Image: Electric Fields by Bryony Jackson

MEET THE ARTISTS

ALICE SKYE

Alice Skye is a singer-songwriter, Wergaia woman and universal little sister. Originally from country Victoria, Alice grew up aside the Sandstone Mountains and wildflowers of the Grampians. Still inspired by her roots, Alice now calls Melbourne home and says "I take great pride in my heritage and to combine both music and my background brings me an unexplainable amount of pride and happiness."

In 2015 Alice entered the Alukura Competition (Alukura meaning ‘women' in the Arrernte language), run by Australia’s longest running Indigenous music label CAAMA Music, and Alice’s original song ‘You Are The Mountains’ was selected to lead the compilation album. Funnily enough until she was selected for The Alukura Compilation Alice’s family and friends had no idea she could write music and had never seen her perform! Later that year, she was a finalist in the Triple J Unearthed NIMA competition and named one of the 5 new Indigenous artists you need to hear.

Hailed by the Courier Mail as one of the Top 5 must-see acts prior to her incredible performance at the 2017 BIGSOUND CAAMA Music Showcase in September, Alice’s first single ‘60%’ has now been added to rotation on Triple J Unearthed and reached #3 in the national AMRAP AirIt Regional Charts in its third week. Taken from her forthcoming debut album, Friends with Feelings (slated for release Feb 2018), The Music premiered the single and described it as "an ethereal, sparse framework built on Skye's eminently warm vocal tones and piano accompaniment, mixing in restrained percussion and the occasional E-piano run for good measure.” Her latest single 'Poetry By Text' was added to AMRAP’s Face The Music 2017 playlist.

Alice Skye’s songs sparkle with a sensitivity and maturity well beyond her years, accompanied by the gentle and hauntingly sparse melodies of a piano score. Very like young British singer-songwriter Birdy, Alice’s voice is a combination of hopeful and haunting, naturally sweet and slow and dreamlike. Her stripped back piano melodies elevate the gentle moodiness of her songwriting, transforming her once bedroom scribblings into well-crafted and articulated lyrics on love, loss and life. Alice Skye is a name set to soar in the Australian pop scene as music lovers begin to learn more about this young yet mature talent from country Victoria.

BRIAN SOLOMON

Award winning creator Brian Solomon is of Anishinaabe and Irish descent, born in the remote community, Shebanoning / Killarney, located in Northern Ontario, Canada. He has presented his multidisciplinary works in Berlin, Ingolstadt, Bamberg, Seville, Edinburgh,  Amsterdam, Londonand across Canada. Brian is a graduate of the School of Toronto Dance Theatre, and holds a MA in Performance from the Laban Center in London, UK.

He has worked for dozens of creators from across Canada, the US and Europe, and taught for many companies and arts institutions including one of Europe’s foremost universities for performance, H.F.S. Ernst Busch (Berlin). In addition to his career as a Choreographer/Dancer he works as a Visual Artist and Actor.  Brian is passionate about helping people relearn about their forgotten bodies, and take back the space those bodies occupy. Find out more at electricmoose.ca.

CONSTANTINA BUSH

Kamahi’s artistic practices sit across visual arts, acting and singing. Born in Katherine, Northern Territory, Kamahi began painting and sketching at a young age, guided by his grandfather, a member of the Gurindji tribe, who was both a teacher and a mentor to young Kamahi. His grandfather told him stories about the desert and as a result, Kamahi’s work is greatly influenced by his grandfather’s teaching. Kamahi successfully entwines his own unique style and images with other art styles taken from many locations and experiences.

INFINITE DAKOTA

Dåkot-ta Alcantara-Camacho was born in Snohomish Territory and raised in Tscha-kole-chy (within a predominantly diasporic Chamorro community. Their lineage comes from Låguas yan Gåni (the archipelago known as the Mariånas Islands, and specifically the largest island known as Guåhan - incorrectly pronounced as Guam by the Western world). Dåkot-ta grew up in the Seattle hip hop underground and social justice movement excercising a life long passion and skill for rap. Attending the University of Wisconsin-Madison as a First Wave Hip Hop Scholar, Dåkot-ta graduated with a degree in Gender and Women's Studies while a concentration in Chamoru Studies meant a year long study abroad at the University of Guåhan.

