Touring

The Other Side Of Me - East Coast Tour

THE OTHER SIDE OF ME - Gary Lang NT DANCE COMPANY

The Other Side of Me at DanceX, image by Gregory Lorenzutti

Following its acclaimed Melbourne premiere at The Australian Ballet’s DanceX 2025 and a 2024 regional tour across WA and the NT, Gary Lang NT Dance Company’s The Other Side of Me will tour the East Coast in 2026.

““While so-called classic and canonical works are regularly restaged in Australia, it’s still relatively rare to see new Australian works given a second lease of life. While there are, of course, exceptions, far too often many new Australian works have only a brief time in the sun before they’re mothballed and the focus moves on to the next new production waiting in the wings – which makes the current remount of The Other Side of Me by Gary Lang NT Dance Company all the more significant.””
— Artshub, Richard Watts

Tour locations 2026

    • Friday 27 February 2026, 7:00PM

    • Saturday 28 February 2026, 1:00PM & 7:00PM

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    • Wednesday 4 March 2026, 7:00PM

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  • ON SALE SOON

    • Friday 01 May 2026, 7:30PM

    • Saturday 02 May 2026, 7:30PM
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    • Wednesday 06 May 2026, 7:00PM

    • Thursday 07 May 2026, 7:00PM

    • Friday 08 May 2026, 7:00PM

Created by acclaimed Larrakia choreographer Gary Lang, this international, cross-cultural collaboration with Northumbria University (UK) tells a story of the Stolen Generations. Told with care and complexity, it asks vital questions about origin, identity, adoption, justice, and healing.

CREATIVE TEAM

Gary Lang (Co-Creator, Choreographer, Director) Larrakia

Banula Marika (Cultural Consultant, Songman) Yolŋu

Laura Fish (Co-Creator, Dramaturg, Writer) (dec.)

Liz Pavey (Co-Creator, Dramaturg)

Josephine Crawshaw (Cultural Consultant) Kalkarindji

Jesse Norris (Cultural Consultant) Torres Strait Island

Janet Munyarryun (Voice Artist) Yolŋu

Arian Pearson (Sound Designer) Yolŋu

Noelle Shader (Rehearsal Director)

Chandler Connell (Performer) Wiradjuri and Ngunnawal

Alexander Abbot (Performer)

Joseph Mercurio (Lighting Designer)

Jennifer Irwin (Costume Designer)

Samuel Pankhurst (Composer/Sound Designer)

Samuel James (Projection Designer)

BlakDance (Producer)

About Gary Lang

Born in Darwin, Larrakia man Gary Lang is a NAISDA graduate and alumnus of Bangarra and Dancenorth. Since 2002 Gary Lang has choreographed 9 seminal works in the Aboriginal dance canon, including GOOSE LAGOON, Mokuy, Waŋa (Spirit), Forbidden, Milnjiya, Milky Way' — River of Stars created with the Western Australian Ballet. In 2013, he was honoured with the distinguished Australia Council for the Arts’ Dance Board Fellowship.


About the Company

Gary Lang Northern Territory Dance Company (GLNTDC) is at the international forefront of innovative First Nations dance practice. Acclaimed Larrakia dancer and choreographer Gary Lang’s signature choreography blends the gestural physicality of First Nations dance with the ethereal movements of classical ballet, heightening the experience with orchestral strings accompaniments, to create a new art form that is entirely unique within the Australian dance landscape. Lang’s unique style of dance, subverts and transforms traditional Larrakia and Rirratjingu Yolŋu songlines and stories at the intersection of cultures, and explores the themes of spirit worlds, loss, hope, healing and journeys.

The Other Side of Me by Gary Lang NT Dance Company, pictured Cheeky Chandler and Alexander Abbot. Images by Gregory Lorenzutti, DanceX Arts Centre Melbourne.

The Other Side of Me by Gary Lang NT Dance Company, pictured Cheeky Chandler and Alexander Abbot. Images by Gregory Lorenzutti, DanceX Arts Centre Melbourne.

