Exhibition People Movement Stories opened
The exhibition ‘Australia and the Netherlands. People Movement Stories’ opened at the National Archives. In it, twelve people tell the story of their migration to either Australia or the Netherlands.
These twelve people share their motivations and give an insight into what happened during the journey and arrival in their new home, among other things. Based on the personal stories, the visitors travel with these migrants. The exhibition connects that story with official government documents, films and photographs. The visitors thus discover how the migration movement between the two countries changed over time and how migrants reshaped their lives after arrival.
The opening of the exhibition marks the kick-off of the expansion of the migrant.huygens.knaw.nl website to include five new stories and digitised collections from National Archives Australia and National Archives Netherlands. Migrants leave traces in the document collections of local, regional and national archives, as well as in image databases and multimedia archives, both in the country of departure and in the country of destination.
Cooperation and connection
Within the International Heritage Cooperation Programme, the National Archives is working with the National Archives Australia to digitise these archives and make them accessible online. With the Migrant, Mobilities and Connection (MIGRANT) project, the Huygens Institute is developing methods to digitally connect these dispersed migrant collections.
The exhibition at the National Archives was opened by Australia’s ambassador to the Netherlands, Dr Greg French. It was created in 2022 to mark eighty years of diplomatic relations between the Netherlands and Australia and was also previously on display in Perth, Australia. The exhibition was financially made possible by the Australian Embassy in The Hague and the Dutch Embassy in Canberra.
People Movement Stories is freely accessible and can be visited until 2 February 2024 from Tuesday to Friday between 10 a.m. and 5 p.m. at the Nationaal Archief’s public centre.
