privilege of the position and affirming they won’t get this in any other museum or cultural institution in the world.
What we propose to do with this unique and very ‘regal’ space [H EAST PG] is to create a beautiful sensor-based/human-triggered sound shower with responsive images appearing on a custom-made clear view holographic effect display hanging above the chamber. Alternatively, if this is not possible due to heritage concerns perhaps, we can look at using just the individual tablet screens that the user operates for imagery and video with no large hanging screen over the chamber.
Soundscapes respond to the actions of visitors as they approach one of two custom-made plinths holding an interactive tablet. One plinth and the accompanying sound shower above it represents the 1930s, the other the 1940s. On each tablet is a series of ‘discoveries’ of the time that users can choose to dive into. Audiences find themselves immersed in never-before heard audio grabs and archival moments in a directional soundscape that gently rains down on them as they look out at imagery that is almost ‘ghost-like’ (or just confined to the tablet screens in front of them on the plinths).
To help make sense of this conceptually we recommend you view a real-world example of directional sound shower technology: www.squintopera.com/projects/museum-of-literature-ireland/
www.squintopera.com/projects/museum-of-literature-ireland/
This installation evokes a feeling that the most important people, stories, events are still imbued in the walls. The potential with cutting edge technology here allows us to ‘bring them back to life’ in a more 3D ‘hologram like’ aesthetic.
The lighting in the corridors is soft, inside the rooms it is darker to allow for more immersion in the content and once on the gallery above the chamber we are hoping to develop a lighting state that evokes the ‘moodiness’ of the creative. We are aware we can’t ‘black out’ this space but in collaboration with lighting designers we hope to achieve a more dimly lit effect.
To help make sense of this conceptually we recommend you view a real-world example of clear view holographic technology: www.prodisplay.com/projection-screens/rear-projection/clearview-holographic-display/
Using the power of narrative storytelling and blending digital media with physical space has the potential to create a remarkable and unique audio-visual experience that speaks directly to questions arising from the core themes of this era: censorship and media proprietors. All of these questions remain as central tenets of the Australian democracy story.
These simple 3D drawings show initial thinking and preliminary ideas on what we’d like to achieve in each of the ‘scenes’ in ACT 1.
Only Human has suggested several stories for each era derived from the material in the MoAd archive, mostly recorded oral histories of former Press Gallery journalists. These stories are suggestions and require deep historical analysis and rigorous fact-checking.
Through this discovery process, Only Human has identified an editorial challenge with verifying and fact-checking stories, especially in the early decades. Unfortunately, few former Press Gallery journalists from the earlier decades are alive today. As a result, it’s almost impossible to test the multiple 'versions' of events or recounting of history of the early decades. This lack of living memory makes it difficult to navigate the many perspectives of historical events as experienced by Press Gallery journalists. We have no doubt that many of these stories are complex, contradictory and even contested; however, landing the most accurate version of events will be enormously challenging. We suggest MoAD engages a historian who can work alongside the curatorial team to navigate the complexity of patchy historical records.
STORY 1
JOSEPH LYONS DEFECTS FROM LABOR TO FORM THE UNITED AUSTRALIA PARTY (UAP)
Why this story:
The United Australia Party was created in the aftermath of the 1931 split in the Australian Labor Party. It was the eve of the Great Depression when six fiscally conservative Labor MPs left the party to protest the Scullin government's financial policies. What is lesser-known, is that a journalist and his media proprietor were at the centre of the action, they were operating as political players.
It’s a quiet evening in late 1930, an hour or so before the debate in the House of Representatives was due to finish. No one knew it yet but a political defector, a Minister inside the Labor ministry, was about to upend Australian politics.
A whisper reached the Press Gallery that senior minister Joseph Lyons was on his way to the Canberra Railway Station. Some journalists dismissed the early departure as a trivial matter and went home. But not Warren Denning. He made a quick exit from Parliament House, followed Joseph Lyons to the train station and jumped aboard the train as it pulled out of the platform. His instincts were sound, a political crisis was brewing.
Denning always felt that it was “a matter of instinct” that made a journalist good at the job.
