Oral History Victoria’s Inaugural Group Exhibition officially opens at 6:30pm – 8:30pm on Wednesday the 23rd of November. Join us as we commemorate the ordinary and celebrate the ability for everyone to create histories through the power of conversation.
The exhibition runs until the 21st of December and showcases the recent and varied projects completed by members of Oral History Victoria. Through a collection of projects presented as vignettes – snippets of time and of perspective, you will be asked to listen to the obscure, the everyday and the mainstream.
Voices of others displayed in both traditional and digital formats talk us through personal experiences of wartime effort and diplomacy, family life in rural and urban Australia, the perils of dating through generations, the perspective of cultural and political outsiders, impressions of foreign places, the history of the creation of our diverse communities and more…
Contributions from:
Chinese Museum Melbourne, Geelong Voices Oral History Project, History@Work, Let’s Remember This, Memento Media, Somebody’s Daughter Theatre Company, Anisa Puri & Alistair Thomson, The Foundling Archive, Young Christian Workers Archive, Way Back When.
Opening night guest speaker:
Eleanor Whitworth is the Senior Program Manager of the Victorian Cultural Network program, which supports the sharing of Victoria’s cultural collections through two web platforms: Culture Victoria and Victorian Collections. As part of this she works with artists and communities, and with galleries, libraries, museums and archive organisations to find, tell and share some of the many and varied stories that make up our social fabric.
Please go to our 2016 Events Calendar for details about the exhibition and opening night.
The exhibition and opening night are both free events.
Michael Green accepted the award on behalf of the creators (Michael Green, Andre Dao, Angelica Neville, Dana Affleck, Sienna Merope) at a ceremony at the Royal Historical Society of Victoria on Thursday 27 October. Behind the Wire is an oral history project documenting the stories of men, women and children who have been detained by the Australian government after seeking asylum in Australia. It brings a new perspective on mandatory detention by sharing the reality of the people who have lived it. Through in depth interviews with current and ex-detainees, Behind the Wire captures narrators’ histories, experiences of seeking protection in Australia and the detailed reality of mandatory detention. Working with narrators, these interviews are edited into first person narratives that take the form of literary short stories. The project comprises a website, Facebook channel, book, audiobook, podcast, listening parties, videos, portrait photography and a museum exhibition. Further details at http://behindthewire.org.au/
This year the OHV judges shortlisted four wonderful entries for our annual Innovation Award. Each of the four was an outstanding example of a project working with memories to make histories with contemporary relevance. The following three shortlisted entries were Highly Commended for innovation in creating and using oral history.
The Chungking Legation: Australia’s diplomatic mission in wartime China (Sophie Couchman, Jean Chen, Kate Bagnall). Further details at http://chinesemuseum.com.au/
Expectant (Somebody’s Daughter Theatre Company). Further details at www.somebodysdaughtertheatre.com
“Who are we now?” An oral history project for the Australasian College of Dermatologists (Emma Russell, History at Work). Further details at www.historyatwork.com.au
Further details about all four projects at https://oralhistoryvictoria.org.au/ohv-awards/
