Sep 7, 2010, Change Media selected for CCD leadership lab at VCA

Change Media’s founders Jennifer Lyons-Reid and Carl Kuddell have been selected for the first national Community Cultural Development Leadership Lab at the Victorian College of the Arts and the University of Melbourne.

20 participants from a diverse range of high end CCD arts and social organizations across Australia are participating in a 3 day laboratory at the University of Melbourne’s Mt Eliza Conference Retreat end of September 2010.

This national executive education program is delivered in the style of a series of strategic learning conversations as professional exchange with a focus on meeting the challenges of building and managing cross sectoral partnerships.

Find out more here: http://www.vcam.unimelb.edu.au/ccp/execed

Monday Sep 06, 2010, Change Media nominated for Banksia Environmental Award 2010

Change Media has been nominated as finalist for the prestigious Banksia Environmental Awards 2010 in the Indigenous Caring For Country category – winners to be announced October 15, for our Nukkan.Kungun.Yunnan – Ngarrindjeri’s Being Heard collaboration with the Ngarrindjeri communities in the Coorong.

This is a huge national recognition for our work and a big Thank You for all our supporters, funding partners and communities, who worked with us over the last six years.

From the Banksia Awards website:

[...] The Banksia Awards over the last 21 years have recognised many valuable Australian’s for their tireless efforts in making a positive difference to our environment. Leading by example, the finalists and winners of the Banksia Environmental Awards have inspired and motivated other individuals, organisations and companies across Australia to take up the vision, pursuit and practice of environmental excellence.

Within Australia there are many initiatives and projects that are taking place that are making a difference today and more importantly ensuring a sustainable future for generations to come.   The Banksia Environmental Foundation, through our Award Programs, aims to raise the profile of the current environmental issues facing Australia and recognise those whose initiatives are an encouragement and an example for others to follow.

What Banksia provides for our winners and finalists is the public recognition and acknowledgement for their achievements that can then be taken back to their community, organisation or industry and utilised to motivate and assist in providing the extra impetus for further progress, much needed funding, public support and furthering the process of increasing environmental awareness to the rest of Australia. [...]

Again, a huge thank you from our team for all your support!

It would be great if you could support us to spread the good news!

August 11th, 2010 – The Koori Mail

Find below a link to the article in The Koori Mail about Major Sumner’s Tree Canoe at the OurMob exhibition.

Koori Mail article_Our Mob_11 Aug 2010

August 11th, 2010 – The Advertiser reports on Tree Canoe in OurMob exhibition

June 23rd, 2010 – Millicent High School Principal Report about bark canoe project

Millicent High School Report June 23rd 2010.pdf 2

June 12, 2010 – The Age reports about Change Media’s Bark Canoe project in Millicent, SA

Article by Justin McManus

MAJOR Sumner is philosophical about his attempt to cut and shape a bark canoe from a mighty red gum. ”It’s been a long time since anyone has built a bark canoe so we’re just going to have to figure it out as we go,” he says.

The tree is on a property on the outskirts of the town of Kalangadoo in south-eastern South Australia.

The town’s name means “big trees in water” in the local Boandik language. In these times of drought, the swamps that once dominated the landscape are long gone but the towering red gums remain.

Sumner, a Ngarrindjeri elder from the Coorong, is on a mission to revive the spirit and traditions of his ancestors.

“To know the way our ancestors lived on this country brings both cultures together and educates not just non-Aboriginal people but our own people about the value of these trees.”

Building a bark canoe is one of his many projects.

It is a symbolic and educational process. Schoolchildren and Ngarrindjeri youth make up most of the onlookers, among them a video team capturing every detail so it can be studied in classrooms and shared with other indigenous cultures.

Read the full report  on The Age Online here and watch The Age video/slide-show here.

June 9, 2010 – DEWHA announced triannual Indigenous Cultural Support Grant

Arts and Heritage Minister, Peter Garrett, announced $42 million in funding for Indigenous arts, cultural, languages, broadcasting and heritage programs across Australia.