Reconnecting to their ancestral community was a pivotal life change as was beginning participation in an oral history research project, a traditional-styled Chant group specializing in Fino' Håya (a little spoken indigenous form of the language). This opened many pathways for creative potential as a Matao identifying indigenous person, realized in the creation of indigenous contemporary hip hop theatre shows, Buried Beneath: Bombs & Låtte and Guåhu Guåhan. In 2016, on completion of a Masters of Performance Studies at Tisch School of the Arts at NYU, Dåkot-ta founded The Matao New Performance Project and premiered FANHASSO at the Festival of the Pacific Arts 2016.

Dåkot-ta has been the primary composer, graphic & web designer, video editor and technician for I Moving Lab - an international, indigenous, intercultural, & interdisciplinary arts collective. Last year, Dåkot-ta released their first full-length album, Nå'lå'la - meaning "give life" - a sonic artistic mission statement - to give life to ancestral knowing to give life to the world.

ELECTRIC FIELDS

Electric Fields is a potent new music bringing together the brilliance and creativity of music producer and composer Michael Ross, with the mesmerising sensitivity of Zaachariaha Fielding - whose rare and beautiful voice has been described as 'taking soul to the stratosphere'. These two feminine brothers create a striking and haunting merging of living traditional culture with electronic music. Co-writing music and delivering an evocative and memorable live performance experience - Electric Fields bring moments of breathtaking beauty and power to the stage. Often featuring Zaachariaha's traditional language of the Anangu Pitjantjatjara Yankunytjatjara people, Electric Fields music ranges from soulful pop to epic-scale electronic works, through to intensely intimate story-songs.

Within a year of their debut EP release, Electric Fields received the APRA Emily Burrows Award, performed in China and Scotland by invitation, played for a massive New Year’s Eve event to an audience of over 40,000, and were booked to play WOMADelaide 2017.  They hit No1 on Radio Adelaide’s Most Played, went on high rotation on Fresh FM, and are receiving airplay on Triple J.  Taking out New Talent of the Year for the National Indigenous Music Awards 2017 (NIMAs), Electric Fields also became recipients of the much-coveted Stigwood Fellowship for 2017/2018, and were awarded SA Live Act of the Year for the National Live Music Awards 2017 (NLMAs), with Zaachariaha taking out SA Live Voice of the Year.

Currently touring Australia after returning in July from a hugely successful performance for the Matasora World Music Festival in Indonesia, Electric Fields have recently played Big Sound and the Tivoli in Brisbane; the National Centre for Indigenous Excellence (NCIE) Sydney; the National Gallery of Victoria for the Dior Series, and Homeground, at the Sydney Opera House. They opened the national Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Visual Arts Festival, Tarnanthi – with their track Pukulpa being used for Tarnanthi’s television campaign; andprovided the entire music content for the stunningone-hourshow Nurlanthi, Spirit Festival 2016. Their track Shade Away was chosen as the hero music for Adelaide Fashion Festival 2016, which was performed live for the opening, and used as the promotional music for the Adelaide Fashion Festival’s television campaign. Featured on Qantas In-Flight Entertainment, Shade Away has also been included on the latest compilation release NIMA Presents: The Sound of Indigenous Australia – Now and Before – by Warner Music. 

With bookings taking them beyond August 2018, Electric Fields will appear in numerous high profile festivals across Australia before taking up invitations to perform in New Zealand, and Poland, and Germany. 

EMILY JOHNSON

Emily Johnson is an artist who makes body-based work. A Bessie Award winning choreographer and Guggenheim Fellow in Choreography, she is based in New York City. Originally from Alaska, she is of Yup’ik descent and since 1998 has created work that considers the experience of sensing and seeing performance. Her dances function as installations, engaging audiences within and through a space and environment—interacting with a place's architecture, history, and role in community. Emily is trying to make a world where performance is part of life; where performance is an integral connection to each other, our environment, our stories, our past, present, and future. She receives inspiration from the annual migration of salmon, who swim upstream for thousands of miles because they must. She has watched these salmon swim up waterfalls and she believes humans can also be called to do amazing things. She has been told that she makes dance for “dance-lovers” and she makes dance for “people-who-generally-don’t-like-dance.” She would like to think that this is true; she would like to think that her dances are for every body and that maybe they enlighten small aspects of our existence.

