Shrouds and Shroud Making with Blake Lawrence (11:30-1pm)
Drawing on the Byzantium and trans-cultural practice of shrouding and wrapping bodies in fabric, Blake Lawrence will share with you his artistic practice.
Drawing on the Byzantium and trans-cultural practice of shrouding and wrapping bodies in fabric, Blake Lawrence will share with you his artistic practice. A shared moment of intimate performance, immersion, resurrection and manifestation results in a warped and blurred impression of the subject. Enthographic photographic practices are subverted in this way with the masking of gender, age, ability, culture and other markers for identity. In their place, meteorological and biological impressions remain, hinting at time, place and environment as indexes for each portrait.
Lightness of Touch - Brevity of Commitment with Paul Warren (11:30-1pm)
This is a workshop about physicality, movement and meaning.
Two words in our modern times that are laden with misconception: touch; commitment. What happens when we swap the meanings of these two words? How do we than interact with one another? Definitions and our rolls with each other can become clearer.
This is a workshop about physicality, movement and meaning.
Two words in our modern times that are laden with misconception, ... touch - commitment. What happens when we swap the meanings of these two words? How do we than interact with one another? Definitions and our rolls with each other can become clearer.
Paul Warren has been dancing Argentinean tango for the past nineteen years and teaches with one of Sydney’s best-known tango schools, ‘SoTango’.
“… Tango by its very nature is an improvised dance relying on connection, intuition and generosity within the embrace, and demands of its dancers, openness to the intuitive moment to create a ‘dialogue’ within the embrace”. PW.
… Very much like his working life …
He is also one of Australia’s most experienced Directors of Photography.
His portfolio is extensive and displays a huge variety of formats, styles and content.
The feature film ‘The Cup’ was in Official Selection for the prestigious Directors’ Fortnight at the Cannes Film Festival.
He also teaches specialized digital camera courses at AFTRS, and his teaching ‘style’ reflects this broad understanding and innovative creativity.
Bringing this unique and subtle combination of skills for observation, story telling, technicalities, teaching and creativity within the worlds of dance and film enable Paul to bring some extraordinary insights and experiences to a workshop environment.
Paul is a member of ‘The Conductors’ a performance group, embodying a restless search for combining different media and disciplines. Their most notable collaboration was based around time & space, performed at CarriageWorks in Sydney as part of the ‘Expanded Architecture’ festival.
Planning Well with Shanna Provost (11:30-1pm)
Anyone who has had to process a loved one’s death knows that it is a difficult and time-consuming task – even if you know where everything is. This workshop will give you the tools to avoid “leaving a mess” for your loved ones to clean up during their time of grief. You will take the first steps towards getting your affairs in order. The process itself can teach you a great deal about who you are and what you value most.
This workshop is for everyone who will leave a body and ‘stuff’ (that’s all of us!) behind, and who cares enough for their loved ones to not want to leave a mess for them to clean up during their time of grief.
Shanna’s desire for her workshop participants is that they walk away feeling relief that they now understand and have taken those important first steps to getting their affairs in order.
The Rest Easy process encapsulates the sum total of who you are – it is more than making a Will or Power of Attorney.
“Anyone who has had to process a loved one’s death knows that it is a difficult and time-consuming task – even if you know where everything is. This workshop will give you the tools to avoid leaving a mess for your loved ones to clean up during their time of grief. It will help you to gather all your necessary information in one simple, easy-to-access place and provide support in communicating your choices to your loved ones in a gentle and caring way.
This workshop is filled with practical tools and information that will help you to make decisions based on your life/spiritual values; to gather all your information into one simple, easy-to-access place and to provide the tools that support you to communicate your choices to your loved ones in a gentle and caring way.”
We’ll be discussing important aspects of your ‘post-life clean-up’ including ‘What to do when I die (who to contact; what documents you need etc.’, ‘My Funeral Wishes (burial/cremation, flowers/donations, eco option etc.’, ‘Where to find all my financial stuff (bank accounts, credit cards, loans, assets, hidden assets’, ‘All things online (your digital legacy: Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn etc.)’ and your ‘Life Snapshot’ where you get to build the memories of your life so far to share with your loved ones.
Confronting Fear with Peter Banki, Ph.D (2:30-4pm)
Fear is not the opposite of courage. In fact, very often the two go together. Often we are not even aware that we are frightened of something, or the extent to which fear is in the driver's seat in so many important aspects of our lives. Fear is not necessary bad, it is there to protect us, but sometimes the protection prevents us from taking beautiful risks.
