Death In A Statesman | Debase Productions
Death in a Statesman has a lot of fun playing with genre conventions, taking things we typically associate with gritty American crime stories and placing them on a journo in Bundaberg who uses a bike to get around. The whole audience was really receptive to that playfulness and humor, laughing heartily along with the fourth wall breaking jokes and the over the top minor characters. Noir and comedy make a fun combination and I think that genre blend made a good vehicle for a story about family and transitions.
POWER | Strong lady Productions
Childs herself seems like the type of person whose hugs make you feel safe. She possesses a charm that helps her win the audience over almost immediately. Childs is the perfect guide and guardian for the audience as they travel through what power, strength, vulnerability, and weakness all look and feel like to them. From hearing her story and witnessing her vulnerability I can confidently say Childs is not only a Strong Lady, she is a strong person as well.
Echo | ADC
I found myself appreciating the way each [video] used the editing process to produce new kinds of performances not otherwise possible. I was taken to beaches and country sides, highways and bushland; with each passing car a single dancer became three, and elegant hands multiplied upon themselves becoming ghostly worm-like entanglements. One dancer could pause at the end of a sequence only to be replaced by the next in the same position, continuing the next phrase like an Olympic relay of choreography and movement.
Ingress | Bridie Hooper
The show was richly layered with all manner of symbolism, and heavily dosed with extremely high-level acrobatics. And of course, youthful vigour is itself a kind of immortality, for who can imagine being weak when one is full of strength? In the summer of life one cannot conceive of the winter of the body. But being young is not an immunity from self reflection, self doubt, self loathing, and self flagellation.
A citizen science group that attempts to contact alien life through the internet
“An artistic mentor of mine used to say ‘confront the materials’. I think this idea holds true with technology as well. You have to confront what the material of your show is, even if it is virtual. I am filled with a kind of dread about the power that is concentrating in the companies that connect us. Over recent years a hugely powerful force has been unleashed through social media, one that possesses us in strange ways and uses us for its own ends. It reminded me of movies like The Thing, it was like a monster has emerged in our world. So I took that genre and decided a shlock horror story would be a fun way to explore our feelings around surveillance capitalism, privacy and the power of big data and artificial intelligence.”
How to Spell Love | Anisa Nandaula & Queensland Poetry Festival
Anisa Nandaula’s poetry (which, again, is the heart of the work) is deeply confronting and evocative – challenging and documenting the crimes of colonialism, toxic relationships, racism, capitalism and the many unpleasant intersections thereof.
The Inquisition of the Big Bad Wolf | Prying Eye
This is contemporary dance, but not as you know it. Interdisciplinary works are all the rage at the moment, and this talented company have nailed the brief, fusing dance, theatre and performance art into a great big hilarious wonderland.