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Australia Council-Australia Latin America Foundation Initiative
The Initiative had as its main objective the brokering and growth of partnerships between Australian performing artists and arts companies with their equivalents in Latin America, ideally on a multiyear basis and sustainable into the future.
This may involve introductory and matchmaking services, the provision of modest seed funds to assist the establishment of such relationships and limited investment in the development stage(s) of resultant projects. It is not a grant program per se, and it is not primarily aimed at resourcing regular touring, though that may be a component of some projects and hopefully would be an outcome of all.
The Initiative, through the agency of the Australia Latin America Foundation, set in train number of projects in the period 2010-2012.
Artists who participated in the project included: Phillip Adams, Rebecca Hilton, Well Theatre, Roland Peelman, Nicole Canham, Sarah Kaur (Mexico) Lucy Guerin, Shaun Parker (Brazil) David Clarkson, Alejandro Rolandi, Margie Breen, Naomi Vaughan, Peter Kennard, Celia White (Colombia) Finegan Kruckemeyer, En Route, Kate Gaul, Peter Wilson (Argentina)
Here are some testimonials and documentation of their experience:
The Hourglass Project - Mexico
As a result of introductions brokered by the Foundation, Melbourne based musician Nicole Canham developed a multiyear Mexican-Australian project, Hourglass with visual artist Sarah Kaur. This was jointly undertaken with composer Rodrigo Sigal of Centro Mexicano para la Música y Artes Sonoras (CMMAS) in Mexico City. The collaboration arose from Ms Canham's Churchill Fellowship visit to Mexico in 2008/9 and introductions there brokered by the Foundation. The Foundation was instrumental in placing the project with Punctum and the Abbotsford Convent in Melbourne to secure the exchange process.Hourglass was a triumph and a sensuous affair to experience...aesthetically beautiful; immersive; meditative; intuitive and an intense live event to be part of" Megan Spencer
"Collaborative artistic projects across cultures, generations and art forms take a great deal of time and effort to realise: both in a creative and a practical sense. The Australia Council's Latin America Initiative managed through the Australia Latin America Foundation has enabled the artists of Hourglass in both Australia and Mexico to spend time working together to develop our ideas and to forge deep and lasting artistic connections - enabling our dream of an immersive collaborative process to materialise into a work of art" Nicole Canham
Well Theatre - The Book of Revolutions - Mexico
This event for the 2010 Bicentenary was curated for the Mexican Bicentennial Expo in 2010 on a site near the festival city of Guanajuato. It ran from June to November and featured Well Theatre's Great Wall of Books (renamed the Book of Revolutions in October 2010. The choice of work was guided by the Initiative's prime intention to provide a degree of interchange with local artists and/or the public through an extended residency rather than offering merely a straightforward performance.
"Working with the Australia Latin America Foundation allowed us to realise a long awaited dream - to collaborate across borders, creating new work with Mexican and Australian artists. The access, guidance and well of knowledge that the Foundation provided us was invaluable in creating the "Book of Revolutions" project (which saw a team of 15 Australians work with countless Mexican artists and non-artists over a 2 month period).
Stemming from this collaboration we are further developing new work with Latin American artists and producers. Thus possibilities of these initiatives have come directly from the doors opened to us by the Foundation". Dario Vacirca
Well Theatre "The Book of Revolutions" Guanajuato, Mexico as part of the Mexican Bicentennial Expo, 2010
http://welltheatre.com/ellibro/
http://www.takeoffyourskin.com/BookofRevol/
Phillip Adams - LAMB - Mexico
"The Australia Council's Latin America Initiative through the Australia Latin America Foundation is a pivotal program that broadens the cultural depths for international relations in the creative arts, as the cultural divide between international boarders has never been more narrowed in the global dance sector.
I am enamoured by the sheer dedication and courage that the dancers of Mexican dance company Lux Boreal bought to our collaboration. Together we premiered a major work entitled LAMB for the Festival de Mexico in 2011 with the producing and financial support from Australian Latin American Foundation.
