The National Film and Sound Archive of Australia has appointed archivist, producer, academic and storyteller Pauline Clague as its Head of First Nations Engagement.
A Yaegl woman from the North Coast of NSW, Clague will drive the NFSA’s strategy governing the collection, interpretation and protocols for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Island artefacts, and lead a dedicated First Nations Engagement team to amplify First Nations voices across all NFSA activities.
Based at the NFSA’s Sydney office, Clague will continue the institution’s work in cultural advocacy, building relationships with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities and driving a First Nations-led program of digital access and repatriation to ensure knowledge and collection content is accessible and useful to communities of origin.
Most recently Associate Professor, Manager of Cultural Resilience Hub at the Jumbunna Institute for Indigenous Education (UTS), Clague has more than 30 years’ experience in the screen industry. She was series producer of the ABC’s ‘Message Stick’ and of SBS’s The Deadly Awards and became Commissioning Editor and Head of Internal Productions at
NITV, where she launched the landmark series ‘Our Stories, Our Way, Everyday’. Her most recent documentary ‘The Colleano Heart’ aired on SBS Television earlier this year.
Clague was the founder and Artistic Director of the Winda Film Festival in Sydney, a programmer for the imagineNATIVE festival in Toronto and the co-creator of the NativeSlam film challenge in Aotearoa New Zealand. In 2015, she was awarded the Stanley
Hayes Award for Contribution to Australian Documentaries.
‘We are genuinely honoured that Pauline has chosen to join the team at the NFSA,’ said Patrick McIntyre, the NFSA’s CEO. ‘Pauline is a senior leader in First Nations audiovisual
practice. She brings deep archival, creative and managerial skills along with exceptional relationships in the field across the country and internationally. Her incredible experience in
community engagement and consultation will bring great depth, nuance and creativity to our work.’
Pauline Clague added ‘I am very excited to work with the NFSA to strengthen the archiving space for audiovisual material and for the national and cultural interest of our First Nations
practitioners and community. It is an area I have been passionate about for many years and look forward to building on what the team have started in the past few years.’ Clague will commence at the NFSA on April 7th.
Image available here on Dropbox.
Media enquiries:
Louise Alley | Communications Manager, NFSA | 0422 348 652 | louise.alley@nfsa.gov.au
