Meston's Wild Australia Show

ABC Radio National 'Arts Today' Michael Aird Guests: Photographic historian. Curator, Wild Australia: Meston's Wild Australia Show, University of Queensland Anthropology Museum Mandana Mapar and Photo media artist and curator, Wild Australia: Meston's Wild Australia Show, University of Queensland's Anthropology Museum

In the 1890s a ‘troupe’ of Aboriginal people travelled Australia to perform a sort of Wild West Show, under the wing of charismatic journalist, politician and entrepreneur Archibald Meston. The venture failed, and Meston effectively abandoned the 27 performers in Melbourne, but not before the actors were photographed and their images sold as postcards. Aboriginal curator and photography specialist Michael Aird has been interested in these images for a long time, and with Mandana Mapar and researcher Paul Memmott has put together an exhibition that opens tomorrow at the University of Queensland's Anthropology Museum.