The Sea of Hands is ANTaR's primary public education initiative and Australia's largest public art installation. The Sea of Hands has been installed in every major city and many regional locations throughout Australia, and continues to gather signatures everywhere it appears.

You can add your hand to the Sea of Hands online and by doing so you will add your voice to the growing number of Australians calling for

• justice for Indigenous peoples;
• for the right to be themselves, to enjoy their cultures, languages, laws and traditions; and
• to have their rights to land and cultural heritage respected and protected.

About the Sea of Hands

Over 300,000 Australians have signed their names on one of 120,000 plastic hands that make up the Sea of Hands, to show their support for Native Title and Reconciliation.

The Sea of Hands was created in 1997 as a powerful, physical representation of the Citizen's Statement on Native Title.

The Citizen's Statement was a petition circulated by ANTaR to mobilise non-Indigenous support for native title and reconciliation, at a time when native title rights were under serious threat from the Howard Government's proposed changes to the Native Title Act 1993 (see our page on Native Title).

Plastic hands in the colours of the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander flags, each one carrying one signature from the Citizen's Statement, were installed in front of Parliament House in Canberra in October 1997, in what was then the largest public art installation in Australia.

The Sea of Hands has become a symbol of the People's Movement for reconciliation - and a tangible recognition of the failure of the Howard Government to lead Australia in the reconciliation process.

Wherever possible, the Sea of Hands reproduces designs by a local Indigenous artists.

The Sea of Hands has been installed in every major city and many regional locations throughout Australia, and continues to gather signatures everywhere it appears.

Hold your own Sea of Hands event

The Sea of Hands is fundamentally a locally-focused reconciliation activity. Many local reconciliation groups and other community groups, such as churches, schools, universities, local events committees, etc, have staged small Sea of Hands events (which we call "puddles") of various sizes. This may involve anything from a few hundred to many thousands of hands.

Check with your local ANTaR group to find out how your organisation can hold its own Sea of Hands event.

How it all started

The Sea of Hands was preceded by a petition, the Citizen's Statement on Native Title, which quickly attracted thousands of signatories. The Citizen's Statement was authored by Phil Glendenning (ANTaR's previous National President) and launched in early 1997 by Charles Perkins and others at the Harold Park Hotel in Sydney.

Realising that petitions presented to Parliament rarely have much of an impact, the organisers sought a way of producing a more effective and lasting result. The idea of a field of white hands in rows was conceived, like the white crosses of war cemeteries.

Australian Artists Against Racism (AAAR) was asked to develop the proposal and came up with the idea of coloured hands in the colours of the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander flags, planted in a design. The name 'Sea of Hands' was also conceived at this time.

Turning the Sea of Hands into a reality required finding an appropriate medium (a strong, light, flexible, colourful, re-cyclable plastic was chosen), support mechanism (wire), developing the basic shape, producing templates and dies, organising a storage system and developing an operational plan.

The Christian Brothers in Balmain provided funding to assist in manufacturing the hands and premises for their storage, together with office space for ANTaR's National Clearing House. Many volunteers were involved in assembling and boxing the hands and many others in helping to organise Sea of Hands events.

Sea of Hands, Canberra 1997The first Sea of Hands was held on the 12 October 1997. 70,000 coloured plastic hands, each one carrying one signature from the Citizen's Statement, were installed in front of Parliament House in Canberra. Highlights of the event were speeches by Mrs Typingoompa, the Wik traditional owner who danced in front of the High Court following the Court's Wik decision and Camilla Cowley, a non-indigenous pastroralist from Queensland who embraced the concept of coexistence rather than extinguishment of native title.

Six weeks later the Sea of Hands returned to Parliament House, this time with 120,000 hands, to launch a blueprint for a coexistence approach to native title. So popular was the first Sea of Hands in Canberra that over 500 volunteers turned up before work on the day to help plant the hands! The blueprint launched that day, "Six Steps to Coexistence", was endorsed by all the major opposition parties and representatives from national peak organisations.