BAAI

Castlemaine State Festival Opening Night Performance: 19 March 2021

Film and Live Performance Premiere

Ulumbarra Theatre: 12-13 November

Throughout 2020 and 2021, Arena facilitated and supported a weekly meeting, bringing together 10 women from the Bendigo South Sudanese community. This was supported by disabled musical artist/writer, Eliza Hull and three professional South Sudanese artists Atong Atem (photographer), Awak Kongor (writer, script consultant) and Ajak Kwai (writer/director and musical artist)

Together the group wrote songs, stories and created choreographed dance and movement. Their stories included their experiences of traveling from South Sudan through the refugee camps in Kenya and now calling Bendigo their home. Support workers from Bendigo Community Health Services were available for counselling when required.

The group began by performing at a Bendigo Community Health event which was extremely well received. After this the group performed at the Castlemaine State Festival in March 2021 as part of the opening night. The show was a mix of dance, singing and storytelling.

The women also sang back-up vocals for professional artist and mentor Ajak Kwai. The show was very well received, people from the audience said they felt like it was long overdue to see South Sudanese cultural representation on a major festival stage.

After this performance, the women’s stories were recorded in July and October by Eliza Hull - the group worked for a full week on developing a live performance with Ajak Kwai and Awak Kongor. The performance was scheduled to be performed at the Ulumbarra Theatre in October 2021. Due to COVID restrictions, this project then evolved into the women producing a short film in October 2021 with award winning director/ cinemaphotographer Keiran Watson-Bonnice. The film was titled BAAI (Home) and presented at the Ulumbarra Theatre in November to a group of both South Sudanese and non-South Sudanese audiences over 2 nights. Over the two nights 600 audience members attended, each night there were standing ovations. The film was followed by a live performance of singing and dancing, showcasing their rich South Sudanese culture. This performance garnered media support including Bendigo Advertiser, ABC Radio, Vision Australia, PBS and RRR. The group was also interviewed, and their performance showcased on ‘Art Works’ on ABC TV nationally.

The greatest success of this project is the relationships the women created together through their time connecting in the weekly meetings. Without this, they have stated they often feel isolated, even from members of their own community, especially during COVID.

Coming together created an opportunity and gave them purpose to not only meet regularly but to celebrate their rich culture and shared experiences. In addition, the project generated a tremendous amount of pride for the group by creating an opportunity to share their culture with the wider Bendigo community and beyond.

As a company we are now actively seeking opportunities for the film to be shared with a wider audience through film festivals around Australia and internationally.

The film has already been screened at The Village Square Festival in Castlemaine and Harmony Festival in Bendigo, with the expectation it will be screened nationally and internationally in 2022.

The group continues to meet and through the connections they have made, they are furthering their careers; One of the participants is now forging a career in modelling and performance through a mentoring opportunity created through the group.

This project was largely successful due to the relationships that were created, the meaning and purpose it gave the South Sudanese participants, and the way it shifted and disrupted attitudes and perceptions in wider society of what it means to be a refugee in a regional city like Bendigo.