Arts & Culture

Claire O'Keefe, originally from Coleambally, has a love of history - and a degree in it. Her husband Ben also loves history, particularly that with a military bent - and he spent much of his youth at flea markets. Together they boast the best of skills for how they now earn a living - picking, visiting other people's homes by...

A documentary shines a light on the impact Captain James Cook's arrival in Australia had and continues to have on First Nations people on the NSW South Coast, 250 years after he sailed past the shores. "Yuin people were the first to see the ship sailing up the coast, so we had a lot of different stories about the Endeavour,"...

When you've followed in the tradition of your father by collecting antiques, and spent your working life buying and selling them for other people, chances are you've amassed a treasure or two. Chances are you've probably also run out of room. On the weekend of 25-26 September, 2021, Tuckerbox Auctions will put one of the most remarkable collections of antiques...

It takes more than a global pandemic to conquer Eurobodalla's creative spirit. Just as the 2019-2020 bushfires which swept through the region couldn't keep good artists down, the COVID-19 lockdown of spring 2021 has motivated Eurobodalla's River of Art into finding new ways to give voice and visuals to its creative community. So while the planned 10-day physical program that...

A clear winner from the Far South Film Festival has emerged as a suite of three music videos featuring Indigenous songs takes home three awards. The 10-minute Bagan, Barra Barra, Mirriwarr (Land, Sea and Sky) has snatched up 35 per cent of the vote for the People's Choice Award after the results came in from an email survey and the numbers were...

Here's a scientific phenomenon based on absolutely no facts whatsoever: you take better photographs in the country. Perhaps because you're in the most natural of settings and, if you're timing's right, you're working with natural light you couldn't possibly recreate with any number of switches and really long extension cords. How can you not capture a sunrise right in front...

A new learning platform for school students which was trialled in south east NSW and Canberra has been launched to celebrate First Nations culture. NEO-Learning is designed to give all Australian primary school teachers and students access to First Nations digital arts content and lessons, and was piloted in Cobargo, Braidwood and at the Canberra Hospital School. It was co-created by First...

It wasn’t that long ago that one of Australia’s foremost sculptors was ladder deep in piles of wood near Yass, chipping away at an installation set to elevate the Snowy Valleys high country to dizzying heights of tourism. So shrouded is this initiative even the Snowy Valleys Mayor James Hayes can’t talk about it, but he’s beyond euphoric at the...

The controversial Dragon Dreaming Festival, scheduled to run at Wee Jasper next month, has been postponed  because of the COVID-19 virus. The festival will now be held in April next year, disappointing the thousands of fans who had already bought tickets to the sold-out event. But a spokesman for Dragon Dreaming said COVID-19, lockdowns and border closures had given organisers...

Cooma folk duo Cielle Montgomery and James Church have been making sweet music since they met at a live-in intensive before the Tamworth County Music Festival six years ago. Performing as Montgomery Church, the pair have just released their second album, Where The Quiet Can Hide, but like artists everywhere at present, are unable to tour. After wowing audiences at...

You are walking alone through the bush. Suddenly you hear a supernatural cry, find a footprint no normal hiker could make or, just maybe, you see an oversized figure, hairy and tall, staring straight at you. The yowie is an enduring legend that lives on in the minds, if not in the hidden enclaves of our country's mountains and forests,...

The COVID-19 outbreak in NSW has continued to impact the South Coast, wreaking havoc on two of the region's much-awaited arts festivals. The Giiyong Festival near Eden has been cancelled and while Eurobodalla's River of Art Festival will no longer be going ahead as a live event it will, instead, be virtual. Earlier this month organisers delivered the sad news...

Tom O'Dea takes remarkable photographs. Stunning close-ups of birds and animals, and landscapes of his hometown of Yass that look like the sort of still lifes that famous Australian artist Fred McCubbin had in his focus at the end of the 19th century. But recently, Tom focused his camera on a scene he later described as not far removed from...

An enterprising group of emerging country artists have decided that if art galleries and exhibitions are out of their reach for now, they’ll set up their own. The prolonged COVID-19 pandemic has been a mixed blessing for these youngbloods, most who are fresh out of uni with the struggle of artistry forcing them from the city and back to the...

16 August 9:20 am: Due to the recent NSW-wide COVID-19 lockdown, the Far South Film Festival will be held online. Anyone who purchased tickets for the planned cinema screenings can transfer their tickets to the online festival at no extra charge. Visit Far South Coast Film Festival for more information. 14 August, 11:oo am: Across a range of ages and genres,...

Located within a dimly lit display cabinet in Parliament House — beneath the watchful gaze of portraits of former prime ministers — stands a table, a quill and an inkstand. Together with one of our nation’s most vital documents, they tell an extraordinary story. The story begins in the late 1800s when moves were afoot for our country’s colonies to...