The story is based on actual events. However, names, incidents and timelines have been changed for dramatic purposes. All characters depicted in the production are composites or fictitious. Any similarity to the original story, or of fictitious characters to an actual person, living or dead, is coincidental and unintentional.

The Other Side of Me is produced and toured by BlakDance. The tour has received financial assistance from the Australian Government through Creative Australia, its principal arts investment and advisory body.

The production is a collaboration between Gary Lang NT Dance Company and Northumbria University, UK. It has received financial support through the Northern Territory Government, Regional Arts Australia, the British Council, Creative Australia, Brisbane Festival and Queensland Performing Arts Centre. 

The work premiered in 2023 in Darwin Festival at the Darwin Entertainment Centre, toured Western Australia and Central Australia 2024 and premiered in Melbourne at DanceX Festival in 2025.

Garabari

Video courtesy of Sydney Festival

A sovereign act of gathering. A ceremony grounded in Country.

Created by Joel Bray Dance

Produced and toured by BlakDance

Tickets on sale now. Visit The Sydney Festival website to explore the program.

Friday 9th – Sunday 11th January | 8pm

Northern Broadwalk | Sydney Opera House

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At the heart of Garabari is the Story of the Making of the Murrumbidgee, gifted to the project by the late Uncle James Ingram, a respected Wiradjuri Elder and cultural custodian. Shared with permission and care by Uncle James and the Elders of Wagga Wagga, this story forms the narrative and spiritual spine of the work.

Garabari is a contemporary civic ceremony led by Wiradjuri artist Joel Bray and developed in close collaboration with Elders, artists, and community members across Wagga Wagga and the Riverina. Created in response to an instruction from Elders to make a new dance for a lost one, Garabari affirms First Nations sovereignty and celebrates the living strength of Wiradjuri culture.

The work honours the leadership of:
Uncle James Ingram (dec.) – Cultural custodian of the story
Uncle Christopher Kirkbright – Project Elder and language custodian
Aunty Cheryl Penrith, Aunty Mary Atkinson, and Aunty Jackie Ingram – Senior Knowledge Holders and Community Leaders

Taking its name from the Wiradjuri word for corroboree, Garabari is not a reinterpretation of the past. It is a continuation. It embodies community-led gathering, story-sharing, and resistance. Throughout the work, a song in Wiradjuri language composed and performed by Uncle Christopher Kirkbright and Letetia Harris carries memory and cultural strength, echoing the flow of the Murrumbidgee itself.

With cultural permission, Garabari includes the teaching of foundational Aboriginal dance movements to audiences. These are offered not as spectacle but as a respectful act of welcome, grounded in deep protocol and guided by community leadership. The audience is invited to step into the work through call and response, shared rhythm, and a large participatory dance moment. It is a collective experience of joy and gathering on Wiradjuri terms.

Featuring an ensemble of powerful First Nations performers, sound by Byron Scullin, design by Katie Sfetkidis, and costuming by Wiradjuri fashion label Ngali (Denni Francisco), Garabari is a space of movement, memory and togetherness.

This is not ceremony imagined. It is ceremony continued.

Garabari is produced by Joel Bray Dance with the tour produced by BlakDance. The national tour has received financial assistance from the Australian Government through Creative Australia, its principal arts investment and advisory body.

Creative Team

  • Joel Bray – Choreographer/Director (Wiradjuri)

  • Uncle Christopher Kirkbright – Project Elder, Wiradjuri language custodian, song writer and performer (Wiradjuri)

  • Uncle James Ingram – Collaborating Elder, Custodian of the Story of the Making of the Murrumbidgee (Wiradjuri, dec.)

