Fashion Week’s Ganbu Marra Runway mixed collections by 16 First Peoples fashion designers into evocative multi-story projections of the art and music of their Elders and ancestors. Wow doesn’t cover it. (Updated from the MFW issue, Creative Victoria Fashion News)
Photos by Voxfrock Rookie Photographer Joel Parkinson (Scroll to meet Joel)
It’s hard to imagine a more exquisite destination for Fashion Week’s Ganbu Marra runway than South Wharf’s air-craft-hangar sized The Lume where digital projections of First Peoples art, tracts of remote Australian bushland and drone shots of ancient landscapes roll like clouds around four-storey high walls while the waters of Torres Strait appear to slip and wash beneath visitors’ feet.
The 3,000 square metre gallery space is currently hosting Connection, a history-making curation of works by more than 110 First Peoples artists and musicians.
“The technology breaks down barriers,” says one of Connection’s most significant participants, Eora Nation artist Kate Constantine. “A lot of people like Aboriginal art because it is colourful or pretty, but a lot of people are quite challenged by Aboriginal art too, by not knowing or understanding how to interpret it or not feeling like they have permission to be involved. Connection is just so inclusive.”
And so it was into this inclusive, immersive 360 degree, multi-sensory “set” that Ganbu Marra’s First Peoples models and performers walked for more than 1000 ticketted guests this week, showcasing the collections of 16 First Nations artists and designers: ADJADURA ART, BAYIKINA AWAKEN, Clair Helen, Elverina Johnson x Taking Shape, Ginny’s Girl Gang, Ihraa Swim, Ikuntji Artists, Kamara Australia, Kaninda, Lazy Girl Lingerie, Nungala Creative, Take Pride Movement, Ticia Designs, wa-ring, Wuurn of Kanak and Yarrenyty Arltere.
Legendary Wurundjeri elder, Aunty Joy Murphy Wandin AO offered a warm Welcome to Country and in a poetic linking of generations, her granddaughter, Wurundjeri woman Chenile Chandler performed her moving Call to Country song.
Then the fashion. The line-up was heavily salted with high-potential emerging designers, including Letticia Shaw of Fitzroy Crossing who launched her label Ticia Designs at Paris Fashion Week earlier this month.
Letticia’s diamanté and feather-trimmed collection featuring her sacred lizard totem picked out in patterns of black and gold sequins was a glamorous high point in the looping runway choreographed across The Lume in a giant, floor-lit “figure 8” runway with vivid projections synced to fashion genres from lingerie and swim to athleisure and streetwear.
And also…(for culture connoisseurs)
Elsewhere in the city, among M/FW Fashion Capsules dotted across the grid, an installation of more Indigenous works, “Ceremoni X Yarrenyty Arltere Artists” contains a curated exhibit of story-rich keepsakes and crafts from the unique community of women in Alice Springs’ Larapinta Town Camp.
Meet the Rookie. Joel Parkinson
