Marriage: Love and Law exhibition catalogue - Flipbook - Page 135
CONCLUDING
THOUGHTS
‘Oh, Lizzy! do anything rather than marry without affection’,
urged Jane Bennet to her sister Elizabeth upon the shock revelation
that she and Mr Darcy were engaged. Jane Austen’s 1797 novel
Pride and Prejudice captures a moment in time in which the reason
to marry was shifting away from long-held traditions associated
with entitlement, towards those that privileged love. In the Colony
of NSW—a place where the likes of Mr Darcy and Elizabeth Bennet
were few in number—marriage was to be encouraged. Authorities,
such as Governor Lachlan Macquarie, took a paternalistic and
pragmatic approach towards this, their message being less about
love and more about stability, morality and respectability.
Fast forward to the present, more than 200 years after Austen first penned her
words, and it would be difficult to imagine that Australian couples would enter
the institution of marriage for any reason greater than love. What comes after
a marriage is celebrated, however, as printmaker Jan McKay asked in her 1977
work, After the confetti, what?, is another issue. Marriages succeed, marriages
fail and marriages are remade. And in many cases, marriages are consciously
not made.
The exhibition project Marriage: Love and Law has engaged with the story
of an enduring institution through the lens of the work of the State. In telling
this history, it becomes clear that marriage is a concept that has been shaped
and reshaped over time, not only by the State, but equally by society.
However, like many stories, this one remains incomplete. New insights into
the past will be formed, and alternative perspectives drawn. In the future,
will ‘marriage’ and ‘love’ stay in step? Or will new ‘partners’ join the dance?
Whichever way the tale of love-meets-law plays out, it’s sure to be one
worth telling.
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