Emily received a 2014 Doris Duke Artist Award and her work is supported by Creative Capital, Native Arts and Cultures Foundation, Map Fund, The Joyce Awards, the McKnight Foundation, New England Foundation for the Arts, and The Doris Duke Residency to Build Demand for the Arts. Emily was a Mellon Choreography Fellow at Williams College 2015 - 2017, a fellow at the Institute for Advanced Study at the University of Minnesota 2013 - 2015, an inaugural Fellow at the Robert Rauschenberg Residency, a 2012 Headlands Center for the Arts and MacDowell Artist in Residence, a Native Arts and Cultures Fellow (2011), a MANCC Choreographer Fellow (2009/2010/2012/2014/2016), a MAP Fund Grant recipient (2009/2010/2012/2013/2015/2016), and McKnight Fellow (2009, 2012). Johnson’s written work has been published and commissioned by Dance Research Journal (University of Cambridge Press); SFMOMA; Transmotion Journal, University of Kent; Movement Research Journal; Pew Center for Arts and Heritage; and the recently published compilation, Imagined Theaters (Routledge), by Daniel Sack. 

Emily is a lead collaborator in the Indigenous-artist led Healing Place Collaborative (Minneapolis, MN), focused on the vital role of the Mississippi River in the life of residents along its path; she was an inaugural participant in the Headlands Center for the Arts' Climate Change Residency, and a member of Creative Change at Sundance. In 2016 Emily served as a water protector at Oceti Sakowin Camp at Standing Rock. In December 2016 she co-facilitated TIME PLACE SPACE, NOMAD with ArtsHouse in Wotjobaluk Country, Australia. In January 2017 she produced UMYUANGVIGKAQ with PS122 on Manhahtaan in Lenapehoking, a durational Long Table/Sewing Bee focused on indigenizing the performing arts and the world at large. She is part of the current and related four year strategy for the Australian and North American Indigenous performing arts sectors; collaborating with Blakdance, Ilbijerri and partners.

Her most recent work, Then a Cunning Voice and A Night We Spend Gazing at Stars -  an all night outdoor performance gathering taking place on and near eighty-four community-hand-made quilts - premiered in Lenapehoking (NYC) with PS122 on Randall's Island in summer 2017 and will tour to Chicago, San Francisco, and Narrm (Melbourne), Australia.

ERIC AVERY

Eric Avery is a Ngiyampaa, Yuin, and Gumbangirr Mayi. Eric's parents grew up in Redfern, Alexandria and surrounds, and Eric's Grandparents where the first of their families to move to Sydney from North/Western NSW and the NSW North Coast. Eric Grew up in Southern and Eastern Sydney learning of his mother and father's connection to country (Yuin, Gumbangirr, Ngiyampaa). In the last 7 years Eric has been able to connect with his Father's side of the family, revitalising family ties, singing and continuance of culture. 

Eric is currently enagaged dancing with Marrugeku and has previously had a mentorship at The Australian Ballet and studied dance at NAISDA Dance college. An avid violinist Eric started learning classical music by “ear” when he was 11 and continued on to train at Newtown Performing Arts and more recently the Australian Institute for Music. He combines his skills on the violin to perform classical music and create new music expressing his Koori (NSW Aboriginal) heritage. Eric's work explores dispossession and reconnection, language and form.

HANNAH BRONTE & FEMPRESS

Wakka Wakka, Yaegl.

