BRISBANE FESTIVAL AND ART SERIES HOTEL – THE JOHNSON PRESENT
j o e l b r ay ( A U S )
Brisbane Festival is an initiative of the Queensland Government and Brisbane City Council
BILADURANG
CREATOR’S NOTE
ART SERIES HOTEL – The Johnson, SPRING HILL 12 – 15 September
Biladurang began in a tumultuous time
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT OF COUNTRY
in my life. Having recently broken up with my long-term partner, I had also left Israel, the country I had called home for nearly a decade. But I hadn’t yet ‘landed’ anywhere.
In keeping with the spirit of reconciliation,
I was in this strange moment in life, travelling
we acknowledge the Traditional Owners of
between Israel, Europe and Australia, performing
Brisbane, the Turrubul and Jagara Yuggera
and undertaking creative residencies, visiting
Peoples, and recognise that this has always
old friends, but mostly just…floating.
been a place of creative expression. We wish to pay respect to their Elders – past, present and emerging – and acknowledge the
I found myself in a different hotel room every week, and so I began to write.
important role Aboriginal and Torres Strait
I found myself asking “Who am I?” Who am
Islander people continue to play within our
I as a dancer, my body carved with years
creative community.
of dancing other people’s material? Who am I as a Wiradjuri man, so many years away
BRISBANE FESTIVAL ARTISTIC Director’S Note Joel Bray is one of Australia’s best
from the beautiful Country of Western NSW that is my ancestral and spiritual home? Who am I as a gay man rapidly approaching
contemporary dancers. But this is personal,
middle-age and suddenly single?
utterly on his terms, with the richness of his
What started off as scraps of writing scribbled
culture at the core. Festivals like to feel out
late at night in bland hotel rooms in Tel Aviv,
unusual venues and to offer artists platforms
on trains in Switzerland and in French cafes,
for risky invention, and this performance does
began to reveal themselves as a love-letter
both. Biladurang places us in an intimacy with
for home.
the artist that is rare. It’s to be treasured. David Berthold
And since the writings were written in those strange nowhere-but-everywhere spaces that we call hotels, eerily familiar in their sameness, it made sense that the performance would also happen here. So welcome to my room, come up for a glass of bubbly… and a boogie. Joel Bray
J O E L B R AY Creator/Performer A proud Wiradjuri man, Joel began dancing
Joel’s choreographic credits include works
at age 20, with traditional Aboriginal and
for PICA, the ArtRage Festival (Perth), The
Contemporary dance forms at NAISDA Dance
Albania International Dance Meeting, and
College, before graduating from WAAPA.
STRUT WA. In Israel he created works for
He has performed with Company CeDeCe
the Mixer Festival, Suzanne Dellal and the
(Portugal), Kolben Dance, Machol Shalem
IntimaDance Festival. His work for a children’s
Dance House, Yoram Karmi’s FRESCO Dance
audience, SPLASH, was commissioned by the
Company, Niv Sheinfeld and Oren Laor,
Israeli National Science Museum and had
and Roy Assaf.
an audience of more than 11,000. Biladurang
Joel is an ongoing performer with CHUNKY MOVE and has continued his collaboration
was awarded Best Performance at the 2017 Melbourne Fringe.
with Anouk van Dijk and Falk Richter with Safe Places at the Frankfurt Shauspielhaus.
Kate CARR Composer Kate has been investigating the intersections
Her work has been featured in The New
between sound, place, and emotionality
York Times, The Wire, The Quietus, and The
both as an artist and a curator since 2010.
Guardian. It has also been played on the radio
During this time she has ventured to tiny
on stations ranging from various channels
fishing villages in northern Iceland, explored
of the BBC, to independent stations in Estonia.
the flooded banks of the Seine in a nuclear
Her music can be found on the labels Helen
power plant town, recorded wildlife in South
Scarsdale (US), Rivertones (UK), Soft (France)
Africa, and in the wetlands of southern Mexico.
3Leaves (Hungary) Galaverna (Italy) as well as on her own label Flaming Pines.
CREATIVE TEAM
Brisbane Festival
Concept/Choreography/Performance Joel Bray Music composition Kate Carr
Chair Paul Spiro Deputy Chair Philip Bacon AM Artistic Director David Berthold Chief Executive Officer Charlie Cush
Special thanks to Daniel Santangeli, Dan Koop and the CHUNKY MOVE staff for all the invaluable help during the first development of this work.
D O N ’ t m i s s t h i s a lt o g e t h e r D A R I N G s h o w !
“Legs On The Wall blasts physical theatre into a new and triumphant dimension.” The sun-herald
LEGS ON THE WALL (AUS)
BOOK NOW
26 – 29 September | BRISBANE POWERHOUSE