Tallstoreez’ Change Media program is one of 16 organizations nationally and one of only two in South Australia, to receive federal triannual funding for its digital media program with Indigenous communities: To facilitate the transmission of stories, culture and experiences through digital media and create professional and creative pathways through certified training.

Find a full list and media release here.

Monday May 31, 2010, Change Media wins biggest national award – Kookaburra Award 2010

This is a huge national recognition for our work and a big thank you for all our supporters, funding partners and communities, who worked with us over the last six years.

The inaugural Kookaburra Award [formerly known as Community Idol Australia], was awarded by OurCommunity at their annual Communities in Control conference in Melbourne. We were invited to screen a 6min version of Nukkan.Kungun.Yunnan. to a huge audience at the conference’ Kookaburra Awards presentation.

Again, a huge thank you from our team for all your support!

It would be great if you could support us to spread the good news  – find the full media release here.

June 1, 2010 – ABC Newcastle reports about Change Media’s On The Move project in Dungog, NSW

Dungog-made film makes festival debut

Article by Anthony Scully

The Dungog Film Festival made national headlines last week for its championing of Australian-made movies from the tiny village nestled at the foot of the Barrington Tops National Park. But it was a community-made short film about the tongue-in-cheek controversy surrounding a local main street monument that had audience members in stitches.

Read the full report on ABC Online here.

April 21th, 2010: Change Media interview for Le Monde

Change Media executive producer, Carl Kuddell, was yesterday interviewed by Marie-Morgane Le Moel, a journalist for widely-read french newspaper Le Monde, to comment on the ongoing Change Media collaboration with the Ngarrindjeri nation. She especially was interested in the production of  Nukkan.Kungun.Yunnan – Ngarrindjeri’s Being Heard, the environmental issues in the Coorong and the potential of the Change Media training program for the communities to take control of their stories and record traditional culture and knowledge. Find the link to the article here.

April 20th, 2010: Tallstoreez’ Change Media founders invited for national arts curriculum consultation forum

Change Media creative director, Jennifer Lyons-Reid, and executive producer, Carl Kuddell, have been invited to attend the national forum for the first Australian arts curriculum, to advise on media in schools and community empowerment. The forum is organized through ACARA, the Australian Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting Authority, as part of their consultation process for the Shape of the Australian Curriculum.

April 19th, 2010: On the Move selected for the Dungog Film Festival 2010

Fantastic news for the community media team at Dungog in the Upper Hunter – their film, On the Move, made during a Change Media workshop in April 2009, has been selected to screen as part of the world’s biggest film festival of Australian films, the Dungog Film Festival. The festival is an important event in the international and Australian festival circuit, a great success for this quirky and uplifting film. Congratulations to the team in Dungog!

Check out our SA Film Corporation Good News story for March 2010 here or find article below:

http://www.safilm.com.au/Article/NewsDetail.aspx?p=16&id=1536

Documentary NUKKAN.KUNGUN.YUNNAN – Ngarrindjeri’s Being Heard won two awards at the International MyHero Film Festival in Los Angeles, November 2009. The film also went straight to broadcast on NITV and Foxtel/Austar this February and is the first documentary to be produced through the Tallstoreez digital media empowerment outreach program called ‘Change Media’. The film was made in four days in collaboration with Ngarrindjeri youth.

Other films produced through the Change Media program have also enjoyed recent successes including Pinnaroo Surfer, also invited to screen at the Lahore International Children’s Festival 2010 and I Am A Rocket; selected to screen at the 2010 International Little Big Shots Film Festival.

Find the full ABC story and radio interviews from Friday March 26th, 2010, here:

http://www.abc.net.au/local/stories/2010/03/24/2854810.htm?site=northandwest

Ngarrindjeri documentary to screen at New York film festival

By Petria Ladgrove (North and West morning show producer)

A documentary about the Ngarrindjeri community’s struggle with dropping water levels in the Lower Lakes system will be screened at the Human Rights Watch Film Festival 2010.

Listen to Edie Carter’s ABC Radio interview here.

