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THE LOVE BOOTH
8-9 March 2024
The Love Booth is a musical story telling of queer adventures and love from Chicago to Canada to Newport in Melbourne. The invisible history of our LGBTQIA+ locals comes out from behind the curtain to dance in the spotlight in the grand space of Williamstown Town Hall for three shows only.
A combination of song, fashion, dance and storytelling reflect local experiences as well as international activism. The world has turned and danced forward (in many places) since the listing of homosexuality as a ‘mental illness’.
Playwright Tara Goldstein was inspired to write The Love Booth to celebrate the 50 years since the delisting of this diagnosis. With her Toronto based company Gailey Road Productions she has partnered with the Hobsons Bay community and director Donna Jackson of Art & Industry Projects and Hubcap Productions to research, reveal and weave local queer folks’ histories into a new cabaret version of The Love Booth.
This promises to be a bold, brash and beautiful celebration of a new world that is not perfect but it is something to sing and dance about.
Friday 8 March at 7.30pm
Saturday 9 March at 3.30pm (matinee)
Saturday 9 March at 7.30pm
Bookings: hobsonsbaytickets.com.au
Tickets: $30/$35
Seating is at tables. BYO drinks and snacks.
Williamstown Town Hall
104 Ferguson Street Williamstown 3016
Directed by Donna Jackson of Art & Industry Projects. Brought to you by Gailey Productions, Hobsons Bay City Council and Hubcap Productions.
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Image: Pauline by Leilani Fuimaono
NOW SHOWING
SO'OTAGA (CONNECTION) by LEILANI FUIMAONO
February – July 2024
So’otaga (Connection) is a new exhibition appearing in February 2024 at The Outside Gallery in Paine Reserve, Newport and will feature a series of images by multi-disciplinary artist Leilani Fuimaono. Presented as part of Midsumma and PHOTO 2024.
Read about the artist and images here
The Outside Gallery is managed by Art & Industry Projects on behalf of Hobsons Bay City Council.
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SEE OUR PROJECTS HERE:
SEA FLOWERS AND LAKE STORIES
The Sea Flowers installation may have gone from Cherry Lake Altona, but you can still music and a host of voices telling stories about this spot and what it means to people locally. Discover the history of the lake from marshland to car racetrack to what is now home for water birds and other small creatures.
Watch the event highlights
Watch the 'behind the scenes'
This project featured fourteen Sea Flowers floating in the waters of Cherry Lake with the skyline of Altona in the background (just off the Millers Road carpark) through April 2023.
It included a one-night-only event during which the community brought a picnic dinner, rug, or foldout chair, and heard water inspired music, local lake stories over a large PA. As the sun set there were small kayaks on the water and performance at the water’s edge.
Sea Flowers and Lake Stories was initiated by Donna Jackson of Hubcap Productions through Hobsons Bay City Council • Sea Flowers by Sandra Lancaster was first commissioned by Ten Days on the Island 2007 • This version of Sea Flowers has been built from the original mould by Tony Mead of Industrial Art Signs • The installation is accompanied by an original sound track featuring voices and stories of local residents, collected and recorded by Jennifer Lund • Original lake image courtesy of Mike Lowe on Flickr.
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HIDDEN HISTORIES
HIDDEN HISTORIES, a short film created for Hobsons Bay City Council as part of BETTER PLACES Spotswood & South Kingsville, celebrating stories of this unique area captured through listening to and filming those in the know… locals. A beautifully filmed little gem that reminds us how a little local area can have a distinctive style and feel.
Watch the film here
This project featured fourteen Sea Flowers floating in the waters of Cherry Lake with the skyline of Altona in the background (just off the Millers Road carpark) through April 2023.
It included a one-night-only event during which the community brought a picnic dinner, rug, or foldout chair, and heard water inspired music, local lake stories over a large PA. As the sun set there were small kayaks on the water and performance at the water’s edge.
Sea Flowers and Lake Stories was initiated by Donna Jackson of Hubcap Productions through Hobsons Bay City Council • Sea Flowers by Sandra Lancaster was first commissioned by Ten Days on the Island 2007 • This version of Sea Flowers has been built from the original mould by Tony Mead of Industrial Art Signs • The installation is accompanied by an original sound track featuring voices and stories of local residents, collected and recorded by Jennifer Lund • Original lake image courtesy of Mike Lowe on Flickr.
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CABARET AMONGST THE CARRIAGES
A show featuring live original music and industrial fashion inspired by Melbourne's western suburbs, presented in a train track wonderland in November 2022.
As the sun set on the lawns of the Newport Railway Museum, it transformed into a unique performance site. Walking through a wonderland of locomotives guests ventured into heritage train carriages, to discover industrial fashion inspired by iconic places in Melbourne’s west. They stepped up into a fast and fabulous dance fashion parade presented in a 1930s, art deco, train buffet car.
Wandering into an undercover area they took their seats near the stage, snug between magnificent, Newport-built, steam locomotives, to watch a cabaret of live original songs performed by the musicians who wrote them including Rusty Berther (ex-Scared Weird Little Guys) and Peter Farnan (Boom Crash Opera). They heard ballads, comedy and rock anthems portray haunting whispers of an historic boatyard, clinking of a glass bottle assembly line, and mysteries of now empty train carriages, bringing rich industrial histories and unexplored stories to life.
Cabaret Amongst the Carriages was an entertaining and insightful journey, exploring characters and places that give the western suburbs of Melbourne its unique history and flavour.
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SEE OUR FILMS AND PODCASTS HERE:
FILMS
• Industrial Fashion 2020
• Song Series
• AIF20
SHORT FILMS
• Welcome to Spotswood by Heather van Heerwaarden
• The Butcher by Chris Downey
• Homeward Bound by Emma Buglisi
• Talking Hands by Emma Buglisi
• Glow by Chris Downey
• Moving Parts by Kiralee Greenhalgh
• The Birds and the Beers by Emma Buglisi
• Shimmer by Heather van Heerwaarden
• Sea Legs by Heather van Heerwaarden
PODCASTS
• Secrets of Being An Artist
• The Bridge
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SEA FLOWERS AND SEA STORIES
This art installation was on show at the Williamstown water’s edge in February 2022 with 14 Sea Flowers floating in the water with the Melbourne city skyline in the background.
An original soundscape accompanied the installation. Click here to listen to the sound track which reveals music and a host of voices telling stories about this spot, the sea as a place and what it means to people locally. Discover what’s under the water, who travelled over the water to get to this spot, and how the water in this area has been a source of renewal during difficult times. Also find out how these floating artworks were created and installed!
The Sea Flowers and Sea Stories was initiated by Donna Jackson of Hubcap Productions through a Hobsons Bay City Council, Make it Happen. Recovery and Reconnection Grant.
Sea Flowers by Sandra Lancaster was first commissioned by Ten Days on the Island 2007.
This version of Sea Flowers has been built from the original mould by Tony Mead of Industrial Art Signs and installed and anchored by Greg Blunt of Blunt Boat Builders.
The installation is accompanied by an original sound track by composer James Henry featuring the voices and stories of local residents, collected and recorded by Jennifer Lund.
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CATCH UP ON PAST FESTIVALS
AIF 2016. • Program • Short film
AIF 2018 • Program • Short film • Industrial Fashion • Newport Project
AIF 2020 • Program • Short film • Industrial Fashion • Song Series
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