Friday, 16 August 2019
The Travelling Light tour, planned for over a year, began with four shows in early August, and continues here into the second leg of the tour, on Eyre Peninsula.
The fifth stop of our illuminart Odyssey was Elliston, located on the western coast of Eyre Peninsula. Projection art has been a real newcomer to this region, and the proposal to illuminate the silos with art and storytelling had been met with some puzzlement. However we found the perfect venue for the presentation was the Elliston Caravan Park who hosted our projection and presented the event. The natural amphitheatre provided a grassy sheltered space for the audience, overlooking two Viterra Silos standing side by side (dubbed Mr and Mrs by locals!), and we incorporated both silos into the presentations.
We had a small audience of approximately sixty people, local families and tourists sharing the experience together in a beautiful only slightly chilly evening. There was a significant amount of Elliston animations and stories to share thanks to the work Sue Wegener had already done in the community to collect and animate local material. One in particular “The Hawsons”, has been shared in towns including Port Pirie, Cowell, Booleroo Centre and Beachport, giving other South Australians a taste of the history of Eyre Peninsula.
Also in Elliston, we were joined by Telene Clark (Louth Bay) who has provided voice overs, animations and sound support for many projects, and also by Mark Thomas of Missing Link Media, who created a great microdocumentary and footage that was featured on Channel 7 news.
The weather was already starting to look very bad across South Australia at this time, with storm warnings being issued for the entire coast from Port Lincoln through to Victoria, so we were very relieved we had chosen the west coast for the beginning of the tour! But we still had some concerns about weather warnings coming up to Ceduna, especially as strong rain and wind hit Elliston immediately after our show finished.
Ceduna residents have been hoping to see Silo art and projections for a very long time, and we arrived in Ceduna on Wednesday the 7th just in time to present a digital media workshop at Arts Ceduna, attended by several local artists who were keen to make their art projection ready, in anticipation of being able to blow it up to the size of the silos on Thursday night. In the meantime we did our final site surveys and preparations for the event, keeping our fingers crossed that we would still be able to project.
The event was presented by Ceduna Foreshore Motel and Arts Ceduna, who between them arranged all the council permissions, road closures, provided accommodation and organised local artists to be involved. Everywhere the local support and creative partnerships have been brilliant and here was no exception, and having the event organised by these two local partners ensured a fantastic and stress free presentation for everyone involved. We were also supported by Off the Grind coffee who ensured a good supply of hot drinks and brownies for all!
On the day itself the wind picked up, and therefore we decided to do things a little differently. Using the social media network we announced that we would do the show “Drive In style” and shared maps of where community could come to park their cars, and how to tune into an experimental live facebook feed to hear the audio.
Over 50 cars were parked in the streets facing the silos and some even further away. There were dozens of families in cars rugged up and a good contingent of kids running about happily to keep warm and play. The artwork by local artists organised by Arts Ceduna and attending the workshop, looked incredible on the Silos. We also featured some video by OzDiverDown featuring some local islands and shipwreck of the Eleni K. It was a spectacular sight and we are very happy to have brought large scale projection to Ceduna!
The District Council of Streaky Bay have been involved in the Port to Port project as a partner and so this tour has been a very important stage to share the stories made locally and present them around SA. Coming to Streaky Bay we were very fortunate to have the rain ease off at the last moment, so although it was a very cold event we still had about 100 people attending to enjoy the anmation projected onto the Streaky Bay Institute. Vibrant colours, stories from many communities shared in Streaky, and a stunning array of local stories presented in their town of origin made this a hugely significant event.
We have been looking forward to Whyalla with excitement and anticipation of projection onto a 75m long ship! The event was a perfect night attended by an estimated 400 people – a fantastic turnout for an Arts event and no doubt with plenty of curiosity and enthusiasm to see “The reluctant lady” to be illuminated. Projection on to the Ship was a fantastic opportunity for the illuminart team as well, creating a memorable new experience of large scale projection.
The show featured a wealth of gorgeous animation, stories of old Whyalla illustrated by primary school children, and animated by Michael Rostig. The show also featured dramatic underwater videography of the Giant Cuttlefish contributed by OzDiverDown – which were extraordinary when blown up to the size of the ship (imagine, giant cuttlefish tentacles wrapping around the ship, to give you an idea!). 1980s footage of the move of the Whyalla and some Stephen Stanley cartoons of the era, were also projected, creating an exciting, vibrant show! We are very grateful to d’Faces of Youth Arts and the City of Whyalla for presenting this event and supporting our Port to Port project in Whyalla.
Check out the fabulous little video of the event below, by our partners the City of Whyalla.
See how we reprised this event for Cuttlefest 2023 here.
Thanks to all our partners, cohosts and supporters:
and the Progress Association of Booleroo, Progress Society of Wilmington, The Falie Ketch, Uniting Church of Aldinga