Reframing Culture at the Kumuwuki Regional Arts Australia national conference 2012
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Welcome to Country then what?
The Change Media team traveled to Goolwa for the 2012 ‘Kumuwuki/ Big Wave’ Regional Arts Australia conference to produce a series of short, collaborative documentary interventions during a four day workshop with the Ngarrindjeri Media Team.
The Kumuwuki conference was held over four days in Goolwa to showcase art practices from across Australia. Change Media’s presentations focused on indigenous media literacy and the power of storytelling in a modern and increasingly digitized world. The workshops were titled ‘Surfing on Country – Surfing on Culture’ - a nod to the Kumuwuki/ Big Wave theme of the conference.
Jen, our Artistic Director, came up with the concept of using a colonial frame as a prop to reframe the way we speak about our shared colonial history;
If this is the colonial frame, what would you do with it?
Our team used this storytelling device to invite Ngarrindjeri Elders and conference participants to come up with ideas and creative visions to re-frame Australia’s colonial mindset. A great prop to get people thinking and talking, and to engage in an artistic and political discussion about how we can best re-frame the argument together, as part of a push for reconciliation…
The team received huge applause at the daily keynote screenings and lots of fabulous comments during the conference, often hollered across the streets in Goolwa – our concept of feeding work straight back into the conference was a great success, and exhausting, 3 sleepless nights, to edit a 5min film for the 9am key note each morning.
The three short films have now been combined into one 18-min documentary, ‘Reframing Culture’.
Partners:
Australia Council for the Arts
Indigenous Cultural Support, Office for the Arts, Department of Regional Australia, Local Government, Arts and Sport
Ngarrindjeri Regional Authority
Regional Arts Australia
Country Arts SA