The Gooniyandi Music Project involved seven young men from the Yiyili Community which is situated 170km south east of Fitzroy Crossing in the Kimberley region of WA.

With the support of community elders, they decided to create a band called the Walkabout Boys. The group invited musician Monkey Marc (Combat Wombat) to come out to the community to train them in the use of the recording technology, sound gear and in song writing. Monkey brought Matt Noffs with him who is the Coordinator of Hiphoperations and a musician.

A mob of 25 people headed out on a two-day bush trip to record the traditional Bat and Croc story, as told by Elder Mervyn Street at the dreaming sites. This story was then transformed into a reggae song. The band learned how to play guitar chords, the organ, electronic drums and gained skills in song writing and sound editing software. On the last night, a very proud community came together to listen to the song and watch images of the two week workshop.

The project received funding and support through Country Arts WA, YCulture Regional, Halls Creek Shire, Kimberley Aboriginal Land and Culture Centre and Kimberley Land Council.

Walkabout Boys Poster

Gooniyandi bush trip mob

Rebecca Cockram

The ancient art of Puppetry comes to life!!!!

Morawa is a town located in the Mid West. It was settled as late as 1905 and officially gazetted as a township in 1912. The Amangu people are the traditional custodians of the area.

OUT THERE brought together 13 young people to develop a puppetry performance with Spare Parts Puppet Theatre artists Cecile Williams and Karen Hethey. Cecile taught the "Morawa Puppet Mania Crew" how to construct medium-scale puppets out of everyday found objects and materials. Karen led workshops on script writing, character development, storytelling, backstage work, and puppet manipulation.

Morawa Puppet Mania was performed at Morawa Shire Hall to an audience of almost 200! The production also featured a multi-media aspect with background projections of real locations around Morawa as well as old post-war archived images. The young people’s script reflected what life is like for a young person growing up in a Wheatbelt town.

Cecile Williams demonstrates puppet making

Photo by Rebecca Cockram

One of the scary puppets!

Photo by Rebecca Cockram

Puppet and puppeteer in Morawa

Photo by Rebecca Cockram

We let our pictures do the talking.

OUT THERE came to Northam in 2005 and the end result was Wot U Lookin At? Photographic Challenge that saw 80 young people from all walks of life make use of disposable cameras to capture images that represented events, family, environment, culture or activities.

The group that steered the development of the project included people from the Northam town and shire, Avon Valley Youth Services, Avon Valley Arts Society, Northam Senior High, the Local Drug Action Group and Avon Valley Public Health. The project aimed to bring together three distinct groups of young people who don't normally interact in the community. The artform of photography was chosen.

An image taken by each young person formed part of a dynamic community exhibition. Wot U Lookin At? was shown at the Avon Valley Arts Society, and again at the Bring it On Wheatbelt Youth Festival and at local Australia Day celebrations.

The photographs have become an important visual history of youth in Northam at a particular point in time and show that photography can increase the profile of how young people see their world within the community.

At the Wot U Lookin At? exhibition

Photo by Rachel McKenzie

Detail of At the Wot U Lookin At? exhibition.

Photo by Rachel McKenzie

Making the connection

Quinninup, Pemberton, Northcliffe and Walpole are spread over 7028 square kms of the South West region of WA. The Where’s Warren? Filmmaking project aimed to connect young people from the four communities by having them produce a short film which featured a life-size silhouetted mannequin figure named Warren.

Local filmmaker, Rose Ferrell led the workshops in each of the four communities. The 85 participants looked at script writing, story boarding, storyline and plot development and basic filming and editing techniques.

During the shooting, which took place over four weekends, the young people travelled to several different spots around their community to film each other in their staring roles. The result was four short films that were unveiled to around 200 people at the Northcliffe town hall.

The project was funded through grants from YCulture, Country Arts WA and the Northcliffe Arts Association.

Where’s Warren?

Photo by Rachel McKenzie

Northcliffe cast from Where's Warren?

Photo by Rachel McKenzie

Warren in Walpole?

Photo by Rachel McKenzie

Bringing out the drummers

Port Hedland is an energetic town of 15,000 people in the Pilbara region of WA. The original custodians, the Karriyarra people, call the place Marapikurrinya for the hand shaped formation of the tidal creeks coming off the natural harbour. South Hedland is a residential and service town for Port Hedland, 20kms away.

African artist, Kojo Sam Adjei taught local young people how to make African drums using goatskins and recycled oil drums. The young crew got into all aspects of making the instruments from stretching the skins to decorating the drums. Meanwhile African Dance instructor Fiona (Funky Boots) Haasz swapped some dance moves with the crew to create funky dances with an African flavour to accompany their new drumming skills. The creative juices were flowing for the final performances, where some unusual costumes and dance sequences were performed on the beach in ankle deep water. The week-long workshops ended with a screening of a short movie of the drum making and the performances at the local disco.

With mentoring from the RYADO, the young people were successful with YCulture Regional funding for this project.

Getting into the groove at a drumming workshop

Photo by Rachel McKenzie

Dance instructor Fiona Haasz leads the dance performance at the water's edge

Photo by Rachel McKenzie

Beating the drums with Kojo Sam

Photo by Rachel McKenzie

You can find Busselton in the South West region of WA on the shores of the dazzling Geographe Bay. The Wardandi people are the traditional custodians of the area.

With help from Country Arts WA's Regional Youth Arts Development Officer, the Busselton and Dunsborough Youth Advisory Councils, collectively known as Southern Rip, secured YCulture funding to hold silk screening workshops to create their own t-shirt with the Southern Rip logo.

Led by local screen printer, Rachel McKenzie, the crew learned about project management, the design and production processes of screen printing and ended up with some awesome t-shirts. The crew also worked on creating t-shirts for the volunteers working at the 2005 South Bound Festival, which gave excellent exposure to Southern Rip!

The Southern Rip Crew wearing their new t-shirts

Photo by Ryan Santera Ammon

Dan Van Halen hard at work

Photo by Ryan Santera Ammon