  • Letetia Harris – Song translation and performance

  • Katie Sfetkidis – Lighting and Projection Designer

  • Byron Scullin –Original  Sound & Music

  • Gideon Cozens - Sound and Music

  • Luke George – Dramaturg

  • Denni Francisco – Costume Designer

  • NON Studio – Screen Video Production

  • Carolyn Conners – Additional voices and voice textures

  • Juanita McLauchlan and Jordan Ingram – Community art-making facilitators

  • Veronica Bolzon – Executive Producer (Joel Bray Dance)

  • Merindah Donnelly – Co-CEO Executive Producer (BlakDance, Wiradjuri)

  • Nicole Reilly – Senior Producer (BlakDance, Wiradyuri)

  • Simon Cook – Production Manager (BlakDance, Mamu)

  • Luke Peacock – Associate Producer (BlakDance, Samsep/Meriam)

2025 Cast

  • Luke Currie-Richardson – Kuku Yalanji, Djabugay, Mununjali, Butchulla and Meriam

  • Amelia Jean O’Leary – Gamilaroi

  • “Cheeky” Chandler Connell – Wiradjuri and Ngunnawal

  • Karlia Cook – European, Mā’ohi and Māori descent, hailing from Norfolk Island, Hitiaurevareva (Pitcairn Island), and Ngāpuhi iwi (Aotearoa)

  • Zoe Brown-Holten – Dunghutti, Gomeroi

  • Glory Tuohy-Daniell – Indjalandji Dhidhanu, Alyewarre

  • Kiarn Doyle – Dunghutti

  • Nadiyah Akbar

  • Siobhan McKenna


Indigenous Cultural and Intellectual Property (ICIP) Acknowledgement

Garabari contains and embodies Indigenous Cultural and Intellectual Property (ICIP), including the Story of the Making of the Murrumbidgee, gifted with permission by the late Uncle James Ingram. We honour Uncle James as a cultural custodian and respectfully acknowledge his recent passing. His legacy, wisdom, and generosity are carried throughout this Garabari.

We advise First Nations audiences that this work contains the name and contributions of a respected Elder who has passed away. This acknowledgement is made with the consent and guidance of his family and community.

Garabari has been developed in accordance with First Nations Protocols and guided by community-determined principles of cultural authority, attribution, and care. All ICIP remains the property of the community and is shared with consent, under ongoing cultural accountability.

We acknowledge with deep respect the following Elders whose leadership, stories, language, and generosity form the heart of Garabari:

  • Uncle James Ingram – Custodian of the Story of the Making of the Murrumbidgee (dec.)

  • Uncle Christopher Kirkbright – Project Elder, Wiradjuri language custodian, song writer and performer

  • Aunty Cheryl Penrith – Senior Knowledge Holder and Community Leader

  • Aunty Mary Atkinson – Senior Knowledge Holder and Community Leader

  • Aunty Jackie Ingram – Senior Knowledge Holder and Community Leader

We also acknowledge:

  • Letetia Harris – Song translation and performance

  • Juanita McLauchlan and Jordan Ingram – Community art-making facilitators

  • Carolyn Conners – Additional voice textures

  • Community art-making participants: Oliver Rolls, Taniesha Wilson, Tylor Wilson, Maree Atkinson, Wesley Williams-Boney, Darren Honeysett, Richard Penrith

  • All cast, creatives, crew, and community members who upheld cultural safety, kinship values, and artistic integrity across every stage of Garabari’s development

This Garabari exists because of the collective strength, generosity, and cultural leadership of the Wiradjuri community. We offer our deepest respect and thanks.

Garabari was commissioned by Chunky Move with the support of the Tanja Liedtke Foundation, and received support through the Restart Investment to Sustain and Expand (RISE) Fund - an Australian Government initiative, the Australian Government through the Indigenous Languages and Arts program and Creative Australia, the Victorian Government through Creative Victoria, BlakDance, the Besen Family Foundation, Arts House, Eastern Riverina Arts, Lucy Guerin Inc and WXYZ Studios. It premiered in 2022 at Arts House Melbourne, presented by Arts House, Chunky Move and Joel Bray Dance.







SILENCE

SILENCE by Karul Projects

SILENCE is an urgent call for TREATY, highlighting the stories and struggles of Blak communities since colonisation. Through SILENCE, Karul Projects take their place in the lineage of fierce First Nations makers calling for Sovereignty.

