Connecting Identities

Memory Bank connecting to memory Mouth to Mountain connecting...to land m2m connecting...to songline Mouth to Mountain happens Saturday 9th May, 2009... download the Mouth to Mountain flyer for more information (772 KB pdf )

On my first day as Artistic Director of Connecting Identities, on the way up the ramp of the National Wool Museum to the Cultural Development Unit within the Arts and Culture Department of the City of Greater Geelong... practicing how to get my mouth around all of this... I met Margaret, a Customer Service Officer at the Museum.  

After explaining that I was starting work on a project called CONNECTING IDENTITIES, I casually asked what 'identity' meant to her.   Her answer was anything but casual.  

She told me the story of how for a whole year back at high school she couldn't understand what her teacher meant by 'identity'. Just before the final exam, it sunk in - identity. "I realized that identity is everything," Margaret said. "It's everything that makes you who you are. Everything. But you see, once I understood what it was, I couldn't write about it.   What can you say about everything?"

CONNECTING IDENTITIES as an arts project is aimed at expressing something about the 'everything' that Margaret was talking about, those things that make us who we are, that can't always be seen or quantified, but if they go missing, leave a sense of emptiness in us as individuals and as communities. CONNECTING IDENTITIES is also about making connections, across land and between people, in the wider community as well as across departments of Council.  

CONNECTING IDENTITIES is focused on the theme of 'change' - our world is changing rapidly, our environment and our lives. The project runs for three years, exploring how the arts can create links between people and places, giving expression to what is important and unique to the area of Geelong in southern Australia.

CONNECTING IDENTITIES is based in the Arts and Culture Department of the City of Greater Geelong and is part of the Cultural Developments Network's national GENERATIONS project taking place in five municipal councils across Australia.

"The power of Connecting Identities is that it draws its inspiration from, and directly involves, the members of our community."  
Councillor Peter McMullin

Contact: Duncan Esler
Arts & Culture Project Officer
City of Greater Geelong
telephone direct: +613 52270773
generations@geelongcity.vic.gov.au
www.geelongaustralia.com.au/connectingidentities

copyright meme mcdonald 2002