OK caravanners, you’ll be pleased to know that things are all making sense for me now that I’ve finally started some ‘real work’ on an early 60’s Sunliner down in Tasmania. I thought I was just swanning in to make some art inside but oh no no. There’s a whole lot of sanding to be done, retro light fittings to be sourced, paint to be matched, shelves rebuilt, wiring to be done etcetera! Wynyard local Chris Symonds, who’ll also be joining us in Canberra has done a stellar job so far and I’m happy to be able to help out on the interior stuff. Skills acquired in my days as part of an all-woman gang of house painters in Melbourne are going to come in handy.
You can read more about my burgeoning love affair with The Fossicker on my website here but on to some exciting updates about Museum of the Long Weekend!
We’re welcoming a few more people to the creative team. Firstly Robyn Marais and Tyson Mowarin up in Ieramugadu (Roebourne) in the Pilbara who are teaming up with Big hART’s Elspeth Blunt in a collaboration with the Ieramugadu community. Their work will take tales of travel, holiday food and family recipes from Ngarluma and Yindjibarndi families as precious cargo and collect stories from the west coast along the way. These stories will be shared in Perth, Kalgoorlie and finally at MOTLW in Canberra as a multimedia installation inside the caravan.
Secondly film-maker Ewan McLeod who’s based up in Townsville is going to be traveling with the convoy from Cairns down the coast to Home Hill and then skipping on to Brisbane to work with Lisa Mora from Vintage Caravan Magazine and some caravan park residents to make a film piece about their experiences to show in Canberra in Lisa’s van.
I encourage everyone to check out the ‘creative team’ page on this site to familiarize themselves with the diverse range of artists who are involved on the project and who will be in Canberra as part of MOTLW.
Big hART director Scott Rankin and I have been talking about creating boards/collection points for written stories, perhaps akin to supermarket notice boards when people can contribute snippets of holiday/leisure-time related memories in four categories: ‘Lost n Found’ (descriptions of objects lost and found on holiday), ‘Missing Persons’ (…eg someone never seen again since summer of ’92), ‘True Heroes’ (the time that Dad rescued Lilly from the killer geese…) and ‘The Museum of the Unsaid Thing’. So get your thinking caps on about these as we’d love to hear what you have to offer in Canberra.
We’ve been casting nets far n wide for people interested in organizing small local events for the convoys as they pass through regional towns an cities en route to Canberra. So far there will be events taking place in the following locations: Home Hill, Castlemaine, Lismore, Coffs Harbour, Port Macquarie, Brisbane, Adelaide, Cowra, Townsville, Maryborough and Devonport. Activities under a broad umbrella of ‘a cuppa with the convoy’ include: Fruit Salad under trees by a river, a tea-party in the middle of town, sausage sizzle at the caravan park and a welcome to country in the local botanical gardens. If you know people in places who would be interested in helping organize a little something please tell them to get in touch beth@bighart.org
It’s getting closer! The first convoys depart from Carins/Roebourne in less than a month!
Looking forward to seeing you there. Beth.