A provocative, participatory installation that reinvents our national currency as a celebration of Aboriginal history. Step up to artist Ryan Presley’s Blood Money Currency Exchange Terminal, where you can swap your Australian dollars for ‘Blood Money’ (AKA limited edition prints).

Blood Money Currency Exchange Terminal is the latest in a series of works exploring contemporary Australian history through the lens of important Aboriginal figures, with valuable lessons to teach on the legacies of dispossession and oppression.

Presley has redesigned Australia’s banknotes to feature Aboriginal people as the key figures. The public is invited to purchase BMD – Blood Money Dollars – from an exchange booth. All funds raised go to Aboriginal youth organisations.

Born in Alice Springs, Presley works across different media – drawing, painting, etching and installation – to unpack the social, political and cultural baggage Australians have been gathering since first contact. Challenging the iconography of Australia’s distinctively colourful, high-tech banknotes, and replacing white faces with those of Yagan, Truganini, Vincent Lingiari, Oodgeroo Noonuccal, and Fanny Cochrane Smith among others, Presley zooms in on the fundamental values of our nation and asks the question: Australia’s Aboriginal history – what’s it worth to you?