ABC Kids star behind Dance with Tom creates powerful solo show for ancestors denied final ceremony

TRADITIONALLY, when Indigenous Australians pass away, a ceremony takes place. While it differs from place to place, it usually involves a gathering of people, song and dance.

But for the communities who died during British colonisation, that didn’t happen. There was nobody left to perform the ceremonies.

Dancer and choreographer Thomas E.S. Kelly aims to rectify that in his acclaimed solo work, Kuramanunya, which is coming to Byron Theatre next month.

Through movement, spoken word and sound, the show honours First Nations ancestors whose stories were cut short, offering a precise and quietly powerful act of remembrance.

“It’s a ceremony for those who didn’t get their ceremony,” Kelly said. “There’s a lot of communities in Australia, including here, where groups of First Nations people didn’t survive the British colonisation. There are clan groups that were completely massacred; family lines that ended. There are places where you can’t get a Welcome to Country because those people don’t exist anymore.”

 

The Gold Coast-based Minjungbal, Wiradjuri and Ni-Vanuatu artist, who also stars in the new ABC Kids TV show Dance with Tom, became interested in the performing arts while a student at Kingscliff High School.

He considered studying at NIDA before learning about NAISDA Dance College, Australia’s leading performing arts training organisation for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander students, where singer Christine Anu also studied.

After graduating in 2012, he began creating and performing his own works, driven by a love of storytelling.

He and his wife, Taree Sansbury, whom he met at NAISDA, founded Karul Projects in 2017 after their breakthrough opportunity came when PACT theatre in Erskineville created a residency program for emerging companies.

Karul means “everything” in Yugambeh language, spoken in South-East Queensland and North-East NSW, covering Country between the Logan River in the north and the Tweed River in the south.

“I will use everything I need to tell whatever story needs to be told,” Kelly said.

While Sydney-based Bangarra Dance Theatre is Australia’s best-known Indigenous dance company, Kelly wanted to create an alternative pathway, which led the couple to relocate and establish their work outside Bangarra’s established base.

 

After performing to sold-out audiences in Brisbane, for NORPA (Northern Rivers Performing Arts) and at the Commonwealth Games on the Gold Coast, they decided to return to the region where he grew up.

Being based on the Queensland side of the border also opened up access to funding opportunities that Bangarra could not apply for.

Kelly hadn’t originally planned to create a solo work, but it came about after his wife became pregnant.

Kuramanunya was first performed at the Brisbane Festival in 2023 and won the Aboriginal & Torres Strait Islander Award at the 2026 Adelaide Fringe.

It will be Kelly’s last major solo work before stepping away from the stage when his daughter starts school next year, as he takes a step back from touring to focus on family commitments.

“It’s my heaviest work because of the content that we talk about,” he said.

“It’s truth telling in a matter of fact way. I’m not saying that it’s anyone’s fault. I feel we’re all better moving forward and learning together. I’m offering a chance to learn and if you take one thing out of it then you have something.”

The audience is often so moved by the performance that they embrace him at the end of the show.

“It’s quite beautiful,” he said. “People have really responded well to the work.”

Kuramanunya is at Byron Theatre at 7pm on Friday 1 May.

For more information and to book, visit byroncentre.com.au/theatre-events/kuramanunya