The Big West Festival returns in 2015 with its biggest line-up yet and fertile ground in the theme ‘House’.
Marcia Ferguson has been very busy indeed. Big West’s Artistic Director has been feverishly curating the 70-odd collected brainchildren of Melbourne’s creative inner west for months. The roster kept growing as the theme, House, provided fertile ground for broad interpretation.
The result of Ferguson’s team’s efforts will be on display from 20 to 28 November, Footscray in the 10th incarnation of the Big West Festival.
The diverse program is a chance to celebrate the vitality of a rich community which includes dozens of migrant groups, an established working class community a recent influx of young professionals and growing families drawn by the handy location and lively community life.
The mix makes for an exuberant arts scene and Big West has drawn together a program that reflects the diverse demographics and cultures of Footscray with a show for everybody. In keeping with this close-knit community vibe, Ferguson has crammed as many free events as possible among the ticketed shows and interactive performance pieces scattered across the suburb.
The House theme addresses the social and economic challenges faced by both the established and incoming populations of the area including rising housing prices, sustainability concerns, personal and national security. It also celebrates the importance of home as a place of safety and leisure, the location of community, family and tenderness.
Big West’s home is an actual house, built in collaboration with TAFE students, an architect, and a social housing provider and, importantly, in consultation with women who have experienced homelessness. It has been temporarily located in a Footscray carpark to draw attention to the issues of housing as well as provide a venue for the festival.
The House will be the site of many of the works confronting issues of house and home. Dwelling by Jessica Wilson is a commission of the Big West Festival which aims to ‘offer solace to anyone who ever felt homeless within their own home’. A tornado, a rainstorm, crocodiles and insects are harsh Australian elements that live on the inside, as the audience travels with three women, and their children, seeking shelter.
The festival isn’t just a venue for heavy social issues. Outside it will take over Nicholson Street to create a village with an all-day all-access arts mall including food, music and crafts scattered among the theatrical offerings.
On Saturday 21 November, the Street Party is ready to rock the socks off all and sundry. Featuring the first-ever Dance Runway, a bunch of hula hooping, beats and food trucks, the street party is set to be the most fun you can have between festival shows. Where else can you drink artisanal lemonade while petting an anthropomorphic ‘bunnyman’ in a hutch on the back of a truck?
The grade 5 and 6 students of Deer Park North primary have teamed up with Joseph O’Farrell (of The Suitcase Royale) to create the Blood! Death! Show! haunted house. It is one of several examples of theatre by and for young people which highlight Big West’s commitment to developing an interest in the arts from an early age. Nothing inspires love like involvement, as any school musical director knows, and in this age of precarious funding, love is the surest road to support.
And therein lies a secondary theme to the whole affair: a home for the festival itself. Melbourne is lucky to suffer an extraordinary glut of festivals and events. We’ve just about hit critical mass, with every weekend bringing a new FOMO-drenched spectacle. Meanwhile, the same sets of grants and sponsorship resources are stretched thinner and thinner, with the lion’s share feeding the big cats down by the river.
So how will we sustain events like this one in this consumption-driven market? Will it be fancy marketing campaigns? Armies of staff grant-writers? The audience’s raw enthusiasm, or their participation?
In the interest of generating this arts sustainability message, Marcia Ferguson has organised a panel session to get participants talking about the issue. Gamechangers features Ferguson and five of her fellow prestigious festival directors debating our cultural future. She promises it will be passionate
‘After all, if we can’t get impassioned in the arts, who can? This is our future! You don’t buy a ticket for Diwali,’ she says ‘You don’t buy a ticket for the running of the bulls. The most extraordinary events come from the collaborations of a community invested in the arts. The question is how to stimulate it.’
The Big West festival is on 20-28 November, all over Footscray.
Head to their website to check out the full event list and details.
