Bangarra's YULDEA Returns For 2024 Regional NSW Tour

Australia's leading Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander performing arts company, Bangarra Dance Theatre will bring Frances Rings' powerful production, Yuldea, to regional New South Wales in 2024. The Yuldea regional tour comes after a record-breaking premiere season earlier this year, which marked Yuldea as the highest grossing tour in company history. 

Brought to life with costumes from multi-award-winning Jennifer Irwin, lighting by Karen Norris, and set design by Elizabeth Gadsby, Yuldea features original music composed by David Page Music Fellow, Leon Rodgers, a descendant of the Worimi nation in NSW. In an exciting new creative collaboration,  the work also features multi-award-winning duo Electric Fields as guest composers.

Frances Rings' first work as Artistic Director of Bangarra Dance Theatre is a deeply personal ceremonial affirmation of history and heritage, inspired by her family's connection to the area. Yuldea awakens the earth and sky worlds to tell the story of the Aṉangu people of the Great Victorian Desert.

Yuldea explores the abrupt moment that traditional life collided with the industrial ambition of a growing nation in South Australia's Yuldea (Ooldea). In Yuldea, the ancient water soak, Yooldil Kapi, connected important trading routes and dreaming stories that crossed through the site for thousands of years.

Yooldil Kapi was instrumental in the construction of the Trans-Australian railway extending across the Nullarbor, joining the east coast to the west coast in 1917. As a result of the industrial pressures placed on the permanent waterhole, the water quickly ran dry.

Now memories lay scattered, like the Aṉangu people, displaced from their home. Remnants of colonial progress are swallowed by sand. But the Aṉangu endure, determined to keep strong their knowledge systems of land and sky, honouring their eternal bonds of kinship between people and place.

 “Within my family lineage lies the stories of forefathers and mothers who lived a dynamic, sophisticated desert life, leaving their imprint scattered throughout Country like memories suspended in time. Their lives were forever changed by the impact of colonial progress,” said Frances Rings, Bangarra Artistic Director, co-CEO, and choreographer of Yuldea.

“The story of Yuldea asks us to look beyond the narrative of our nation's modernisation to reconcile a fraught history, and to affirm a future that no longer hides behind its truths but grows because of them”.

For more information and to purchase tickets, visit https://www.bangarra.com.au/productions/yuldea/

Community tickets across our Regional Tour are made possible through the generous support of The Balnaves Foundation. 

YULDEA TOUR DATES:

 

 

DARKINJUNG COUNTRY

Art House Wyong

1st – 2nd March 

Coming soon

YUIN NATION

Shoalhaven Entertainment Centre

6th March

https://www.shoalhavenentertainment.com.au/Whats-On/Event-Details/Yuldea 

WIRADJURI COUNTRY

Griffith Regional Theatre 

9th March 

Coming soon

WIRADJURI COUNTRY

Wagga Wagga Civic Theatre 

13th March

https://civictheatre.com.au/whats-on/events/bangarra-dance-theatres-yuldea

WIRADJURI COUNTRY

Dubbo Regional Theatre

16th March

https://www.drtcc.com.au/season-program/yuldea

KAMILAROI COUNTRY

Capitol Theatre, Tamworth

20th March 

https://www.capitoltheatretamworth.com.au/yuldea

Frances is a descendant of the Wirangu and Mirning Tribes from the West Coast of South Australia. In 2002, Frances made her choreographic debut with Bangarra Dance Theatre with the critically-acclaimed Rations bill of Walkabout. Frances has followed this by creating or co-creating a further seven works for the company; Bush (co-choreographed with Stephen Page), Unaipon, X300, Artefact, Terrain, Sheoak and SandSong (co-choreographed with Stephen Page). Terrain is currently listed on the NSW Higher School Certificate Dance syllabus.

In 2004, Bulletin Magazine named Frances in their Smart 100, following the world premiere of her work Unaipon at The Adelaide Festival of the Arts. Frances has choreographed works for many of Australia's leading dance companies including West Australian Ballet and Tasdance, as well as continuing a successful independent career. Frances has danced in works by many of Australia's leading choreographers and companies including Meryl Tankard, Leigh Warren, and Legs on the Wall.

Internationally, Frances has been fortunate to establish important intercultural relationships with First Nations performing arts companies in Canada and New Zealand.

Frances directed her first end of year production for NAISDA Dance College titled Your Skin, My Skin in 2014, following with Kamu, From Sand to Stage, Restoration and Storyplace. Frances was Head of Creative Studies at the College from 2016 - 2019.

In 2019, Frances returned to Bangarra in the position of Associate Artistic Director, and was appointed to the position of Artistic Director in 2023 and recently named co-CEO.

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