It’s a steamy, sticky, Sydney evening when we gather at Bangarra Dance Theatre, on Gadigal Country. The theatre is in the Walsh Bay Arts precinct, one of Sydney’s semi-natural wonders, where historic piers parade into the sparkling harbour, and the exposed wood of the former loading docks frame the curved steel of the harbour bridge. The precinct wraps the edge of the city business district and after navigating through the screech of the city circle trains and jostling corporate rush hour, the smell of timber and salt hits the body like a balm.
It's water and wood that sets the scene to watch the next generation of Bangarra movers, storytellers and cultural leaders showcase three new choreographic works in Dance Clan. Already, there is a sense of homecoming, embrace, and reconnection with nature and land, in the midst of chaos and disorder.
For 25 years Dance Clan has fostered emerging Bangarra artists. It isn’t just an opportunity for the new generation of dancers, but an entire host of indigenous early career artists, including set (Annalise McCarthy), costume (Lillardia Briggs-Houston) and composition (James Howard, Leon Rodgers and Amelia Thompson).
The production opens with Kallum Goolagong’s Metamorphisis. Goolagong, a proud Wiradjuri and Darkinjung man, wanted to explore questions about “what makes a flow state happen? What makes change happen? And how does that create the spiritual and natural flow of life?” He’d been reading stories where “there was a switch from one kind of spirit to another…I wanted to debunk how someone changes from one state to another and sees clarity through different eyes.”
The set to Metamorphisis is a smoky moonscape, with large wooden bowls, curved and carved, lit at the edges with embers. The score intertwines bird trills with beats. The choreography is dynamic and compelling. Kiarn Doyle, in particular, is mesmerising, moving with force and intelligence.
Next up is Daniel Mateo’s dance film Brown Boys. Mateo, a proud Gamilaroi man and Tongan from Ma’ufanga, comes from a family of nine, seven of whom are boys. Mateo tells us that it’s his shared experiences with other young indigenous men that fuelled him to create Brown Boys. He wanted the work to be “an offering of our story.’’ The genesis for Mateo’s film was his collection of poetry; stories that he also wanted to tell – “give them light” – through the medium of dance. Light is a major theme in Brown Boys. It opens with sunlight on Mateo's brown skin, the camera spanning two tattoos at the end of each of his collarbones: the moon and the sun. Mateo is sheltered in a Fala (a Tongan woven mat), which has an open circle at the top, where the sun shines through.
Mateo wanted to showcase “my connection or my concept of belonging to the land and how there’s this holistic connection between land and body and how that’s necessary for us to feel close or feel at home.” It might seem like an odd comparison, but Brown Boys has notes of the 90s classic Keanu Reeves film Point Break, with its cinematic love letter to sun, ocean and the male body. Though, where Point Break echoes salt and surf, Brown Boys embraces honey and dirt. It culminates with Mateo standing waste deep in the earth, surrounding him like a skirt.
To finish, we have Yawuru Buru, by Lillian Banks. Banks, a proud Yawuru woman from Broome, Western Australia, created a work about her people and home. Most importantly, “I’m most excited to work close to my mum. I’m using my mum’s artwork in the costumes. I’m also going to be learning language to have in the music as well as mum speaking language. I’ve always wanted to collaborate with my mum on a work about home and the challenges I’ve faced to get where I am today.”
Yawuru Buru highlights two stories most important to Banks: gathering ocean pipis with her mother, and of women’s collective healing. The piece starts with smoke and language; it smells and sounds like cleansing and country. The women are dressed in red and ochre, and a huge net covers the ceiling and stage. The men are costumed in cool blues, mesh and aquamarines, reflecting the ocean. The choreography is classic Bangarra, and the music is both urgent and soothing. In the latter stages of the performance, the score incorporates the sounds of chains, while the dancers move with increasing pace, shaping their hands into pistols, and sliding pointed fingers down their torsos. All of Bank’s performers are committed, talented and compelling storytellers, but Mateo is unmissable. He was listed as one of Bachtrack’s rising stars in 2024 for a reason. Anyone who can see Mateo perform live, should. He’s a once in a generation talent.
The fact that Dance Clan clocks in at a punchy 75 minutes, and is performed in Bangarra’s compact Dance Theatre, gives it a unique condensed intimacy. It’s always a privilege to see Bangarra perform, particularly up close, and Dance Clan proves that its future is on solid ground.