Choreographed by Thomas E.S. Kelly, SILENCE is a powerful dance performance, featuring seven performers on a stage slowly engulfed in dirt, representing the call for Land Back.


““Structurally fragmentary and narratively fluid, this innovative work functions as an artistic journey of emotion, movement, music and meaning. Clear in its purpose, strong in its message and fierce in its delivery, SILENCE will be sure to leave its mark on ongoing conversations concerning sovereignty, power, recognition and Aboriginal voice. Irreverent but deadly serious, this provocative performance achieves every aim it sets out to accomplish.” ”
— (4 star review, Perth 2024 - ArtsHub, Nanci Nott)

Is this the Commonwealth of Australia? Yes? This is your Landlords speaking!

Through raw physicality, humorous skits, and a power anthem soundtrack, we disrupt the silence of a 250+ year struggle. The same questions echoed through generations. SILENCE pulls the Treaty conversation out from under the rug and slams it back on the table. Because the conversation about a TREATY cannot be silenced in Australia.

Funny and irreverent and reverberating with power… If you think you know Australian contemporary dance, you haven’t seen SILENCE. With thrashing live drumming and a raw aesthetic, Thomas E.S. Kelly has combined intimate storytelling with significant moments in Australian history as SILENCE interprets an ongoing conversation for a new generation.

There’s SILENCE between the stars as the Emu travels across the night sky. There’s SILENCE in the dancer’s energy when they hit the cut, the rupture between rhythms and movement creating a vibrational glitch for the spirit world to enter. It’s also the deafening SILENCE under White noise.

We have marched across our Country. We have had promises made and promises broken. We stand on a stage, to the beating of a live drum kit, as bodies thrash through white noise to continue the conversation. Towards action. Towards resolution.

Jhindu Lawrie’s audacious rock drumming full of dynamism, grunge and raw power calls back to Thomas E.S. Kelly’s choreography, in brash, yet vulnerable and visceral scenes, with Kelly’s trademark charm and wit interspersed in between.


Karul Projects is an emerging First Nations professional contemporary dance company based on Minjungbal Country, founded in 2017 by Thomas E.S. Kelly, Minjungbal-Yugambeh, Wiradjuri and Ni-Vanuatu, and Taree Sansbury, Kaurna, Narrunga and Ngarrindjerri.

Image by Simon Woods

Tour dates and locations:

THE MAJ, Boorloo (1-2 MAY)

His Majesty’s Theatre (Perth)

1 & 2 May 2024

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SYDNEY OPERA HOUSE, Warrane (8-11 MAY)

SOH Studio (Sydney)

8 - 11 May 2024

TICKETS

 

60min duration, no interval

Ages 12+

Water based haze, dirt, dust and strobe lighting will be used in this performance. 

Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander audiences are advised that this show references people who have died.


About Karul Projects

Thomas E.S. Kelly and Taree Sansbury, met at NAISDA Dance College on the Central Coast of New South Wales in 2009. They have worked professionally together ever since, creating their own dance-theatre works, choreographing and performing for companies nationally. Thomas and Taree created Karul Projects in 2017, to create more opportunities for employment and skill building for First Nations artists.

Creatives / Cast: 

Thomas E.S. Kelly (Choreographer/Writer/Performer) Minjungbal-Yugambeh, Wiradjuri and Ni-Vanuatu
Taree Sansbury (Rehearsal Director/Performer) Kaurna, Narrunga and Ngarrindjerri
Vicki Van Hout (Choreographic Dramaturg) Wiradjuri
Alethea Beetson (Dramaturg) Kabi Kabi/Gubbi Gubbi and Wiradjuri
Jhindu-Pedro Lawrie (Percussion Composer/Performer) Mirning and Wuthathi
Benjin Maza (Performer) Yidindji, Birri Gubba, Meriam Mer and Tanna Island
Glory Tuohy-Daniell (Performer) Indjalandji-Dhidhanu and Alyewarre
Keia McGrady (Performer) Githabul Migunberri-Yugumbeh
Olivia Adams (Performer) Wulli Wulli
Tamara Bouman (Performer Understudy) Birpai
Sam Pankhurst (Music/Sound Designer)
Karen Norris (Lighting Designer)
Selene Cochrane (Costume Designer)

Header image by Gregory Lorenzutti

 

The national tour has received financial assistance from the Australian Government through Creative Australia, its arts funding and advisory body.

