Q&A

Nicole Chatfield: Designer for fashion performance “Water is Sacred”

What does CIAF mean to you personally and to the broader community in 2020?

For me personally it’s an opportunity to showcase a Yirrganydji perspective and to let the broader community know that we have a cultural practice and a traditional history here in Cairns.

What are the new opportunities you see for the festival and for artists with the pivot to digital?

Having a digital platform, the festival can provide access to a state, national and global audience. The arts industry and tourism play a massive role in supporting the economy and Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander creatives maintain their cultural expression in north Queensland which includes the Gulf, Cape and Torres Strait Island communities.

What are you most looking forward to seeing at this year's event?

Each program will offer something new and exciting for every Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander visual and performance creative, their communities and audiences but I’d especially love to see how powerful each designer’s pieces turned out and the opportunity to have my pieces curated by Bernard Singleton and Simone Arnol for CIAF’s 2020 fashion performance, Water is Sacred.

Q&A

Janina Harding: CIAF Artistic Director

What does CIAF mean to you personally and to the broader community in 2020?

CIAF is important to me as it’s providing our artists and communities with a sense of pride and cultural identity. It is a great platform for our mob to share their stories and lived experiences. Through the various presentations and events, the new platform will retain all the excitement and inclusiveness that engaged audiences in a pre-COVID-19 physical event, only this time around the audience will have a inclusive insight into artists and their communities.

What are the new opportunities you see for the festival and for artists with the pivot to digital?

It’s like we’ve opened up a whole new world of opportunities for artists, curators and communities to create their own virtual content. We are broadening our capacity to enhance sales and further promote artists. When CIAF returns to delivering a physical event, livestreams and videos will continue to be produced for the CIAF website, ensuring that audiences can continue to access artists and communities. 

What are you most looking forward to seeing at this year's event?

I know that everyone who has contributed has an amazing gift of talent. I’m really excited by the diversity of the virtual program and that we are able to share it with the world. Given that we are all experiencing uncertain times, I’m curious to see the response we receive nationally and from the wider world regarding Queensland First Peoples’ arts and cultures.

Q&A

Arone Meeks: Artist

What does CIAF mean to you personally and to the broader community in 2020?

CIAF to me is a creative and informative way to showcase how we as many nations in Queensland are passing on traditional knowledge, building our skills and taking on new technical materials. I believe it gives us a strong voice to share with the broader and global community.

What are the new opportunities you see for the festival and for artists with the pivot to digital?

This is a very exciting time to take on and give the broader community and our own mob an opportunity to be an active participant in this digital presentation. We will have access to share, interact and grow. From the various artforms and discussions being held through this CIAF 2020 festival, I am also very keen to see how the fashion show plays out as they utilise Tropical North Queensland as a backdrop. I am sure this will also open potential new opportunities, through commissions, exhibitions and other creative opportunities here and abroad.

What are you most looking forward to seeing at this year's event?

All of it. I was delivering works for the Undercurrents exhibition at The Tanks Arts Centre, and wow! What a wonderful collection of Indigenous views of Cook’s 250^th  anniversary. There is also a retrospective of Bala Billy Missi, the fashion extravaganza and the showcasing of all the up and coming talent. CIAF is a rare and proud time for us Queenslanders.

Q&A

Pormpuraaw Art and Culture Centre: Fashion performance and visual art exhibitions

What does CIAF mean to you personally and to the broader community in 2020?

CIAF and all the art centres and people involved are our community. Every year we all get together and celebrate our art and culture. Our art and culture are all a bit different but share certain common threads. They all come from country and celebrate our uniqueness.

What are the new opportunities you see for the festival and for artists with the pivot to digital?

We all miss our grand event art fair and celebration together. We will make the digital fun. We must accept our shared circumstances. We might as well all work together; in the future and the here and now. Coronavirus is not going to disappear. Digital events will become more common.

What are you most looking forward to seeing at this year's event?

I think it will be fascinating to see our work being transferred onto a totally different format. A format that is infinitely accessible to a huge audience for countless years to come. As long as humans exist and keep the information stream pumping through the digital world, our art works will be there to be seen.

Q&A

Simone Arnol: Fashion performance curator, designer and artist

What does CIAF mean to you personally and to the broader community in 2020?

One word sums up what CIAF means to me personally and that is ‘challenge’. A personal journey within myself to step up the creativity to captivate the wider community whilst keeping it ‘grassroots’.

What are the new opportunities you see for the festival and for artists with the pivot to digital?

The CIAF digital festival provides a platform for artists to showcase their works to a worldwide audience. The digital platform also allows the artist to use the digital links capturing their art form that can be used in grant applications as supporting documentation - giving funding bodies a visual insight into the artist’s talent.

What are you most looking forward to seeing at this year's event?

CIAF’s virtual fashion performance, Water is Sacred, of course!

Q&A

Lynelle Flinders: Designer and artist

What does CIAF mean to you personally and to the broader community in 2020?

The arts play a different and necessary part in contributing to the health, development and wellbeing of our society. CIAF is a great platform to showcase Indigenous stories and culture through different mediums. CIAF has allowed me to indulge in a passion that I want everyone to see. I want my work to matter. My goal is that I want people to look at my work and say to themselves: “If she can do that, so can I!”

I hope they then have the courage to step forward and do something about it.

What are the new opportunities you see for the festival and for artists with the pivot to digital?

With a wider audience being reached to see what CIAF is about, this swing to a digital platform will deliver an amazing experience for guests. The region as well as artwork from Cape York to Torres Strait will be on display - you couldn’t get better tourist advertising than that.

What are you most looking forward to seeing at this year’s event?

I could be biased and say the fashion performance, but really, I look forward to seeing the festival, and the best thing about the digital platform is that I can watch it over and over.

Click Here to learn more about the Cairns Indigenous Art Fair 2020