Indigenous dance plays a vital role in the healing of a divided Australia, according to Broome-based dancer and choreographer Dalisa Pigram.
Following the failed referendum on parliamentary voice, he says First Nations arts must continue to bring to the surface the “hidden histories, the untold stories, the truth-telling” of Australian history, “recognizing that there is more than one side to a story” and winning the “hearts and minds” of the public.
As co-artistic director of intercultural dance theater company Marrugeku, Pigram turns to her grandfather for ideas on how Indigenous Australians can connect on a human level. Yawuru lawman Patrick Dodson is known as the father of reconciliation; He retired from the Senate late last year after cancer treatment left him with a permanent health condition.
Relating to: Stephen Page’s last dance: Bangarra’s ‘fearless’ artistic director bids farewell after 30 years
“Watching someone like my father dedicate his entire life to the inch-by-inch changes he witnessed throughout his life, watching him get sick and get better and still maintain hope is something I will never forget,” she says. “[I’ve] “I was inspired to try to push this flag a little further.”
Aboriginal painting has become Australia’s most admired and sought-after artistic product, while indigenous dance carries critical songs about the land and antiquity. For more than 65,000 years, generations have passed on stories through dance, but now, as keepers of culture increasingly seek to share their traditions, an existential question emerges: How can we keep First Nations performance successful and relevant to contemporary audiences?
A month before the referendum, Marrugeku completed the international tour of his show Jurrungu Ngan-ga, which translates from Yawuru as “conversation”. Combining First Nations traditional dance, fashion, hip-hop and even classical tones, the show was not only about Australia’s high Indigenous incarceration rates, but also how the Aboriginal nations, asylum seekers and transgender Australians represented on stage had much in common with indigenous people. It was also about having the point. mass.
The challenge for Marrugeku, as for other companies, is to find the resources to achieve high goals.
‘Everything is now in the shadow of ‘no”
In March, First Nations leaders of federally funded Australian dance companies will gather in Adelaide for the first time for the two-day Blak Futures conference. It is billed as “a revolutionary moment for Australian dance”, aiming to “think, imagine and sow the seeds of the future”. The conference has no official agenda, but cross-cultural collaboration will likely be a priority, as will discussions about federal and state arts funding that companies say are inadequate.
Pigram says he has always understood Marrugeku’s deep responsibility to explore the common history of Australians, but the need for post-referendum healing has brought into sharp focus the Yolŋu concept of Makarrata: coming together after a struggle. “You can feed into stereotypes,” he says, “or you can start to open people’s hearts and minds.” Part of this process involves confronting historical realities: Marrugeku’s most recent production, Mutiara, for example, deals with Broome’s pearling industry and the forced labor practice of blackbird hunting; the show was praised as “a surprisingly tender, otherworldly piece of memory.”
The ancient traditions of Indigenous dance met their political moment in the land rights and equality movements of the 1970s; particularly at Redfern in inner Sydney, where Indigenous Australians established the first Aboriginal-led legal and medical services in the country. The arts were part of the struggle, with the founding here of the provocative National Black Theater and the National Aboriginal Islander Skills Development Association College of Dance, which admitted its first students in 1976, applying dance training as resistance and shaping careers. Today NAISDA is still very much involved with the likes of the lauded Bangarra Dance Theatre, where long-serving former artistic director Stephen Page often declared his art’s “cure”, and where both Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal audiences gather for a dose of It is an important field of education. .
Wiradjuri choreographer Daniel Riley, who built his own career in Bangarra, is the first Indigenous artistic director of Australian Dance Theater and will premiere his new work Marrow at the March conference as well as the Adelaide festival. The performers include Kaurna woman Karra Nam and five others from different backgrounds, including Filipino and Irish dancers. A “character” made of smoke will accompany the dancers on stage.
Riley, who organizes Blak Futures, says Marrow is a “post-referendum” dance work. The show’s cultural advisor is Uncle Sumner, a Moogy Kaurna/Ngarrindjerri elder who shared the Dreaming story with Marrow’s creators. waatji pulyeriA moral tale about a lying, cheating little blue fairy wren. The wren becomes a metaphor for Australia itself.
