In the 1970s, an upper-class Englishwoman and botanical illustrator, Vera Scarth-Johnson, settled in Cooktown, a coastal spot in far north Queensland at the mouth of the Endeavour River, where the town’s namesake, explorer James Cook, beached his ship for repairs some 200 years earlier.

The late Scarth-Johnson was an explorer too, and being a natural scientist would send floral specimens back to Britain, just as 18th century botanist Joseph Banks did during Cook’s journey.

Vera Scarth-Johnson

She knew it was essential, however, to understand the Indigenous knowledge that underpinned the plants she painted, so she went to the local Guugu Yimithirr people, and struck up a friendship with an elder, the late Tulo Gordon, who would take her out on Country.

Vera and Tulo painted and yarned together, while the Guugu Yimithirr mob would come to refer to Vera as “wauru ngul-gu-rra-than”, or innermost beauty, says poet and librettist Jan Black, who has spent four years passionately researching the story.

“Tulo would go and stay at Vera’s place, and he’d play his guitar and they’d have a couple of glasses of red.”

Black has co-created the Cooktown Cantata: Songs of Place, Love and Identity, a vocal chamber...