Stories From: Arts

Learning to give our worries and anxieties less dominance by being fully present in our bodies through dance is a valuable art to master. Dancer Beckie Wilson is sharing her dance practice at both Bursill Lane Studio and with young people in the Street University in Katoomba.

This week, Tracie McMahon takes a walk with author John Low, a former Blue Mountains City Council Librarian, and now Portland resident, around the Millpond at The Foundations, Portland.

Cultural anthropologist Margaret Mead once famously said: “Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world; indeed, it’s the only thing that ever has.”

Nurtured by the bushland around his studio and the storytelling of past cultures, Jonathan Drew recovered from depression and became an oral storyteller. He believes these stories provide clues to living a good life in harmony with the natural world.

At Provocations, the Seven Valleys Festival of Big Ideas, local high school students, Ollyvar Baker, Samara Kirkland and Jasmin Cole, performed poetry that communicated the future they want to see.

Hamish Dunlop attended the launch of ‘Somewhere to Live’, a song written and performed by The Blue Gums, Voices for Social Change. The song and accompanying video aim to raise awareness about the impacts of homelessness and housing insecurity in the Blue Mountains and across the Greater Sydney region.

Six Blue Mountains artists take strikingly different approaches to expressing ecological emotions associated with fire, flood and pandemic.

Sitting in half shade, half sun on the veranda of his Lawson home, Phil Somerville tells me that juxtaposition is an effective tool for cartoonists: “Putting two unlikely things together can spawn an almost original idea”.

A ‘Battle of the Bands’ may conjure up fierce rivalries and competitive theatrics, but contestants and audiences at the 2023 MYST Youth Festival last month, were bound by mutual awe at the exceptional talent on display.

Katoomba artist Saskia Everingham reveals the inspiration behind three artworks and how art helps anchor her in an uncertain world.