The essence of our collaboration was created at a level of honesty, vulnerability and desire to explore a cultural divide personally and artistically that dealt with religious concerns and sensibilities. Lamb began as a response to religious iconography that deals with confession sacrifice sex and death. I drew my inspiration directly from biblical, folkloric and mythical references from the catholic mass. As a collective we encouraged one another to work closely through the artistic process that was based on trust, bringing us through points of improvisational terrains and experimentation between
cross disciplinary dance forms. We are more the better artists for taking such risks to the very edges of our physical and
emotional abilities in the studio to produce a performance that was deeply personal and culturally rich. Hopefully I have made room for Mexican audiences to comment and divide in their opinion about this work.
New cultures enrich us in a consumable way and an artistic way. It's how we creatively layer and what context to base our cultural experience in that makes an international collaboration an artistically rewarding engagement. We are all interested in answering the same questions and seeking new ways to participate as artists and producers".
Lamb made by Phillip Adams with Lux Boreal for the Festival of Mexico City. March 2011
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6oA8OShoB4IThe Song Company - Guadalajara. Mexico
The Foundation brokered a multiyear partnership between the cultural program of the University of Guadalajara and The Song Company. The Song Company's Artistic Director, Roland Peelman undertook three short residencies there in 2010 and 2011to establish and develop the program brokered by the Initiative but funded jointly by The Song Company and the University
"It is no exaggeration to say that the Latin American Initiative has opened up a whole new chapter in my perspective of the world. For me personally, and for an organisation as the Song Company, the initiative has unlocked new artistic potential, new future collaborations as well as new markets. These new markets are admittedly not without challenges but the Foundation is fully aware of how different the modus operandi is across the Pacific, particularly in respect to musical culture.
There is no little irony in the fact that my initial contacts with Latin American artists all took place in Europe. Europe still acts as a powerful reference point to both Australia and Latin America. It is how Song Company's Mexican repertoire first developed. Now we have a young Mexican composer joining the MODART project in Sydney and many other things are in the pipeline. But meeting artists and organisers in various countries of Latin America was specifically made possible through the initiative. It has greatly enriched and broadened my perspective and is leading to new creative projects that can add terrific new spice to our Australian diet. I am sure that over time the Foundation will make a substantial impact, not only on the arts in Australia, but also on the image and presence of Australian art and artists in Latin America". Roland Peelman
Finegan Kruckemeyer
The Foundation assisted playwright Finegan Kruckemeyer to initial visit to Latin America out of which came a collaboration
with Argentine producer/director, Solange Perrazzo, who had approached him to commission a new work for children, which would premiere in Argentina, produced by her company.
AmarGinados. That play: "This girl laughs, this girl cries, this girl does nothing at all" premiered in Spanish in Buenos Aires in early 2011 at Theatre Upebe at the University
Popular of Belgrano as a result of the relationship which the Initiative helped to resource. From April to July it has already given 30 performances and will probably give as many
as 60 in Buenos Aires alone before touring to other cities in Argentina. Ms Perrazzo has already expressed interest in presenting another suitable Australian work for young people.
As well Fin was also approached by Mexican director, Aracelia Guerrero who wished to make a new work with him. That project, entitled The Age of the Attic, is now in development. During this creation process, two creative developments will occur: one in Hobart and one in Mexico City.
"It's always something exciting to have your horizons expanded, and the introduction to artists and theatre from a previously unexplored continent, is just one of those moments. The Australia Latin America Foundation's generous assistance allowed me to reach Buenos Aires and, while there, work on a new cross-cultural play, and present a paper at a major international conference. The play has now opened, run in Argentina for six months, and won the Rodney Seaborn Playwrights Award. In addition, amazing South American artists and academics have been met and learnt from, the paper is soon to be published, and the prospect of new collaborations in both Argentina and Mexico now awaits. All of this has stemmed from the Foundation's interest, support and funding, and I could not be more grateful". Finegan Kruckemeyer
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