The Perth presentation is supported by the Queensland Government through Arts Queensland's Grow Market Development Fund.

SILENCE is produced by BlakDance. The premiere production in 2020 was co-commissioned by BlakDance, HOTA Home of the Arts, City of Gold Coast, Queensland Performing Arts Centre and Brisbane Festival, with support by the Australian Government through the Australia Council for the Arts, its arts funding and advisory body and the Queensland Government through Arts Queensland.

The Complication of Lyrebirds

by Jasmin Sheppard, Tagalaka and Kurtitjar

Date Premiered: January 2021

The Complication of Lyrebirds is a 55 minute First Nations contemporary dance work designed to break away from the social expectations of what it means to look or sound Aboriginal. 

What if colonisation denied your family access to their culture? What then makes you Aboriginal? The lyrebird adopts the calls of others to appear attractive, yet there is an authentic identity to the bird that is no mere mimic.

Jasmin Sheppard (Choreographer) and Kaine Sultan Babij (Co-Collaborator) perform on stage with a 3 projector setup. The history of the White Australia Policy is re-contextualised as choreographic tools with other media; evocative voice overs, highly detailed props and video projection, from a team of brilliant creatives Carly Sheppard (Dramaturg), Naretha Williams (Sound), Cris Derksen (Composer), Samuel James (Video), Karen Norris (Lighting), Emily Adolfini (Props) and Fiona Holley (Costume).

Artist-led education programs alongside presentations introduce students to Indigenous choreographic processes with learning around dance appreciation, performance and composition. Post Show Q&A and forums are offered to create a discussion about the diverse themes of the work.

The work premiered at Sydney Festival 2021 in conjunction with Campbelltown Arts Centre, and Native Earth Theatre Company, Toronto.

The creative development and premiere of the work was supported by Campbelltown Arts Centre.

This powerful First Nations dance show is a thoughtful highlight of Sydney Festival 2021. The Complication of Lyrebirds asks us to acknowledge that all First Nations people are unique, that they have their own journey to follow and histories to draw upon.

STEPHEN A RUSSELL, Time Out 2020

Images by Sam James.

Jasmin Sheppard is a contemporary dancer, choreographer and director, a Tagalaka Aboriginal woman with Irish, Chinese and Hungarian ancestry. She spent 12 years with Bangarra Dance Theatre, her performance acclaimed by critics as “powerfully engaging, fluent dexterity” (Sydney Morning Herald). Jasmin choreographed a major work for the company ‘MACQ’, which toured Australia and Germany. In 2012 Jasmin was nominated for an Australian Dance award for ‘Best Female Contemporary Dancer’. In 2017 ‘MACQ’ was nominated for a Helpmann Award for best dance work as a part of ‘OUR Land People Stories’ and in 2018 received a Helpmann for best regional touring program. Other works include ‘No Remittance’ for Legs on the Wall and ‘Choice Cut’ for Yirramboi festival, which debuted at Toronto’s ‘Fall For Dance North’ Festival 2019. Jasmin premiered her main stage production ‘The Complication of Lyrebirds’ at Sydney Festival 2021 and in 2021 also co-directed ‘Value For Money’ alongside Sara Black for GUTS Dance, receiving rave reviews with seasons at Araluen Arts Centre and Darwin Festival. Jasmin created ‘Given Unto Thee’ for Sydney Dance Company’s 2021 New Breed program and was performer, movement director and associate writer for S Shakthidharan’s: 宿 (stay), presented by Sydney Festival 2022 in partnership with OzAsia. Her work is passionate, political and described as “surreal and highly evocative” (The Australian). Jasmin Sheppard is supported by BlakDance, established in 2005, a national industry and producing organisation for First Nations contemporary dancers and choreographers.