Bundjalung woman and arts powerhouse Rhoda Roberts has spent decades shining on an international and national stage.

She talks to Liina Flynn at the Lismore App about her life as a writer, actor, radio star and event director; how she grew up with racism, a prominent preacher father - and dealt with the tragic death of her twin sister.

Now, in 2021, Rhoda said she’s now happy to be home, working on Bundjalung Country as NORPA’s inaugural Creative Director First Nations.

“It was hard to get job in this town,” Rhoda laughed. “Everyone thinks I’ve moved back to the region, but I’ve been travelling home regularly for years

“I bought a property at Jackie Bulbin Flats years ago and lived on a property with no power - and saved money to finished the build.

“My arts advocate and patron, Steven Field is a builder and sandstone mason – he helped me built it with love.”

NORPA

After being the Head of Indigenous Programming at the Sydney Opera House for nine years - as well as running major arts festivals such as Festival of Dreaming and Partijima, she’s now happy to slow down a little.

“It’s great to now be working part time at a venue in regional Australia on the lands of my Widjabal Wiabal people,” she said.

“I never expected it – all those years living overseas, now I’ve come back home and secured a position in the Northern Rivers.

“I’ve been on the NORPA board for a while – they have always encouraged working with Elders and building capacity to tell the stories of First Nations peoples.

“There are so many stories to tell and I’m looking forward to developing talks and programs.”

Beginnings

Rhoda was born in Sydney’s Canturbury Hospital in 1958. She spent the first years of her life in Sydney before her father, Widjabal man and preacher Frank Roberts jnr,

became homesick – and in 1963 decided to move the family back to Lismore

“Australia was a redneck country at the time and my father was dedicated to making life better or Indigenous people,” she said.

“My dad was appointed to the Australian Mission Board and his job was going to Aboriginal missions and bringing attention to the poverty and shanty dwellings there.

“So, we moved back to Lismore and lived on the outskirts and I went to Lismore heights Primary School and Richmond River High School.”

Rhoda Roberts and NORPA creative director Julian Louis.

True love story

Rhoda said her mother and devout father getting together was a “true love story”.

“Dad grew with my granny in a shanty on Country at Cubawee (and Lismore Council bulldozed it on her).

“Dad moved to Greenwich to do theological studies - and mum was a third generation white Australian,” she said.

“At the time, Aboriginal people lived under apartheid and were still classified as flora and fauna and fauna. Dad lived under the protection act and curfews applied to him.

“They met at a meeting - she noticed him and thought ‘who’s that?’ and he saw her and thought ‘she will be my wife’, then they fell in love.

“My mum didn’t listen when people said a child of colour didn’t work - it was about how you brought someone up and honouring blood lines and building relationships with both sides of the family.

“Mum taught me the classics at a young age and would always pull us up on our grammar and said we needed to outsmart and outclass other people, to them show them

were equals.”

Lismore

“When the family moved back to Lismore, dad set up a language centre and the Bundjalung Tribal Society,” she said.

“He wanted to access about 35 houses across Lismore so Aboriginal people could rent them, but real estates had a different assumption about what that might mean.

“Through the Bundjalung Tribal Society, dad wanted to start a newsletter and became the first chairman of the Koori Mail Board – along with all the uncles.

“They developed it into national Indigenous newspaper The Koori Mail - then dad set up Namitjira Haven at Alstonville.

“He always looked at things through a compassionate lens – it was to help Australians come to terms with the atrocities that still happen every day to Indigenous people.

“Every day, when a house is sold, it is an act of theft against Indigenous people. We needed teach a better understanding of why our Mob would self medicate.

“We needed to educate everyone and create opportunities and prospects for us – to create pride in being Aboriginal.

Visionary

“Dad was a visionary, so was his father and grandfather – and it obviously made a big mark on me.

“My grandfather Lyle Roberts senior was the last senor initiated Bundjalung man – in the time when cedar cutters were destroying the Big Scrub and rivers were used as transportation.

“As Lismore was being built, he could see the greed and theft and the white approach to success and could see it was here to stay.

“He wrote some core principles for us to live by – and you can read it on a plaque in Spinks Park.

“He said as Bundjalung people, we always retain pride in race and colour and retain our identity in language – and consider our relationships to make a future world.

“He knew it would take time for change because most Australians had no understanding of ecology and bloodlines.

“For me, the creative industries became a platform to be able to express our insights and communicate our messages to the wider audience.”

School and racism

“I wanted to be a journalist, but Lismore in the early 70s I was advised by my school careers advisor teacher that even though I was biracial, I would end up like cousins on the mission.

“That career advice was destroying - but I’m glad I had to prove her wrong. She had no belief we could reach benchmarks.

“I was a good student and didn’t miss a day of school. From the age of 16, even the careers advisor at Richmond River High made me aware I had no value as an Aboriginal woman in our society.

“I was brought up to believe by my parents that you can achieve anything if you work hard - so, I did communications and journalism studies.