“One has to be alive to every pulse-beat in the Parliamentary body, able to detect the slightest trace of abnormality, able to sense that things are going wrong, that something is out of tune, that somebody is ‘up to something.”
— Warren Denning, Author of Inside Canberra
In March 1931 Dennings’ Press Gallery colleague Joe Alexander broke the story wide open.
Joe Alexander reported the contents of secret cables sent from London by Labor Prime Minister Scullin to his deputy J.E Fenton discussing the disloyalty within his ranks.
Alexander’s story gravely damaged Scullin’s Labor government and Alexander became the first journalist to be banned from the House of Representatives for refusing to reveal the source of the documents.
Two months after Joe Alexander’s story broke in May 1931 the United Australia Party (UAP) was formed.
Joe Alexander was working closely with Keith Murdoch who was knee-deep in decisions about who would lead the newly formed UAP.
Joe Alexander - Former Press Gallery JournalistSoon after the defection, at the 1931 election, Lyons and the UAP campaigned stable, orthodox financial policies. It was the eve of the Great Depression.
The result was a huge victory for the UAP, taking 34 seats against 18 seats for the two wings of the Labor Party combined. The UAP governed for seven years.
As the UAP came into government, the impact of the 1929 Wall Street crash torpedoed the Australian economy. The Australian economy collapsed and unemployment reached a peak of 32 per cent in 1932.
It took Australia almost a decade to recover.
STORY 2
MUNICH CRISIS: BUILD UP OF NAZI STRENGTH AND AUSTRALIA’S EARLY APPEASEMENT TO HITLER
Why this story:
On the eve of the Second World War, Australia under the Lyons government was in lockstep with a British Parliament eager to appease Hitler. Press Gallery journalists were ringing around, casting a wider net to get a picture of the build-up of Nazi strength. Based on their findings, they had the courage to confront politicians about the wisdom of appeasing Hitler and backing the Munich agreement. This is a lesser-known story that is rarely told, a story of a surprising leak at a critical moment. An insider view of how journalists were speaking truth to power. It’s also a story that echoes today with Russia’s aggression in Ukraine.
“I WAS IN MY OFFICE IN PARLIAMENT HOUSE AND PRIME MINISTER JOSEPH LYONS CALLED UP TO SEE IF HE CAN GET THE POPE TO INTERVENE."
— Harold Cox, Former Press Gallery Journalist
– Joe Alexander, Former Press Gallery Journalist
Hitler was gaining strength, and the Defence forces of Britain and Australia were weak. It was a perilous moment.
– Joe Alexander, Former Press Gallery JournalistThe truth Joe Alexander refers to is that Britain was in no mood to confront Hitler. Australia’s political establishment was taking its lead from Britain.
But the Press Gallery journalists were doing what they do best. Ringing around getting multiple perspectives from multiple sources, including their counterparts overseas. They were forming a very different picture of what Hitler was up to and the serious threat he posed.
Joe Alexander had another scoop. He had learned that Australia’s top diplomat in London – former Prime Minister Stanley Bruce - was essentially “preaching appeasement of Hitler” in the lead-up to the Munich agreement.
Back home in Canberra, the Munich crisis began to unfold when journalist Harold Cox received a leak from an unusual source.
A bank manager had accidentally intercepted a telephone call between Australia’s ambassador in London, Stanley Bruce, and Prime Minister Joseph Lyons. Lyons was urging Bruce to go to Rome and see if the Pope could intervene and help deliver an agreement with Hitler in Munich.
After speaking with their sources much of the Press Gallery felt this was a dangerous idea.
At the time Pope Pius XII also felt he could negotiate with Hitler.
Harold Cox rapidly secured his source so one would get the story out ahead of him. He then contacted the prime minister and presented his intel.
The prime minister and Harold Cox then negotiated the release of the story.
The political establishment in Canberra was hoping Germany would turn east toward Russia and attack rather than toward Britain. The Second World War was declared on 1 September 1939.
“I said I'm simply telling you this I'm not asserting it's true… and he said every word of it is true. There has been a very bad leakage.”
— Harold Cox, Former Press Gallery Journalist
