The Canning Stock Route is a place where Indigenous and non-Indigenous histories intersect. First surveyed by Alfred Canning in 1906, it is the longest historic stock route in the world, running almost 2,000 kilometres across Western Australia, from Halls Creek to Wiluna. The development of this venture dramatically affected the lives of the Aboriginal people who lived in the region traversed by the stock route. For many years, however, the story of the stock route was told as a white man’s story. The works in the collection recognise that this story goes back much further and is held firmly in the hearts and minds of the Aboriginal people who lived there.

The Yiwarra Kuju exhibition tells the story of the Canning Stock Route’s impact on Aboriginal people, and the importance of the Country that surrounds it, through the works of senior and emerging artists and the stories of traditional custodians.

The exhibition reveals the richness of desert life. It tells a story of contact, conflict and survival, of exodus and return, seen through Aboriginal eyes, and interpreted through their voices, art and new media.