“In this work I try to connect Australia as a nation to the wren; ‘How did we get to this point after the referendum?’ says Riley. “No matter how you voted or whatever is going on in the cultural and social zeitgeist, everything is now in the shadow of ‘no.’ “We have to turn this around and change the hearts and minds of so many people, and that is a difficult thing, but it is something that art can do in a truly progressive, empathetic, intelligent and creative way.”
Narungga/Kaurna choreographer Jacob Boehme also premiered his new work at the Guuranda Adelaide festival, which includes the story of the creation of Spencer Gulf, the westernmost gulf of Australia’s south coast. The study “contains lessons not only about the environment,” he says, “but also how 300 generations of custodians have valued the Country that has been raped, pillaged, and turned into mining and agricultural fodder over the last 200 years.” The work includes Kaurna artists, a Kaurna choir, and non-Indigenous collaborators.
“Opportunities for non-Indigenous people to sit down, listen and learn are becoming increasingly important,” says Boehme, noting the government’s continued failures to achieve its Closing the Gap goals. “Intercultural collaboration” is vital, he says, especially after the referendum, which was “a huge wake-up call for a lot of First Nations people about where we really are as a nation.”
“I don’t think about it [referendum] A ‘No’ vote necessarily means that the Australian public does not care about or support First Nations cultures or First Nations people,” says Boehme. “Look at the interest across the country in our theatre, our dance, our literature, our food, our science, our astronomy.”
‘First Nations first, nice slogan – but we haven’t seen any action yet’
The fifth National Arts Participation survey found the number of Australians attending a First Nations dance, theater event or performing arts festival fell from 18% to 15% between 2019 and 2022; however, this decline reflects cancellations of arts events and quarantines due to Covid-19. 19 epidemics. Attendance at First Nations arts events in 2022 was still higher than in 2016, with almost three-quarters of Australians consistently believing First Nations arts and culture are important; but only 47% believe Indigenous cultures are well represented in arts presentations (down from 51% in 2019).
A year ago the federal government released its cultural policy called Revive, which promised to establish an autonomous, dedicated First Nations body within Creative Australia (formerly the Australia Council for the Arts) in 2024. Boehme notes that “a lot of time, energy and effort went into it.” money is spent on politics. “‘First Nations First’ is a lovely slogan,” he says, “but we haven’t seen any action yet.” Blak Futures aims to influence the development of Revive as well as arts policies formulated in various states such as South Australia.
Daniel Riley said Dance Theater Australia was “grateful and proud” to receive four years of federal funding in Creative Australia’s latest investment round, but he wanted to see the company returned to the major performing arts company status it was stripped of in 2015. Early 2000s. Currently three First Nations communities – Bangarra, Marrugeku and Ilbijerri Theater Company – are part of this Creative Australia upper tier, known as the national performing arts partnership framework, which offers greater assurance of ongoing funding.
However, the financial benefits from this high-level status are uncertain. Marrugeku’s Pigram, for example, says that being a “major performing arts company” in 2021 means “not actually charging a red penny more”; “We have just joined the list of those who do this job.” He says he’s “very grateful” for the support the company has received, but “it’s not like we’re a full-time company; our core funding can barely cover the little things… and then we have to tap into other money to make bigger dreams come true.”
Meanwhile, Bangarra will stage Horizon this year, including The Light Inside, co-created by Maōri choreographer Moss Te Ururangi Patterson, in the company’s first mainstage cross-cultural collaboration. Artistic director Frances Rings says major performing arts companies “haven’t had a boom for a while; transportation costs, touring costs, travel, maintaining operations, CPI indexing; These all affect how much we can do. “We would love to do more, but there is only so much we can do to meet demand.”
Rings says Black creators have a huge responsibility. “I think Australia likes to be comfortable, and we have to find the discomfort in that,” he says. “We must look in the mirror, we must know the light and the shadow… Our role is so vital, to bring that voice, that truth-teller, and also that incredibly hopeful seed of resilience of the leaders who came before us. “It is a demonstration of our ability to adapt and survive, as well as our ability to create inspiring work.”
-
The Blak Futures conference will take place in Adelaide on March 17. Australian Dance Theatre’s Marrow will run from 13-17 March as part of the Adelaide festival. Horizon by Bangarra will be released in Sydney on June 11.