Sunday Arts Magazine

28 Feb 2022

Take Over

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What happens when young people are given the chance to produce site-specific and participatory arts works at Northcote Town Hall? It’s a take over! Darebin Arts Speakeasy’s sensationally successful program LET’S TAKE OVER returns for its fourth year showcasing the creativity by 11 talented young people aged 15 – 25 for a one-day arts festival on Saturday 5 March.

“Let’s Take Over represents everything that’s unique about our arts community in Darebin. It’s an inclusive, diverse program lead by community that not only showcases the work of our young artists and performers but supports them with the tools to succeed as local creatives,” said Darebin Council Mayor Cr. Lina Messina.

Across 16 weeks, Let’s Take Over participants completed a professional development program facilitated by Sarah Austin, Cassandra Fumi and Stella Charls, with mentoring support from Guy Ritani and Edwina Green, covering programming and curation, budgeting, marketing, production logistics and networking. Workshops were led by guest industry professionals, including Uncle Bill Nicholson Jnr., Wesley Enoch, Caroline Bowditch, Kate Davis, Selene Bateman and Declan Furber Gillick.

Inspired by the Young Producers program at Battersea Arts Centre in the UK, participants come from different worlds with their own unique skill sets, art forms and life experiences.

2022 projects include works by Tash Atkins, a Melbourne based mezzo-soprano, composer sound artist and creative, who has combined an interest in opera, installation and sound art to create experimental compositions using technology and code; performance by An Dang, an actor, dancer and singer with a background in circus where she trained with the National Circus of Vietnam as a contortionist; works by Akwal Magek, an arts facilitator from Melbourne’s west, whose art practice utilises poetry and spoken word to focus on the issues of identity and self-love and Fathiah Raihan, a henna and jagua artist with an interest in facilitating community healing through the arts.

LET’S TAKE OVER is the first event for the 2022 Darebin Arts Speakeasy season and is expected to be immensely popular with the 2021 iteration selling out within 24 hours of release.