‘It tells the story that we’re not good enough’: why isn’t an Indigenous creative agency selling the Voice?

“Why was a non-Indigenous agency hired to do potentially the most important job in history for our people?” said Peter Kirk, co-founder of Indigenous creative agency Campfire X. 

“If it’s not Indigenous-led, it’s just another campaign. If it’s not Indigenous-led, it tells the story that we’re not good enough.”

In September, ad agency The Monkeys — on behalf of the Uluru Dialogue Group — pioneered the push for a Yes vote in the referendum on a Voice to Parliament. The campaign was called “History is Calling” and pitched a case for constitutional recognition of First Nations peoples to the Australian public.

The campaign was commissioned by the very group that called for an Indigenous Voice (together with Makarrata to open the door to treaty and truth-telling) in the 2017 Uluru Statement From the Heart. The messaging has come from it, but Kirk said that without Indigenous people on the front foot of the creative process, the campaign comes from the wrong place.

“It’s an Indigenous referendum,” he told Crikey. “It’s about Indigenous people having a voice. It’s about telling Australia that Aboriginal people are good enough to have a voice. And what they’ve done is send a message that Aboriginal people are not good enough.

“Now when they reach out to mob, the first question they’ll be asked is ‘Who worked on it, brother? Who worked on it, sister? ’”

Sydney- and Melbourne-based advertising firm The Monkeys was the agency responsible for the ad and did not respond to a request for comment on First Nations involvement in the creative process by deadline.

Arrernte and Kalkadoon man and award-winning cinematographer Tyson Perkins was part of the ad’s production and said the filming side of things was handled with integrity and a high level of Aboriginal representation. 

“Obviously on shows like Mystery Road we’ve had more Aboriginal cast and crew and creatives, but for an ad, it was definitely the highest level of Aboriginal participation that I have experienced on set,” he said. 

As well as Perkins, the spot was directed by Kamilaroi man Jordan Watton and composed by Yuwaalaraay man James Henry, and many of the cast were Indigenous. Perkins was clear that his role was rooted in production and he could not speak to the “nuts and bolts of the creative process behind the idea development”.

CEO of First Nations Media Australia Shane Hearn said it was critical for the creative industry to understand that Aboriginal content must involve Aboriginal people from idea inception to campaign creation.

“The whole thing is the voice,” he said. “The Aboriginal songline needs to go from start to finish. It’s not good enough just to have input or output, we need to be part of the horizontal and vertical of things.

“To my knowledge, none of us saw a brief, none of us were invited, it didn’t go through a formal process. Why not? We as a collection of professionals have lots to offer the creative industry.”

Hearn said the lack of due process was symptomatic of an industry that is “a siren of white privilege” and heavily insulated from the realities of Aboriginal Australia. Despite a dire need for diversification and due diligence, he maintained advertising was the correct medium to communicate the ins and outs of the Voice to Parliament.

The government is gearing up for a big neutral (neither Yes nor No) educational campaign on the Voice. Led by the Australian Electoral Commission, it will tap into primarily procedural politics — how to vote and what to look out for. 

To vote in the referendum you must be enrolled. And that is where Leigh Harris, creative director of Cairns Indigenous agency Ingeous Studios, said the campaign really fell flat.

As of June 2022, 81.2% of the Indigenous voting age population were enrolled to vote, up from 79.3% in June 2021 and 78% in June 2020. Compare that with the 97.1% (up from 96.2% and before that 96.5%) June 2022, 2021 and 2020 enrolment rates for all eligible Australian voters.

“You’ve got this big thing at the moment but they should have been running the campaign long ago to get blackfellas to enrol to vote,” Harris said. “As an Aboriginal man, I’m a bit bewildered by all of it.”

Crikey contacted the Uluru Dialogue but did not hear back by deadline.