Latai Taumoepeau is a multidisciplinary artist whose practice fuses ancient and everyday temporal practice using mediums like performance, dance, installation and social engagement.  Her faivā (body-centred practice) is grounded in the traditions of her homelands, the Island Kingdom of Tonga and her birthplace Sydney, land of the Gadigal people.  Latai joins us to discuss her work over the past decade exploring the impact of climate change in the Pacific and the threat of dispossession that many island communities face. Latai was a leading artist on Arts House Melbourne’s five-yea ..read more

Kerry Jones is the Director of Systems Initiatives for the Australian Centre for Social Innovation (TACSI). We spoke with Kerry in Meanjin / Brisbane, during the Australian Disaster Resilience Conference where she presented a program of work that is enabling communities to lead their own disaster response systems through a model of engagement called “Now-Future-How”. This work, led by TACSI through the Fire to Flourish initiative, is built around the philosophy that when it comes to building resilient communities, the answers lie within the communities themselves. Kerry shares how the model i ..read more

When Cyclone Yasi hit the coast of North Queensland in 2011, the Girringun Aboriginal Corporation and its active community of rangers and artists took a position of leadership in the recovery process and galvanised a devastated community. In this episode, Girringun’s Founder and Executive Officer Phil Rist shares the story of their Traditional-Owner led organisation; we take a tour around the renowned Girringun Arts Centre with manager Joann Russo; and we also hear from Girringun Ranger Michael George and Communications Officer Seraeah Wyles about the interconnectedness of arts, culture and c ..read more

Bhiamie Williamson is a Euahlayi man from North West NSW and one of Australia’s leading researchers into Indigenous peoples’ experience of disasters.  Bhiamie’s work in this field has led to his current leadership of the National Indigenous Disaster Resilience Project which sits within Monash University’s Fire to Flourish program. We spoke with Bhiamie following the inaugural National Indigenous Disaster Resilience Summit in Meanjin, Brisbane - a first-of-its-kind event that marks a significant step forward in disaster planning in Australia.  Instigated by Bhiamie’s work within Fir ..read more

Annette Carmichael is an award-winning choreographer and dance artist based in Western Australia with community engagement at the core of her work. She joins Scotia to discuss The Stars Descend, an ambitious and inspiring performance work that consists of five chapters, crafted with and for five different communities in the south-west of Western Australia in partnership with renowned eco-restoration project, Gondwana Link. Driven by the desire to inspire climate hope and action, the performances were staged in outdoor settings across Gondwana Link’s 1000 kilometre ecological pathway, with eac ..read more

Dr Margaret Moreton is Executive Director of the Australian Institute for Disaster Resilience (AIDR) and leads the work of AIDR to develop and share knowledge and learning to support a disaster resilient Australia.  Margaret joins Scotia to talk about the work of AIDR and the importance of building a collaborative approach to how we plan for and respond to disasters. She shares the story of her first understanding of the importance of community and collaboration from her childhood growing up in rural Australia and how this has informed her life and work. This, along with her experiences ..read more

Hard Place / Good Place is a project developed by the Yarra Ranges Regional Museum following a devastating storm that swept through the region in June 2021. It was thoughtfully designed in collaboration with the fEEL lab at the University of New South Wales as a way to work with young people in the region aged 15 to 25 to give voice to their experience as part of the recovery process.  The work focusses on lived experiences of being in a ‘hard place’ or a ‘good place’ through a collection of personal and community stories, told through Augmented Reality. It was exhibited in the museum in ..read more

Vic McEwan is the Artistic Director and co-founder of The Cad Factory, an artist-led organisation whose work and practice aims to enrich broader conversations about the role the arts can play within our communities. Vic is a leading practitioner in the field of socially engaged practice and joins us to discuss how this guides his work and The Cad Factory’s professional development and mentorship programs dedicated to exploring the ethics and expanding the community of practice around socially engaged work.  He shares some of The Cad Factory’s impactful projects around community pre ..read more

Zena Armstrong joins us to share the story of community recovery following the Black Summer bushfires that devastated the village of Cobargo and the surrounding regions.  Zena is a former Australian diplomat and director of the Cobargo Folk Festival where she works with a close-knit team of volunteers using music, art and the spoken word to grow community connectedness and imagine new ways of being.  In the wake of the 2019-20 bushfires, Zena and the folk festival team joined forces with other key local organisations to harness the outpouring of support for their community forming ..read more

Dr Naomi Sunderland is a lead researcher on The Remedy Project - an Australian Research Council supported project exploring music as a primary cultural determinant of health for First Nations communities.  She joins us to discuss the healing power of music and her investigation into its role within First Nations communities as an enduring link to ancestors, Country, language and community. Naomi is a descendant of the Wiradjuri First Nations People and is based out of Griffith University in Meanjin, Brisbane. Her extensive research and publishing record in arts-health and First Nations ..read more