Edie is the Ngarrindjeri media officer at the Ngarrindjeri Land & Progress Association.

Listen to Carl Kuddell’s ABC Radio interview here.

On the ABC News website today, March 26th 2010, as part of our interview with ABC Radio earlier this week:

Indigenous struggle gains US screening

A film documenting the cultural struggles for Indigenous groups due to a shortage of water in the lower lakes and Coorong of South Australia will screen at an international film festival in New York.

The film Nukkan.Kungun.Yunnan explains some of the difficulties faced by the Ngarrindjeri people, including a shortage of reeds for their traditional basket weaving.

Meningie youth worker Edie Carter worked with young people to make the 22-minute film and says it has a role in efforts to retain local culture.

“Because of what’s happening with the drought we need to document our cultural history for our next generation so … our young people can see what we’ve got now and what we had back in the past,” she said.

“What my mum and dad done with me, I can’t do that with my children and it’s very sad.
“So I’m crossing my fingers and if we can make other states aware of what is happening in the lower lakes, especially around Meningie, you know, just hoping and praying that we get that flow back.”

March 17, 2010: Nukkan.Kungun.Yunnan – Ngarrindjeri’s Being Heard selected for the Human Rights Watch Film Festival 2010 in New York City!

Fantastic news for the Ngarrindjeri youth media team – their film, Nukkan.Kungun.Yunnan, made during a Change Media workshop in 2009, has been selected to screen as part the international 3rd Edition of Youth Producing Change at the Human Rights Watch Film Festival 2010.

“On behalf of the Selection Committee of the Human Rights Watch International Film Festival (HRWIFF), we are pleased to inform you that your film Nukkan.Kungun.Yunnan – Ngarrindjeri’s Being Heard has been selected for YOUTH PRODUCING CHANGE (YPC) at the 21st Human Rights Watch Int’l Film Festival. The film was selected from a pool of over 250 submissions made by youth from across the globe. The power of this film is a great achievement, and we offer our deep congratulations to the youth filmmakers and to your organization. We are thrilled to be able to include it in our festival this year.” [John Biaggi, Director, and Jennifer Nedbalsk, Program Manager, HRWIFF ]

The 21^st HRWIFF will take place June 11-24, 2010 at Lincoln Center’s Walter Reade Theater in NYC. The YPC program will be screened up to two times during these dates. The exact dates of the screening will be provided at a later date, along with filmmakers’ attendance to the festival. In addition to the screening at the 21st HRWIFF, your film will be screened in the following venues:

HRWIFF, Boston: Fall 2010 (dates tba)

HRWIFF, London: March 2011 (dates tba)

HRWIFF, San Francisco: Spring 2011 (dates tba)

HRWIFF Traveling Film Festival (sites tba)

The YPC program will also be included in:

Adobe Youth Voices and Human Rights Watch websites

HRWIFF High School teacher’s lending library

This is a great success for this empowering, peer-produced documentary and adds further support to the Ngarrindjeri’s struggle to save the Coorong and the Lower Lakes. Congratulations to Edie, Mel, Rita, Vic and Veronica and their whole team at Camp Coorong and Raukkan Aboriginal Community!

The program was supported through the Australian Government, Department of the Environment, Water, Heritage and the Arts Indigenous Cultural Support,  the Australia Council for the Arts Creative Community Partnership Initiative, the Arts SA Partnerships for Healthy Communities and Apple Australia.

February 8, 2010: I Am A Rocket selected for the Little Big Shots Film Festival 2010

Fantastic news for the youth media team at Dfaces youth arts in Whyalla – their film, I Am A Rocket, made during a Hero Project workshop in 2009, has been invited to screen as part of the Little Big Shots festival. The festival tours nationally and internationally, a great success for this quirky and uplifting film. Congratulations to Abby and her team in Whyalla!

2 February 2010: Lahore International Childrens Film Festival selects Pinnaroo Surfer

Pinnaroo Surfer goes to Pakistan: the Lahore International Childrens Film Festival selected the film to screen in their 2010 festival.

Congratulations again to Kade and Danah!