In this workshop, rather than work to overcome fear, more modestly we will simply seek to feel the fear. Without being willing to feel the fear and dwell in it, there is no chance of overcoming it.
Fear is not the opposite of courage. In fact, very often the two go together. Often we are not even aware that we are frightened of something, or the extent to which fear is in the driver's seat in so many important aspects of our lives. Fear is not necessary bad, it is there to protect us, but sometimes the protection prevents us from taking beautiful risks.
In this workshop, rather than work to overcome fear, more modestly we will simply seek to feel the fear. Without being willing to feel the fear and dwell in it, there is no chance of overcoming it.
The psyche is very complex, it can let go of things, only once it feels them. Often the thing we are we most frightened of, is the very thing we most have to confront. What we are most afraid of is usually where we have to go. This workshop will help you to be in that space.
Intergenerational Trauma and Healing with Aunty Rhonda Dixon-Grovenor (2:30-4pm)
In this workshop Aunty Rhonda will speak about the legacy of complex intergenerational trauma that has been a consequence of settler colonialism in Australia.
In this workshop Aunty Rhonda will speak about the legacy of intergenerational trauma that has been a consequence of settler colonialism in Australia.
Aunty Rhonda Dixon-Grovernor is a Gadigal/Yuin elder with over 50 years experience as an entertainer and Cultural Arts Educator.
Aunty Rhonda embodies Indigenous Knowledge Systems through Traditional Art and Cultural Practices drawing from embedded Ancestoral Knowledge handed down to her from her Elders.
AuntyRhonda has also has studied within the Western Education system and has a Masters in Aboriginal Studies and Wellbeing (Intergenerational Trauma and Recovery) She has competed Seasons for Growth (Grief and Loss) Studies and currently developing a Holistic Empowerment and Healing Program
AuntyRhonda is Passionate about Healing and Peace
ONE 🌏 EARTH
ONE PEOPLE
Intergenerational Trauma and Loss in Aboriginal Communities Is because of complex Loss
Loss after
Loss after
Loss
It is accumulated loss
Loss of Land
Loss of Equity
Loss of Status
Loss of opportunity
Loss of Culture
Loss of children (Stollen Generation)
Loss of Acknowledgement Breaking up of families through the extremely high incarceration rate of Aboriginal people. This accumulated Loss has bought sadness and Trauma which has been passed down through the generations.
My Grandfather said “They bought the Problem here: the Alcohol violence etc and left us with Mental Health and other problems. Now we are left dis-eased with complex problems and trauma. We need the mainstream system to work with us, be guided by us and our methodologies utilising our Cultural and Traditional Knowledge and Practices) where the mainstream Non-Aboriginal people with skills in Western Psychology and Neuro Plasticity methods can assist them with skills, knowledge and training Empowering Aboriginal and other people who are trying to live with complex Trauma and how they can again find their lost souls.
Your Will - What Do You Really Want To Say with Donal Griffin (2:30-4pm)
How do you write a Will that reflects your own wishes and values? Legacy lawyer, Donal Griffin, will share with you what people have done well and not so well in terms of their Wills.
In this workshop you will learn how to write a Will that reflects your own wishes and values. Donal Griffin will share with you what people have done well and not so well in terms of their Wills. Personal relationships often pay the price in a world where the property market means a lot. Too often, dry lawyers give people documents that are either too complex or too simple to look after a client’s family. This workshop will enable you to have the Will you deserve. In addition Donal will also share a little about the book he is writing for his son: The Irish Book of Living and Dying.
Donal Griffin is admitted as a lawyer in New South Wales and in Ireland. He also has qualifications in financial planning including the award of Certified Financial Planner. Donal has a Masters in Wills and Estates.
Donal practices as a lawyer in the areas of asset protection, estate planning, estate litigation, family trusts and business succession planning.
He specialises in advising on superannuation and family trust issues. He has a particular interest in the international aspects of estate planning which affect a large number of people in Australia.
Donal’s Sydney based firm, LEGACY LAW, is a specialist private client law firm for people who want experts to advise them in important personal areas such as wealth preservation, beneficiary protection and, for those who do not spend it all, successful inter-generational wealth transfer.
Donal takes his own advice sometimes and has a Will but more interestingly is writing a more personal document for his young son called “The Irish Book of Living and Dying”.
