Bangarra premiere’s first-ever visual arts collaboration, Illume.

Australia’s leading Indigenous performing arts company, Bangarra Dance Theatre, will present the world premiere of their first-ever visual arts collaboration, Illume, an exciting new presentation from Mirning woman and Bangarra artistic director, Frances Rings and Goolarrgon Bard visual artist, Darrell Sibosado.

Inspired by Sibosado’s Bard – Bardi Jawi Country on the north-western coast of Western Australia, Illume draws together music, visual arts and dance to explore the ways light has captivated and sustained Indigenous cultural existence for millennia.   

Rings and Sibosado’s collaboration examines artificial light pollution and its disruption to land and sky, devastating First Nations people’s connections to sky country and limiting their ability to share celestial knowledge and skylore. Illume explores the awe of light, a bridge between the physical and spiritual worlds. It charts the impacts of light pollution in a climate emergency. 

Working alongside Sibosado to bring his designs to the Bangarra stage, will be set designer Charles Davis, costume designer Elizabeth Gadsby, lighting designer Damien Cooper, Wiradjuri/Gamilaroi man and composer Brendon Boney, and cultural consultants Trevor Sampi, a Bardi Jawi man from Lombadina and Audrey (Pippi) Bin Swani, a proud member of the Baad/Nimanburr tribe.