Council

Jodie Sizer - Chairperson

Ms Jodie Sizer is a Djap Wurrung/Gunditjmara woman, and part of the Framlingham Community of South West Victoria. 

Jodie is one of the Co-Founders and Co-CEOs of PwC’s Indigenous Consulting, a majority Aboriginal owned, purpose led organising professional services firm leading innovation, impact and change with and for Aboriginal communities across Australia. Jodie is also Director on the Boards of Wathaurong Glass and Arts, the Ebony Institute and the Collingwood Football Club.

Jodie commenced her career in the community controlled sector, further graduated to work as an auditor and qualified Accountant (CPA), she possesses a strong background in corporate governance and is a graduate of the University of Melbourne Asia-Australia New Leaders Program.

Jodie has also worked in Indigenous organisations and government. She was an ATSIC Regional Councillor, a finalist in the Telstra Business Women of the Year award, listed in the Australian Women's Who's Who publication, inducted on the Victorian Women's Honour roll, recipient of the Prime Minister's Centenary medal and listed as one of the Australian Financial Review's 100 Women of Influence. Jodie was recently appointed to the Council of the Australia Institute of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies (AIATSIS).

Ash Walker

Ash Walker is a Dharawal/ Dhurga man belonging to the La Perouse Aboriginal community in Coastal Sydney and works in the Investment Team of Yamanah Investments. Previously, Ash has worked as a management consultant at Boston Consulting Group, a corporate lawyer at Gilbert + Tobin and as Acting CEO of the La Perouse Local Aboriginal Land Council.

Ash holds a Master in Business Administration (Distinction) from the University of Oxford and a Bachelor of Laws/ Bachelor of Commerce from the University of New South Wales. Ash Walker is a Dharawal/ Dhurga man belonging to the La Perouse Aboriginal community in Coastal Sydney and works in the Investment Team of Yamanah Investments. Previously, Ash has worked as a management consultant at Boston Consulting Group, a corporate lawyer at Gilbert + Tobin and as Acting CEO of the La Perouse Local Aboriginal Land Council.

Dr Clint Bracknell

Dr Clint Bracknell is a proud Wirlomin Noongar musician and researcher from the south coast of Western Australia.

He is currently Associate Professor at the Western Australian Academy of Performing Arts and Kurongkurl Katitjin Centre for Indigenous Australian Education and Research, Edith Cowan University. 

Henerietta Marrie AM

Henrietta Marrie AM (Masters in Environmental and Local Government Law; Diploma T; Grad. Diploma of Arts [Indigenous Studies]).

Elder of the Gimuy Walubara Yidinj people, traditional owners of the land on which Cairns now stands. Wide experience in Indigenous cultural and natural resource management and impact assessment, intellectual property law, heritage legislation and philanthropy. Henrietta has over 50 papers published in academic books and journals.  Henrietta has served six years in the UN Secretariat of the Convention on Biological Diversity in Montreal (1997-2003) and nine years as Program Manager Northern Australia with The Christensen Fund, a California-based private philanthropic fund (2003-2012).

A Visiting Fellow with United Nations University – Institute for the Advanced Study of Sustainability based in Tokyo (2012-2016). She is also Patron First Nations of the Cairns Indigenous Art Fair.  Listed among the Westpac and Australian Financial Review 100 Women of Influence for 2014 for her work in public policy. Made a Member of the Order of Australia (26 January 2018) and recognised as a Queensland Great (8 June 2018). Member of the Queensland Human Right Commission’s Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Advisory Group and the Commonwealth’s National Cultural Heritage Committee. Her life and accomplishments were dramatized in a play Bukal produced by the JUTE Theatre Company (Cairns) in association with CQUniversity in 2018.

Judith Ryan AM

Judith Ryan received a BA Honours in Fine Arts and English Literature at the University of Melbourne in 1970 and a Certificate in Education at Oxford University in 1972. She began her Art Museum career in 1977 at the National Gallery of Victoria where she is currently the Senior Curator of Indigenous Art. Judith's special interest is Indigenous Australian art of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries – its diversity, dynamism and transformation in the face of social change.

Judith has curated about fifty exhibitions of Indigenous art and has published widely in the field. Judith is currently working on TIWI, a major exhibition and publication scheduled for 18 September 2020 – 31 January 2021. In 2017 Judith was awarded a Member of the Order of Australia in the General Division ‘For significant service to the visual arts, particularly to the museums and galleries sector, as a curator of Indigenous exhibitions and as an author.’

Murray Saylor

Murray Saylor is a Samsep man from Erub (Darnley Island) in the Torres Strait. Murray’s passion and drive are focused on Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander cultural, ecological and economic sustainability. Murray has over 20 years of diverse experience in the fields of Government, Defence, Community Development, Indigenous affairs and Resource sectors.

Murray is the founder/Managing Director of Tagai Management Consultants, a company driven to work respectfully with clients in the Australia and Asia/Pacific region to deliver market leading procurement/supply chain management, business advisory, innovative futures, and stakeholder engagement services. In 2019, Tagai Management Consultants were presented with the Innovation in Business award by the Ipswich Business Chamber, and in 2018 was selected as one of 100 faces of Small business in Queensland.

Bart Pigram

Bart, a proud Wajarri/Yawaru man from Broome, Western Australia is the owner/operator of Narlijia Experiences, one of the few Aboriginal experiences on offer in Broome.

Bart is currently a director of Goolarri Media Enterprises and formally a Yawaru PBC Director. Bart has been involved in several successful cultural heritage projects in Broome over the past six years including the award winning ‘Lustre – Pearling and Australia’ travelling exhibition with the WA Museum.

Sue Kee

Sue is a long standing AIATSIS member and has a Bachelor of Arts Honours degree in Anthropology and a Bachelor of Law with Honours.

Sue has been a Council member at the Law Institute of Victoria, is currently a Senior Lawyer at 32 Degrees South Law and will bring a unique combination of professional skills in anthropology/archaeology and commercial law.

Dr Myfany Turpin

Dr Myfany Turpin is a linguist and ethnomusicologist at the University of Sydney. She holds an Australian Research Council Future Fellowship to investigate the relationship between words and music in Aboriginal songs in central Australia. She has been conducting research with Aboriginal communities since 1994. Her research focuses on Aboriginal song-poetry and Arandic languages.

Her research on the Kaytetye language resulted in a co-authored encyclopaedic dictionary, picture dictionary and collection of stories with Kaytetye speaker Alison Ross. She has written scholarly articles in the areas of semantics, music, phonology and ethnobiology and produced audio-visual publications of Aboriginal songs.

She supports school language and culture programs in central Australia and works with local organisations to produce resources and provide opportunities for Aboriginal people to assist them in their struggle for cultural and linguistic survival.

She is a member of the Musicological Society of Australia and the Australian Linguistics Society and is a member of the organising committee for the 2017 Linguistics conference.