Embodied Surrendering and Relaxation with Tod McKendry (4:30-6pm)
We will physically explore letting go. We will undergo a process of guided relaxation of the body and from this relaxed state, we will explore the beginnings and endings of interactions with other people with the help of tai chi partner work.
In this workshop, we will physically explore letting go. We will undergo a process of guided relaxation of the body and from this relaxed state, we will explore the beginnings and endings of interactions with other people with the help of tai chi partner work.
Tod McKendry is tai chai practitioner and player for 20 years experience. He has always had an intense interest in human beings and the human condition. This has expressed itself through involvement in a wide variety of lifestyles and practices from Thai Massage to trading financial markets. He got involved in the recovery movement over 17 years ago and as part of that exploration he developed a keen interest in psychology and counselling, specifically a variant of Gestalt termed Conscious Integration. Todd was recognised for his emotional courage, empathy and technical aptitude and was asked to co-lead and later lead emotional exploration process groups. Todd has always had a keen interest in the nexus of sexuality and authentic relating and the issues that arise through relating and how those issues can be a portal to healing less than optimal formative experiences. Since 1992, Tai Chi Chuan has been a consistent source of experiencing and healing on the physical, emotional and energetic levels for Todd. It has been a source of great insight and inspiration and a touchstone in being present and harmonious in relationship.
The Power of Ceremony with Victoria Spence (4:30-6pm)
When most of us think of ceremony we imagine it as a series of actions to mark an occasion or life event that are given a particular form and mode of expression. Whilst this is true, what is most powerful about ceremony is that which remains unseen. Ceremony is a way of performing how things can yet be, in tension with the way they are in everyday life. Ceremony is a sacredness within the everyday, where other possibilities are glimpsed, and where changes (both real and attitudinal) are seeded.
When most of us think of ceremony we imagine it as a series of actions to mark an occasion or life event that are given a particular form and mode of expression. Whilst this is true, what is most powerful about ceremony is that which remains unseen.
Ceremony is defined in its conception and intentions by the level of congruence it facilitates, both in the lead up process and within the ‘expression’ of the form itself. When preparing to leave your youth, to have a child, to marry or to come to the end of your life, or to mark the changing of the seasons, a birthday or other significant life event, all of it is ceremony – ceremony is the context in which you operate – research is ceremony, preparation is ceremony, conversation is ceremony, disagreements and challenges are ceremony and most of all, the relationships engendered are ceremony as well as the elements that are presented on the day.
Ceremony begins with the setting of intentions, the way in which the visible elements are conceived, thought about, given language to and brought to expression. Ceremony is a process in which ones intentions are clarified and made manifest by paying particular attention to the quality of the experience you take your guests on.
Understanding that the people meeting and participating in the ‘ceremony’ will have the opportunity to enter their lives anew, with a shift in perspective, thought and feeling.
Rites of Passage, a term coined by Arnold Van Gennep, an early 20th Century Anthropologist identified (produced) ‘3 phases’ (- I call them experiences) in all Rites of Passage-
Separation – pre liminal
Transition- liminal
Re-Incorporation- post liminal.
Coming from the Latin term, Limen-‘ to stand at the threshold’ between one way of being and another.
Liminality is the middle phase of all initiations, characterized by ambiguity and disorientation, where the subject has left his or her previous identity or way of living and is yet to assume their new one or place in society. Later in the 20th C, the term was reclaimed by Victor Turner who focused in the liminal period entirely and applied it more widely that to passage rites themselves, noting, that the status of liminal individuals is socially and structurally ambiguous.
‘the subject is structurally, if not physically, ‘invisible’” (1967: 95)….Liminality may perhaps be regarded as a realm of pure possibility whence novel configurations of ideas and relations may arise” (1967: 97).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liminality
Ceremony is a way of performing how things can be that may be in tension with how things actually are. This ‘ceremonial narrative’ happens within the everyday in place and time, but is set apart from it.
It is this space- the sacred within the everyday, where other possibilities are glimpsed is where real societal or attitudinal changes are seeded and become possible.
It’s an act of listening for the integration points, the building of relationships around certain actions through repetition, careful and clear language and the creation of congruence in those participating and those presenting.
Good ceremony is good storytelling that transmits a sense of inclusion, shared values and becomes a mooring point for belonging and for the possibility of new questions and perspectives to be produced.
To bring it to our lives offers us an opportunity to see things anew, to create the narratives by which primary meaning is made in our lives.
Winter Solstice Ceremony at Rockwood Cemetery, 23 June, 2018. Images Courtesy of Dean Walsh and Kaz Therese