Painting connections to Sea Country: Creative pathways for mangrove restoration
Mangrove restoration works best when it starts by listening to Sea Country.
On Yirrganydji Sea Country (Cairns), a recent workshop explored how creative, community-led approaches can help ensure restoration reflects cultural knowledge, relationships, and responsibilities to place.
Co-developed with the Yirrganydji Gurabana Aboriginal Corporation (YGAC), the workshop brought together Yirrganydji community members across generations to walk through mangroves, share stories, and explore artistic ways of expressing connections to Sea Country. The activities form part of a broader research effort to strengthen how Indigenous knowledge informs restoration planning and decision-making.
Walking on Sea Country: reconnecting with mangroves through experience
The workshop began with a guided walk-through the local mangrove system on Yirrganydji Sea Country. Led by Gavin Singleton (Chair of YGAC), participants moved through the landscape together, observing plants and animals, sharing memories, and reflecting on the role mangroves play in supporting culture, livelihoods, and wellbeing.
For many participants, the walk created space to reconnect with places that hold ongoing meaning for families and community. It also helped frame mangroves not only as ecological systems, but as living cultural landscapes shaped by long-standing relationships between people and Sea Country.
Moments like these are critical in restoration contexts, where technical priorities often dominate early planning stages, but cultural relationships remain central to long-term stewardship.
Participants walking on Yirrganydji Sea Country, followed by a creative workshop where different art forms were used to express connections to mangroves.
Creating space for expression through art and storytelling
Following the time spent on Sea Country, participants came together for a collaborative art-based workshop led by CNPS researchers (Alexandra Rodriguez, Maria Palacios, Jasmine Pearson) that created space to explore connections to mangroves through creative expression and dialogue. Rather than relying on conventional consultation tools such as surveys or structured interviews, the workshop supported people to share knowledge through drawing, storytelling and conversation, allowing values and perspectives to emerge in more nuanced and embodied ways.
As a Yirrganydji community member reflected:
“What we're doing today is culture, empowering… empowering in a whole and subtle way.”
The workshop also created space for collective discussion about how restoration projects can better support outcomes on Sea Country, demonstrating how creative engagement can strengthen dialogue between Aboriginal knowledge systems and Western restoration practice.
Bringing generations together on Country
A key strength of the workshop was the participation of community members across age groups, including young people, adults, and Elders, each contributing different experiences and perspectives.
This intergenerational exchange helped surface memories of place, responsibilities to future generations, and aspirations for how restoration should be approached locally. It also reinforced the importance of creating engagement spaces that are relational, inclusive, and grounded in Sea Country.
Yirrganydji community members Aunty Patricia Singleton, Nicole Chatfield, Shannon Shaw, Sarah Szydzik, Raelee Singleton, Bernie Singleton, Tarquin Singleton, Tandia Singleton, and Uncle George Singleton made this workshop possible through their reflections and active participation, generously sharing their knowledge and experiences.
Yirrganydji participants in the workshop holding their creative artwork.
About the project: empowering Indigenous voices in restoration
This workshop forms part of the project “Empowering Indigenous Voices in Nature Restoration Through Creative Decision Tools” co-designed by RMIT’s Centre for Nature Positive Solutions and the Yirrganydji Gurabana Aboriginal Corporation.
The project proposes to co-create an Indigenous-led, art-based process with the Yirrganydji people to express, document, and share cultural values connected to mangrove ecosystems. It explores how creative approaches can strengthen the role of Traditional Owner knowledge in shaping restoration planning from the earliest stages.
As part of the proof-of-concept phase, the team is:
- supporting co-design workshops on Sea Country
- trialling art-based engagement approaches
- working alongside Yirrganydji artists, craftspeople and community practitioners
- identifying culturally meaningful ways to express connections to mangroves
- developing early components of a relational values toolkit for restoration engagement.
This emerging toolkit is intended to support practitioners and communities to better recognise and integrate relationships to Sea Country within conservation and restoration processes.