Hannah Brontë is a practicing visual artist living and working in Meanjin (Brisbane), QLD. Employing video art, costume design, weaving, textiles and installation her vivid videos depict her imagined futures. Her self made textiles using microscopic imagery of oestregen combined with camouflage explores the idea of female militia. All her work is entwined with the constant theme of female empowerment. The creator of Fempress her dance parties combining live hip hop acts with large scale installations, have become immersive artworks. DJ’ing at festivals all over Australia has seen Bronte combine her artwork with her music slowly beginning the evolution of her imagined universes crossing into reality. 

JACK SHEPPARD

Jack Sheppard is of the Kurtjar clan of the Gulf of Carpentaria, North QLD. He is an artist driven by his culture, spirituality, and humanity. Jack studied at Naisda Dance College and WAAPA’s Aboriginal Theatre Course. He works and creates in the artistic elements of movement, circus, physical theatre and poetry. Jack has written one short play, ‘Monsoon’, received a small grant through Footscray Community Arts Centre, for his physical theatre creative development, ‘The Honouring’ which showed @ Wominjeka Fest ’17. He has had his poetry published in Rabbit Poetry Magazine – The Indigenous Issue; The Australian Poetry Journal; And Djed Press.

JOSHUA PETHER

Joshua Pether is an emerging choreographer/performer based in Western Australia. He is of Kalkadoon heritage and also identifies as having a disability. As a dancer he has worked for companies in both Australia and New Zealand and has toured both nationally and internationally. His practice works within dance and performance art giving audiences a visceral and sometimes confronting experience.

He is interested in the aesthetics of the disabled body and also that of the colonized body and finds that these two cultures when intertwined feed of each other to create new forms and ideas. 

KAHL WALLIS

Lead singer and songwriter for indie/alternative band The Medics, environmental and social activist, storyteller, and now solo performer, Kahl Wallis is a young Aboriginal man on a mission.

After releasing their debut album Foundations in 2012, Kahl’s band The Medics took out top honours at the 2012 National Indigenous Music Awards with wins for Best New Talent, Album of the Year, and Song of the Year for 'Griffin', and were crowned Best New Talent at the 2013 Rollingstone Awards. They have performed at a number of festivals across the country including Big Day Out, Splendour in the Grass, Woodford Folk Festival and Groovin’ The Moo, and in 2014 they were invited to tour internationally to Brazil.

In late 2014 Kahl decided to strip back into raw acoustic mode to explore his songwriting and cultural roots further. He was soon invited to tour with Blue King Brown, opening for them as a solo artist at their shows across the country. With his solo project only just beginning to gather speed, Kahl was extremely honoured to receive the Dreaming Award at the 2015 National Indigenous Arts Awards, presented by the Australia Council for the Arts. The award came with a $20,000 cash prize for him to record his debut solo album, currently scheduled for release in 2017.

Between recording as a solo artist, touring, participating in community projects, and working on his second record with The Medics, Kahl also works as a music mentor and healthy-lifestyle facilitator with The Jimmy Little Foundation, delivering workshops to Indigenous children in remote communities.

Kahl identifies with his grandfathers country, the Wuthathi Nation from the white sands of Shelburne Bay in Cape York Peninsula, and his Grandmothers mob, the Lardil people from Mornington Island in the Gulf of Carpentaria. He takes his last name 'Wallis' from his great-great-grandfather of the Polynesian islands of Wallis and Futuna.

KAUMAKAIWA KANAKA'OLE

A riveting performer, Kaumakaiwa creates some of the most original work to emerge in contemporary Hawaiian music, drawing from ancestral memory and hula practice as chant transforms to melody. Kaumakaiwa seamlessly melds Hawaiian culture and modern sensibilities in deeply powerful music.

A modern transgender Hawaiian (mahu wahine), she is a vibrant keeper of culture, an authentic innovator, and fun, as she engages indigenous thought to address today’s issues through music, chant, and sharing of spirit. With plenty of humor, she provides wry commentary and stories to give context to her songs.

She was honored with an NACF (Native Arts & Cultures Foundation) Fellowship Award. In 2018, she is invited to be an Opening Plenary Speaker at the APAP’s annual national conference in New York.

Kaumakaiwa brings to the stage an immense talent as a singer, chanter, and dancer as well as a deep understanding of her Hawaiian culture and her place as a modern, transgender (mahu wahine) Hawaiian in this contemporary world. She has been on stage since she could walk.

