plenty serious TALK TALK

For the first time in Aotearoa, plenty serious TALK TALK brings sharp observation and a gleeful humour, and lays bare the full complexity of negotiating culture across disciplines, genres, and eras. Kia Mau Festival presents the production as part of He Ngaru Nui programme – conveying a bold statement about the value and significance of Indigenous narratives.

Join us for an evening with choreographer Vicki van Hout (Wiradjuri) celebrating the sophistication of the world’s oldest living culture through imaginative storytelling, fast-paced wit, and Indigenous movement executed with an arresting honesty. 

From the artist

"Parramatta, Western Sydney is my area, where I generate work. I find it very fertile ground. I am walking along the street, I sit in the mall and I see the world. It is this social context I want to place on stage. Even if I’m on stage by myself, as an artist I’m never truly alone as I am bound to bring my family, my community, my peers and mentors to work with me. In this piece I decided to place the usually behind the-scenes action of the indigenous arts making process front and centre. The nuances of the relationship between work developed within its community and the obligations an artistic work has to that community, are what I’m exploring in plenty serious TALK TALK." – Vicki van Hout

From the media

 “…Van Hout proves herself a consummate performer. She has a lithe, buoyant energy that injects itself into her performance, an innate ability to use pause, gesture, a tilt of the head, a wry expression to reach beyond the moment and make her truth even clearer…. (she) has the ability to ‘speak across cultures’ in a way that is edifying as well as entertaining.” – Carol Wimmer, Stage Whispers

About Kia Mau Festival

Kia Mau Festival is a biennial, contemporary tāngata whenua, tāngata moana and Indigenous arts festival.

Photo courtesy of Kia Mau Festival