In consideration of Indigenous cultural protocols, SBS/NITV has gained permission to use and reproduce Rhoda's name, voice and image. We are doing so in line with her wishes. We also continue to consult with her family and community.
'Elder, leader and cultural storyteller' Aunty Rhoda Roberts AO has been mourned in a moving funeral service celebrating her life and many achievements.
The Widjabul Wieybal woman from the Bundjalung nation was farewelled in Lismore, her childhood home and ancestral Country, on Tuesday.
NITV acknowledges that Widjabul Wieybal is also spelt Widjabul Wia-bal or Widjabul Wiyabal.
The pews of St Carthages in Lismore were filled long before the service honouring her life began, the cathedral's 900-person capacity insufficient for accommodating the many who came to honour her passing.
A smoking ceremony greeted mourners entering the cathedral, and the arrival of Deacon Graeme Davis and Reverend Denise Savage was accompanied by the powerful call of the yidaki, played by her son.
A tireless defender of Indigenous tradition, and the daughter of a pastor, Uncle Frank Roberts, it was a blend of religion and culture of which she would have approved.
Roberts' children, Jack and Sarah Roberts-Field, shared personal memories of their mother, who had touched so many.
"To spend just a moment with Rhoda felt like the greatest gift. She was our mother, but she wasn't only ours," said Sarah.
"Mum was the kindest person I've known in my life so far. Her kindness was unmatched. If you lost a leg, she would have broken hers to give it to you."
She spoke of her mother's dedication to First Nations cultures and communities, something she did not do for accolades but rather from a sense of obligation to her people.
"She taught me respect for Country and people, to always offer a cuppa to Aunt and Uncle.
"To listen to the wind and water, and to known my responsibility to them.
"She would point up at the trees and say, 'Every leaf is an ancestor' ... I see her in the sky and the rivers and in the lines of paint."
Son Jack spoke of a childhood spent at festivals his mother had created, and her seemingly endless capacity to remember the histories, connections, politics and causes of friends and family over generations.
"I would point to a bird and say, 'Look at that nice bird mum,'" Jack recounted.
"She would pause, and then say 'That bird is the totem of a clan up in Queensland who your grandfather had connections to, and he would go on to protest with them in this campaign ...'" he said to laughs of recognition at the inevitable history lesson.
Yaegl and Widjabul Elder Uncle Gilbert Laurie performed the Welcome to Country, the ancient protocol whose modern name Roberts is credited with coining.
"I looked up to this woman a lot," he told the assembled.
"She lived in 187 ballina road, I still remember the address, and that's 50 years ago.
"We're going to put our beautiful Aunty to rest."
Amongst the deep mourning, her friends and collaborators Tracy Askew, Liz Young and Narelle Lewis brought a note of levity with fun anecdotes.
"'There's going to be a lot of sad stories,'" Askew remembered Roberts saying of her own funeral.
"'So I need you lot to be funny!'"
"Rhoda suggested sending out a 'Save the Date' to ensure a good turnout."
"She was the worst prankster," said Lewis, "because she was often laughing too hard to pull it off, she found herself so funny."
The recollections were inevitably peppered with her innumerable achievements: artistic directing the Sydney Olympics' opening ceremony, head of Indigenous programming at the Opera House, helping to launch NITV in 2012, establishing Dance Rites.
Unsurprisingly the service was full of song and dance, fitting for an unrivalled supporter of Indigenous cultures.
Troy Cassar-Daley, Casey Donovan and Tenzin Choegyal sang moving songs; Muggera Dance Group and Jannawi Dance Group both performed powerful works.
With family, including Roberts' partner of decades Stephen Field, acting as pallbearers, Roberts' white casket, draped in an Aboriginal flag, was carried from the cathedral to the strains of Miminga, a work of yet another former collaborator of the cultural giant.
