Intergenerate is a creative ageing program that promotes intercultural and intergenerational exchange of older people in our community.
As part of the 2016 program, the Bankstown Arts Centre offered a cultural calendar which included arts-based workshops in video making for kids, storytelling, drawing, painting, performance, crafts, song and dance, visual arts.
2017 has seen a continuation of the program, presenting a Seniors Week event offering Tai Chi and a short film screening, as well as workshops programs including dance, music and song-writing workshops for seniors. Additionally, the program has seen local high school students involved in digital storytelling activities where they interview older members of the community, record and present these stories through digital platforms.
The Intergenerate project launch showcased some of the shared stories, works created and skills learned during the program's workshops and activities throughout the year.
This project is funded by the Department of Family and Community Services.
Thanks to our project partners: Asian Women at Work, Chinese Australian Services Society, Bankstown Youth Development Service, Arab Council Australia, South Western Sydney Local Health District Health Promotion Service and the more than 400 artists and community members who have been involved throughout the year.
Learn more about some of the activities, performances and workshops that have taken place as part of the Intergenerate Program below:
Participants explored dreams and memories through storytelling and creative activities.
This included stories of migration and settling in the area, lullabies, songs, fairy tales and myths about the night originating from different cultures. Participants each made paper lanterns depicting their stories.
Partner organisation: Asian Women at Work.
Artist: My Le Thi.
Local Spanish-speaking seniors were invited to a song writing workshop series designed to explore themes focused on memories, dreams, the night sky and stories of migration.
A final performance was showcased at the Arts Centre as part of the Intergenerate Project Launch.
Partner organisation: South Western Sydney Local Health District Health Promotion Service
Artist: Carmen Alicia Cordon Hernandez.
Arts and Storytelling workshop with elders from Arabic speaking background in collaboration with Arab Council Australia. Facilitated by artist Nicole Barakat.
Participants explored ideas around the night, dreams and memories through storytelling and creative activities, including:
- Stories of migration and settling in the area;
- Lullabies;
- Songs;
- Fairy tales;
- Myths;
Participants were asked to bring photographs, objects or stories that related to their memories of the night to facilitate the storytelling process.
Night Sky was an outdoor theatre performance developed from the Arts and Storytelling workshops with seniors.
Ever wondered about some of the ways we're all connected? Bankstown Arts Centre in partnership with artists, community groups and local residents explored this notion through the Night Sky Project over a few months.
More than 100 people participated in the project through a series of arts workshops exploring the concept of night time storytelling. Some stories and mementos were showcased as part of the Night Sky theatre performance. The production included video installations, visual arts, dance, song, theatre, poetry and readings.
Night Sky was presented from 24-26 November 2016 at the Bankstown Arts Centre.
The Arts Centre engaged the team from SF3, Australia's only international smartphone film festival, to run smartphone filmmaking workshops with students from Bankstown Public School where students learned all the tips and tricks of making a film on their tablets or smartphones.
Students learnt about choosing what to shoot, how to film their idea, how to do a basic edit and sound of their short film.
The workshops involved students interviewing older members of the community.
Students from Sir Joseph Banks High School and Chester Hill High School interviewed local seniors from different cultural and linguistic background, including members from their own schools, Bankstown Arts Society and Aboriginal Elders Arts Group.
Students from Macquarie University carried pre and post research to shape interviews, transcriptions and evaluation.
Further research from University of Technology Sydney's students is looking at the ways in which an oral history projects could help communities redefine themselves.