Giving space to create from past

A WORKSHOP series is set to take place aimed at giving former residents of Ballarat Orphanage and Ballarat Children’s Home a creative outlet based on their experiences.

The sessions, to start next month, will be run out of Cafs’ recently-established History and Memory Centre in collaboration with the organisation and Ashtree Projects who helmed the space’s design.

Ashtree Projects director Ember Parkin is leading the project, and said the aim is to give the past residents the space to creatively express their experiences.

“The main aim is to offer residents the chance to work with artists in developing creative responses to the works related to their childhoods,” she said.

“We’ve found what can happen often when people are accessing their records, they can be incomplete or incorrect.

“The creative avenue provides another way for them to articulate their experiences. The intent is to empower.”

The free workshop will be delivered by visual artists Kerri Wilson McConchie and Rebecca Russell, running every Saturday in October, and potentially into November, from 10am to 1pm.

The participants’ creative efforts are to be drawn from their personal responses from their time at the sites as well as archival material.

Funded through a grant from the Australian Council of the Arts, the sessions will culminate with an exhibition at Art Space in late November, which Ms Perkin is another way of empowering participants.

“It’s a way to publicly share the outcomes of what these people are working through,” she said. “It provides an avenue for sharing and raising awareness.

“There were up to 18 residential institutions in Ballarat where children were taken in so this about raising awareness on people’s rights to own their own stories.

“The people in those institutions are the ones who need to be telling their stories. It’s ultimately about celebrating these experiences.”

To register for the workshops, visit bit.ly/3YXEyP7.