Festivals pull together and combine a number of elements to create a special event as an opportunity for leisure, social or cultural experience outside the normal
range of choices or beyond everyday experience (Yeoman, 2004). Structurally the festival has four primary operational areas communications, administration, logistics and creative programming. Over the course of the last three evolving festival programs, the Yalukit Willam Ngargee developed creative programming partnerships, outsourcing aspects of program management, administration and logistical operations. Some of the reasons behind setting up the partnerships revolve around the festivals limited human resources as the festival program builds, supporting Indigenous enterprises, strengthening community based initiatives and to provide more targeted festival opportunities to Indigenous artists, musicians and traders.
The following four Creative Programming Partnership examples take into consideration a range of multi-disciplinary forms including visual arts, contemporary dance, film and community capacity building.
• CONFINED 2 was a visual arts exhibition of Indigenous peoples works in custody. The complex partnership combined The Torch a community cultural development organisation with Jesuit post release youth service the Brosnan Centre to maintain integral linkages with the Department of Justice, Corrections Victoria and prison arts program managers.
• Lu’Arn is an adapted contemporary dance piece based on a nearly lost local 10,000-year-old oral story relating to men’s lore. Commissioned by the festival on behalf of the Yalukit Willam traditional owners, Lu’Arn’s revitalising collaborative dance production was also performed as part of the Midsumma Festival, Moomba Parade and premiered as a 24-minute documentary at this year’s St Kilda Film Festival.
• Members of the local Indigenous community who congregate in the park marshalled the Yalukit Willam Ngargee main music day. The evolving partnership consisted of community members doing conflict management training resulting in a statement of attainment to host festival attendees.
• OPEN CHANNEL, a registered film training organisation, conducted a 12- week certificate 3 Indigenous media scholarship for five Indigenous filmmakers winning an Indigenous vocational training initiative of the year award. Three graduates gained qualifications, industry experience and a national screen credit for producing a 25-minute documentary called Living in Two Worlds premiering at the 2009 St Kilda Film Festival and nationally broadcast on National Indigenous Television.
The creative programming partnerships are cultural investments strengthening the linkage capital between the City of Port Phillip and its partner’s contributions to social inclusion. It’s the linkage capital between these relationships that provide direct and indirect reciprocal spaces for the wellbeing of Indigenous peoples living in metropolitan environments.
CONCLUSION
In my conclusion I note how a local government authority can engage with a fragmented community through a festival structure. That by utilising the festival
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Bo J. SVORONOS Indigenous people subjected to trauma, the loss of spiritual beliefs and cultural practices. It is arguably for Indigenous peoples the negotiation of space within rapidly developing medium to high density metropolitan places which contributes to a sense of social inclusion, wellbeing, creative collaborations and shared knowledge. Through these aspects the festival platform is able to establish and maintain practices that can directly and indirectly benefit Aboriginal peoples with spaces for dignity and resilience.
I briefly presented an overview of Creative Programming Partnerships and how they have been set up over a three-year period creating linkage capital through the act of direct and indirect institutional reciprocity. In this way the City of Port Phillip as festival host and producer eases the workload of a small festival team, provides opportunities for Indigenous organisations and a platform for Indigenous artists and performers to present their work. As a cultural festival produced by a local government authority, the Yalukit Willam Ngargee corresponds with what Phipps and Slater note as one of the few consistently positive spaces for Indigenous communities to forge and assert a more constructive view of themselves both inter-generationally, and as part of their drive for respect as distinct cultures in broader national and international communities (Phipps &
Slater, 2010).
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