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.
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
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.
