During the Arab spring, Sarah Black traveled through the Middle East. She recollects how people treated her, compared to how they treated their own locals or neighbouring peoples, starkly contrasted when she arrived in Israel. As a foreigner, but a non-practicing Jewish woman, a considerable number of local Jews warmly welcomed her while snubbing their resident non-Jewish neighbours:
She muses, “I always find this thin thread of commonality is enough to bring a strong bond with other Jewish peoples, even though my direct family line with Scottish and English heritage is non-practicing for three generations. It sparked a fascination on how we choose to place our value, what makes us feel safe around others, and what information we use to come to these conclusions.”
To explore this theme, of how humans value or slight each other, Black choreographed two versions of a contemporary dance production, which she called VALUE FOR MONEY.
To further focus the lens onto how where we come from impacts our value judgments, she asked Jasmin Sheppard to come on board as co-director. Sheppard is a Tagalaka Aboriginal woman with Irish, Chinese and Hungarian heritage.
Black’s and Sheppard’s collaboration has enriched and deepened the choreographic narrative that tells not just the story, but also the historiography, of each individual’s search for personal worth and shared meaning.
Black and Sheppard co-direct VALUE FOR MONEY for Guts Dance Central Australia (GUTS). GUTS is a Mparntwe (Alice Springs) based dance organization, and is a vibrant platform for dance investigation, creation, training, and performance – the only such arena within a 1500 km radius.
GUTS plays a large role in dance opportunities for young people through Alice Can Dance, engaging young people all across public schools, on community, via online learning platforms, and kids in detention. In 2021, they began their Brave Bodies program, delivering dance engagement opportunities to underprivileged and at risk young women. They also run a weekly dance program at Owen Springs Youth Detention Centre, and create programs in the town camps of Mparnture in collaboration with Tangentyere.
Collaborating performers for VALUE FOR MONEY are : Waangenga Bianco from the Mer Island people and of the Pajinka Wik, Cape York; Gabriel Comerford, an Australian_Malaysian independent artist based in Iutruwita/Tasmania; Madeleine Kranek, Co-Artistic Director of GUTS, has worked with numerous dance companies in Australia and abroad; Ashley McLellan, a dancer, teacher, and choreographer based in Naarm/Melbourne; and Frankie Snowdon, Co-Artistic Director of GUTS, born and raised in Mparnture/Alice Springs, and with numerous credits as dancer and choreographer in Australia and abroad.
Each member of the Touring Cast of dancers poured their heart and soul into creating the current rendition of VALUE FOR MONEY. These creatives are: Frankie Snowdon, Gabriel Comerford, Chandler Connel, Tara Robertson, and Samakshi Sidhu.
Over the course of the creative development in 2019 and 2021, the VALUE FOR MONEY team expanded to include a research assistant and dramaturge. These roles helped to streamline the collaborative artistic process to elucidate the themes this dance production distills. Exploration of the issues that drive the choreography take centre-stage: “What the government thinks you are worth;” “Human security”, and “What is life? In search of a unified theory of everything.”
A courageous illumination of why we come to value what we do, feel safe or in peril, and how at once to honour personal integrity yet live in a conflicted world.
VALUE OF MONEY was presented by Form Dance Projects and Riverside Theatres, at Riverside Theatres, Parramatta between the 4th and the 6th Ma 2023..
Production photography by Heidrun Lohr.