LARA KRAMER

Lara Kramer is a choreographer and multidisciplinary Ojie-Cree artist based in Montreal. Her work contrasts the brutal relationships between indigenous peoples and colonial society. Her work has been invited to festivals across Canada and most recently to Australia, gaining her recognition as an important indigenous voice.

Following her acclaimed work Fragments (2012), inspired by her mother’s stores of the Indian Residential Schools Lara was recognized as a Human Rights Advocate through the Montreal Holocaust Memorial Centre. Native Girl Syndrome (2013) deals with the internalization of trauma of Indigenous women as a result of cultural genocide. The installation and performance created in collaboration with Emilie Monnet, This Time Will be Different (2017) denounced the status quo of Canadian government discourse with First Nations and criticized the "national industry of reconciliation".

Working with strong visuals and narrative, Kramer’s work pushes the strength and fragility of the human spirit. Her work is political and potent.

Untitled work: A sound installation performance. Taking and excerpt of a larger work, Lara will explore what surfaces in the unmasking of bedsheets while confronting the turmoil of her blood land. Pushing the duration of ritual, Lara Kramer is accompanied by Stefan Petersen with sound as they discover together markings. The work offers a narrative of voices echoing the choreographer’s fragmented relationship to the land as well as amplified sounds in real time which highlights passing of time. In this 2 ½ hour installation performance the continuing of trauma is acknowledged.

LOUISE POTIKI BRYANT

Louise Potiki Bryant is a choreographer, dancer, and video artist of Māori (Ngāi Tahu, Kāti Mamoe, and Waitaha), descent who has choreographed for companies such as Atamira Dance Company, Black Grace Dance Company and The New Zealand Dance Company. Louise is a founding member of Atamira Dance Company for whom she has choreographed six works, including NGĀI TAHU 32 ('Best contemporary dance production 2004', NZ Listener), TE AROHA ME TE MAMAE ('Best New Choreographer 2003', NZ Listener), and TAONGA: Dust Water Wind (Best Production, Best Music, and Best Scenography awards at the Tempo Dance Festival 2010).

Louise has a strong body of solo and collaborative works which draw upon her interdisciplinary and whakaahua practice. These works include NOHOPUKU (Stand–out Performer award, the Dunedin Fringe Festival 2010), TUMUTUMU, a collaboration with taonga pūoro authority Dr Richard Nunns (for which Louise was awarded the most innovative choreographer at Kowhiti Dance 2011) and the highly acclaimed KIRI, a collaborative performance work with clay artist Paerau Corneal. Her latest solo work NGARO is a collaboration with multi-media artists Rona Ngahuia Osborne and Paddy Free and focuses on mental health issues from a Māori perspective. Both KIRI and NGARO have been the TUAKANA performances to open the Tempo Dance Festival in Auckland, New Zealand.

Louise’s works have a strong interdisciplinary focus. She designs installations for her works, and is responsible for the design, production and editing of the projected video elements - an integral part of each performance. She has made seven dance films including WHAKARURUHAU, AORAKI, NOHOPUKU, and KURAWAKA, a collaboration with Hawaiki TU Haka Theatre. Her most recent dance film ROTO was commissioned by the Festival of Colour 2017 in Wanaka, New Zealand. Louise has designed video for many music, dance and theatrical productions including the operas HOHEPA presented by the NZ Opera Company and NIXON IN CHINA presented by the Auckland Arts Festival. Louise has made several music videos. The music video she made for Ariana Tikao’s song TUIA was awarded Best Music Video at the imagineNATIVE film festival in Toronto, Canada.

MISS ELLANEOUS

Miss Ellaneous is an original Darwin Diva. Beginning her fabulous glittery journey in 2002, Miss Ellaneous (also known as MissE) has had an extensive career on and off the stage and has preformed extensively throughout Australia and Internationally including the UK and Indonesia. 

Known for her powerful and dynamic performances, Miss Ellaneous has established herself as one of this country finest Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Drag Queens. She is the co-owner and director of Party Passport, which produces national and international events, parties and gatherings.

