Slowly but reassuredly we are winding down from the frenetic and full start to the New Year with a season at the Sydney Festival which saw 9500 people watch the show over the 4 weeks and many a glowing review.

On the inside, such a tour means the support and management of a mobile community who are away from home and country living in a way most of us are unaccustomed. The company which makes up the Ngapartji Ngapartji show literally come from all over the country. This work is demanding and this, our longest tour, was exhausting for many of us. As such it feels important to acknowledge the numerous Big hART members, volunteers and audiences who supported us through this season.

Special thanks to Mariaa who managed this tour so well and who finished up her work with us last week. We hope of course Mariaa will be back with us in the future. Also thanks to Rodney Turner who jumped on board in Sydney to help us out for a week but who we couldn’t let go. Thanks also to Beth who coordinated and wrote the news in my absence as well as made sure the language lessons went ahead each week on tour whereby the ladies insisted we speak Pitjantjatjara only as we floundered to express ourselves, play games and learn new songs. These sessions were some of the loveliest experiences of togetherness we had in Sydney and which certainly brought us back to the heart of the project.

Alison and Pantjiti Lewis, Belvoir St Theatre

With a community cast changeover half way through the season we were able to support the participation of 8 choir members from Pukatja, Amata and Alice and 7 young people from Docker River and Alice Springs. We were stoked to have Makinti, Pantjiti Lewis, Pantjiti McKenzie and Belinda stay on throughout the season which offered the production a core strength we may have lost in the switch. There are many stories from the tour, some of which were published in the previous news, and hundreds of photos, which I will continue posting up in the next few weeks.

Dani, Beth, Pantjiti McKenzie, Makinti, Scott, Alex, Trevor and Jangala, debrief, Belvoir St (above); the cast teaches 'Kata Alipiri' at Kid's Festival, Speigletent (below)

Since Sydney Alex has been at the Australian Performing Arts Market in Adelaide along with other Big hART producers negotiating her time between meetings and talking to presenters from Australia and overseas about possible future tours of the work and the model in general. The junk (Junk Theory) has been gracefully sailing up and down the Torrens and over the weekend all of us big hART producers and creators stepped outside our discreet projects and met in Adelaide to talk across projects. It’s been an incredibly prolific time of making and presenting work for big hART and taking time out to look at the big picture was enormously beneficial to all of us.

So back in Alice we are happy to start the year with Jane Leonard on board seeking ways to embed literacy (or learning) into the community work we do. Jane was able to join us for a week in Sydney to get an insight into the work everyone does both behind the scenes and on the stage. Jane says it was especially good to meet with some of the young people who she will hopefully be working more with in the new Learning part of the project, though she reckons that after Sadie, Belinda and Julie insisted she go on a Jet Boat Harbour ride with them, her vocal chords will never be the same again from screaming!

  Maureen, Belinda and Joanne, Sydney Harbour 2008

Jane and I have been cleaning out and setting up the space to support this exciting new part of what Ngapartji Ngapartji is offering. We are also busy discussing and planning ways to go forward with this, which is all about supporting and building on the extensive skills, experience and knowledge the Ngapartji Ngapartji young people already possess, as well as helping them  to build their skills in English as they go about doing all the amazing stuff they do with the project.

We are all looking forward to a rich and eventful year.

Dani