“I had been volunteering as a nursing candy striper and saw a total lack of empathy for our people – dad always encouraged us to volunteer.

Nurse

“At Lismore Base Hospital, a matron interviewed me and told me girls like me would never be a nursing sister, but I could be a nursing aid.

“Luckily my mother was a strong independent woman and said I should go to Sydney and be a registered nurse

“I graduated then cam back home and celebrated with my parents - my mum was proud I was a registered nursing sister.

“Before that, I worked at Woolies, and when I left, HR there told me I’d be back in six weeks because ‘my lot won’t last at anything’. I came back and said ‘you were wrong, I did achieve this’.

London

“Then I went off to London. I travelled overseas and worked and had a stable career.

"Then I left nursing to study in the arts in 1987.

“My mum was shocked I gave up the security for a career in arts.

TV and radio

“My school drama teacher had inspired me to be a writer and actress. I got some acting work making a guest appearance on A Country Practice and Home and Away.

“Then I got involved with playwriting and the National Aboriginal Theatre Trust in the 1980s and I took the role as assistant director of writing.

“I was volunteering for Radio Redfern and it was through those shows that the ABC offered me a job on national radio, then on TV.

“I was the first Aboriginal to host a prime time national affairs show - Vox Populi and also Instyle on Channel Ten.

“I was skinny then,” Rhoda laughed.

Olympics

“Then the Olympics came to Australia in 1993-94 and SOCOC employed me to direct the cultural Olympiad program.

“They has seen a show I did at a festival - and invited me to work with David Page from Bangarra on the opening ceremony.

“It was an opportunity to share and make sure we represented our culture in the right way. After that, we started the Deadly Awards and grew that over the years.

Opera House

“In the 1990’s, I was on the board of the Opera House – at the time, there was no Aboriginal programming or resident companies and we chose Bangarra.

“I spent nine years on the board of the Opera House, then took up the position as Head of Indigenous Progamming there.

“It was a wonderful opportunity and when I finally left, I knew it was time to move on.

“When Covid came, I wanted more control with what I did and I wanted to freelance more.

“It feels good to have set it up for the next great person to come along.

“We brought change through narrative and showcased our art and diversity – it was a brave thing to do because we were taking risks.

“In 1995 I founded the Festival of Dreaming and was its director until 2009.

Songlines

“At the Opera House, looked at gaps in the market and built capacity and increased increase audiences – including First Nations audiences.

“We increased the visibility of our culture – even using the sails of the Opera House to project the Songlines project onto.

“We were looking at our endangered languages and it happened because language was outlawed by government policies. We needed to disperse myths about the cultural bases of our societies because so much of what was written about it was inaccurate.

“It was an important project that brought awareness to the fact that in urban environments, as well as all territories across Australia, Aboriginal lands were unceeded and the response we got was great.

Dance Rites

“We also developed Dance Rites because dance was also outlawed and we created a platform and space to reactivate and give new energy to a people whose children had been kidnapped and elders incarcerated.

“I also wrote a performance called ‘Natives Gone Wild’ which was about how Indigenous people had been kidnapped and dehumanised to be included in Barnam’s human zoo. I wanted to change the narrative and make people see our history.”

Partijima

Rhoda was also curator of Partijima, a Festival of Light in Alice Springs.

“We used lots of Aboriginal artwork and told the stories of thousands of years through light installations.

“The festival took a few years to grow, but now it is a unique festival.

“Now, it’s a compliment to me that whether I am in urban or regional environment’s, the fact our senior artists, law men, dancers, painters and story tellers trust me with their work is the greatest review you can get.

Tragedy

In 1998, Rhoda’s twin sister Lois Roberts was found dead in a forest near Nimbin. Her death remains an unsolved murder to this day.

It’s something Rhoda said she still thinks about “every day upon waking and sleeping”.

“Her greatest gift to me has been the opportunity for me to raise her daughter Emily,” she said. “It’s quite normal in Aboriginal culture to raise children with family members. 

“Lois’s death reminds me about the valuing of out women – so many Aboriginal women and men have gone missing and it has been discredited by police when we try to report it.

“We said we didn’t know what had happened to her and we were upset and worried.

“The police said stop being a nuisance – she’s gone walkabout. She wasn’t valued or investigated. 

“These days, the Black Lives Matter (BLM) movement is looking at structural changes needed in our society to change this.

“In Lismore, when the German backpacker woman Simone was murdered, we saw the police investigating.

“We even saw the mayor, who lives on our land, encourage community to do a fundraiser for her boyfriend – but not for a woman who grew up here all her life

“Now BLM is the catalyst, along with Covid, for us to review ourselves.

“It’s time for us to change, be inclusive and see kindness in all things.”

Rhoda has also been awarded an order of Australian medal for distinguished service to the performing arts through a range of leadership and advocacy roles in the development, promotion and presentation of contemporary Indigenous culture".