Some of MissE’s highlights include performing with Taylor Mac in the 2017 Melbourne Festival, The Dreaming Festival with ‘Constantina Bush and the Bushettes' and in 2013 & 2015 with the ensemble from the all female hit show, ‘Hot Brown Honey’. Miss Ellaneous is a regular performer in Darwin and can be seen as a regular host online with NITV.

MOE CLARK

Métis multidisciplinary artist Moe Clark is a nomadic songbird with wings woven from circle singing and spoken word. Mistress of the looping pedal, her poetic songs resonate with the power to heal and to connect with authentic purpose.Originally from Treaty 7, she’s called Tio’tia:ke/ Montreal home for nine years. As an educator she facilitates creative workshops in community and with indigenous youth with a basis for deepening embodiment and awareness through personal and collective expression.

She's directed and produced multiple intercultural collaborative events including Transcestral: a musical exchange bridging Indigenous and Sufi musical traditions and in 2013 she directed the 10^th Annual Canadian Festival of Spoken Word in Montreal, highlighting Indigenous languages. Moe has two albums of music, a bilingual book of poetry and multiple performance videos and awards. Her work has been featured around the world at the Lincoln Centre (US), Queensland Poetry Festival (AU), Maelstrom Poetry Festival (BE) and Planet IndigenUs festival (CA), among others. 

Moe Clark will be performing with talented multi-instrumentalist Ahau Marino; collaborator, musical magician and friend.

RIA HALL

With the release of her debut self-titled EP, Ria Hall became a blazing female force on the NZ music scene. Winning multiple awards and critical acclaim, her sound fused furious hip-hop beats and richly layered vocals in English and Te Reo Māori, creating an epic soundscape that embraced and challenged multiple genres.

Ria creates music with an urban yet distinctive Māori flare. October 2017 saw the release of her highly anticipated concept album entitled ‘Rules Of Engagement’, a work heavily based on the New Zealand Wars of the 1860’s, and in particular the Battle of Gate Pā which took place in her tribal home land of Tauranga Moana. In its first week of release, it debuted on The Official New Zealand Music Charts at #1. Featuring appearances and production from Tiki Taane, Kings, Laughton Kora, Mara TK and Electric Wire Hustle, the album showcase Ria’s incredible talent as a vocalist and lyricist.

Ria is a powerful live performer, who's sought after live set has seen her play to audiences of thousands at a number of festivals across Australasia. The live set is best described as an experience that showcases her enormous vocal range and ability to effortlessly transition between styles. Always in demand, she has collaborated extensively with a diverse range of artists and producers across a wide genres and backgrounds.

Ria Hall is a fearless female artist with resolute ideas for the future of New Zealand music: “There is so much richness that New Zealand music can take to the world. We haven’t realised our own potential - and that’s exciting”.

ROB RUHA

With his award-winning music and evocative performances, Rob Ruha presents works from his new album SURVIVANCE: a must-see showcase of fresh music that shares intimate ‘Survivance’ stories of his indigenous Māori nation.

In recent years Rob Ruha has been an awards magnet for his ability to sing to and from the soul. His new album with his band The Witch Dr. confirms the diversity of his gifts and in 2017 received the honor of being named as one of five Laureate Award recipients in the NZ Arts Foundation Awards. Rob is a highly acclaimed composer and artist of a new generation of Māori. He is a product of powerful kapa haka traditions and indigeneity, who rooted in traditional knowledge transforms it into contemporary works of music. His unique style of ‘Haka-soul’ music has been performed and embraced all over the world and his compositions can be heard everywhere from the marae to the kapa haka stage, from Spotify to international performance spaces and Disney smash hits like ‘MOANA.’ 

SANGPUY

Sangpuy Katatepan Mavaliyw, oftenly been described as a "young man with an old soul," because of his life journey and ethos in his song and life style. Sangpuy comes from a Pinyumayan indigenous tribe - Katratripulr, in Taiwan's Pacific southeast coast. In Katatipulr, he learned Pinuyumayan music, language, culture and traditions.