Country and Belonging

Dates

Term 1 2022, 1 day per week

Venue

California Gully Primary School

Artists

Annie Brigdale

Christian Leavesley

Tahli Corin

Hermione Merry

Technical support

James Bodin

At right - selection of artworks created by students at California Gully Primary School during Arena’s Country and Belonging residency.

Images: Kerry Brown, Tahli Corin, Christian Leavesley

Country and Belonging was led by Yorta Yorta artist Annie Brigdale, working with Arena’s Artistic Director Christian Leavesley, Tahli Corin and Hermione Merry.

It was a multi-artform school residency that explored the children’s relationship to country. California Gully Primary School has a relatively large cohort of First Nations students in Bendigo, which was an important part of the discussion between Arena and the school in the planning stages of the project.

The heart of Country and Belonging was in facilitating every child in the school to write their own personal acknowledgment of country, describing what the country they live on means to them. The children worked with Arena’s artists to workshop ideas of belonging in relation to the spaces, people, and everyday activities in their lives.

Annie Brigdale worked with the children using traditional art forms, including storytelling, painting, and weaving. The creative team conducted workshops with new technologies including augmented reality, 3D scanning, film, audio, and drone photography.

The Country and Belonging residency ended with a wonderful community celebration of the work the children and Arena’s artists created together. The successes of the project were so profound, we have decided to roll this residency out to other schools in the area. This is the first time Arena has repeated the themes and content of a residency in this way.