If you’ve only got a few minutes, speed through all of 2010 in the 2010 summary video above.

Or dig deeper and journey through our textual and audiovisual portrayal of 2010 below. 

Chairperson’s Foreword 
by Anthea Fawcett

CuriousWorks continue to consolidate their position at the cutting-edge of digital curiosity as the innovative Stories Project in the Pilbara and Western Sydney and the exciting new artistic directions of the Lanka Project demonstrate. Empowering people to interact with new media sources to communicate their own stories and to re-shape their worlds in positive ways – in ways that empower people to continue to create and tell their stories long after the “workshops” are over – is a key measure of CuriousWorks’ success. This, and the organisation’s commitment to professional, artistic excellence, are integral to what locates CuriousWorks at the forefront of the community arts and development sector.

This year has seen strong growth in CuriousWorks turnover and work levels. Building a strong organisational team and robust administrative and financial procedures to support this growth has been a focus of CuriousWorks staff and the Management Committee throughout the year. We were delighted that Mr Eng-juay Sng agreed to join the Management Committee in 2010 and thank him for his valuable contribution as Treasurer of CuriousWorks.

Enterprise Program
by Eleanor Winkler, Head Producer

The Stories Project is a digital media and social enterprise program devised by CuriousWorks to empower young cultural leaders from areas of entrenched marginalisation to leverage their cultural capital – in order to build an enterprise that is an ongoing catalyst for positive change in their community.

2010 was the pilot year of the program; it saw the realisation of two crews from opposite ends of the continent, The Urban Stories Crew from Fairfield and Liverpool LGAs and the Desert Stories Crew from the Western Desert in WA. Keeping it real on the Westside became a whole new phrase for the 6 crew members of the Urban Stories team as they were introduced to 5 other aspiring young Martu filmmakers who travelled over 4000km from the Western Desert to learn, share and sculpt their stories in a combined Artist Lab facilitated by our Educators.

The Desert Crew – made up of young Martu Australians from all corners of the Pilbara – Punmu, Parnngurr and Kunawarritji – are from some of the most remote communities in Western Australia. The Urban Stories crew is made up of some seriously diverse Australians, many of whom came to Australia as refugees from different corners of the planet. The Urban Crew represents the first Australians and 20 years of immigration with one Indigenous member and 5 other nationalities represented; Chilean, Chinese/Thai, Vietnamese, Iraqi and Congolese.

The two Crews then worked together to produce the first video on the Stories Project website, The First Supper. Four other high quality short videos were produced and released on http://thestoriesproject.com.au by the two crews. Screenings of the new works created were held in Sydney City, Casula (NSW) and Punmu Community (WA) in December 2010.

The second phase of the project, which sees the crews form their own enterprise will take place in 2011 and beyond. CuriousWorks will mentor the Urban Stories crew on their journey to incorporate as Matta Media, as well as supporting Martu Media on its path to independence; both with a vision to service their communities with professional and affordable video production with a social conscious.

The project has been generously supported by The Westpac Foundation, the Australian Government through the Australia Council, its arts funding and advisory body, the Scanlon Foundation, Fairfield City Council, Liverpool City Council, Kanyirninpa Jukurrpa and BHP Billiton Iron Ore.

Participants: Guido Gonzalez, Saif Jari, Anna Lam, Alan Lao, Shane Macdonald, Lazare Nyembo, Owen Biljabu (OJ), Morika Biljabu, Cassandra Nanudie, Jeremy Sammy, Curtis Taylor

Staff: Naomi Bower, Elias Nohra, Shakthi Sivanathan, Dave Wells, Eleanor Winkler

Mentors: Craig Anderson, Peter Borosh, Ali Russel, Platon Theodoris

Arts Program
by Shakthi Sivanathan, Creative & Executive Director

2010 saw the end of one multi-year creative initiative – The Migrant Project – and the beginning of another – The Lanka Project.

The Migrant Project concluded with a packed out screening at CuriousWorks HQ of the feature length documentary, This City is a Body, and its companion short film, 100 Blind Deals, to participants, community and friends. It has since been screened in educational institutions around the world and is included in the South Asian Film Festival at Parramasala 2011.

The DVD, with a luscious 22-page booklet, is now available for sale and many of the untold stories unearthed through the project are available to browse through at the project’s new website. Dig deeper at http://curiousworks.com.au/projects/migrant-project/.

The Lanka Project’s research and development stage, seeded in 2009, ramped up in 2010, with a series of interviews with community members in Australia, England, USA, India and Sri Lanka. This was supplemented by intensive research into personal and public archival records and academic essays. The research was distilled into a first draft script for a new theatre work, titled A Counting and Cracking of Heads. A small showing was held at CuriousWorks HQ to community and industry members. A community of interested members has been established online, sharing stories at http://lankaproject.net. The project was supported by Australia Council for the Arts. 

A community project was also designed – The Banyan Project – melding classical Indian dance and new media skills development, which began in earnest in 2011. Finally, an immersive audiovisual work was also designed, premiering at international arts festival Parramasala in 2010 under the moniker Leaving Lanka. This experience was so successful it is again a part of the Parramasala program in 2011, as a large scale, major work titled The Other Journey. Overall, 2010 was a very exciting R&D stage for The Lanka Project and in 2011 it is set to flower with a diverse array of creative development periods and public showings. 

Projects Director: Shakthi Sivanathan
Key Artistic Collaborator: Aimée  Falzon

Community Program
by Elias Nohra, Head Educator

Newman Stories
In 2010, CuriousWorks continued the work we started in Newman in 2009, this time building digital media capacity in all three of the town’s schools, working with both teachers and students. As well as this we established an after-school film club and organised the 2nd annual Newman Film Festival! Supported by BHP Biliton Iron Ore. Dig deeper at http://curiousworks.com.au/projects/newman-stories/ .

Neighbourhood Stories St Marys
6 residents of St Marys and 3 staff members from Penrith City Council’s Neighbourhood Renewal Team worked with CuriousWorks to learn how to make videos and digital media that reported and reflected their local neighbourhood. This content was then published on an interactive online map at http://neighbourhoodstories.net.au/. An initiative by Penrith City Council. In 2011 this project won the the Integrated Cultural Policy Implementation award at the Local Governments and Shires Association Cultural Awards. Dig deeper at http://curiousworks.com.au/projects/neighbourhood-stories/.

Detention
Detention is the result of 8 weeks of workshops led by CuriousWorks with writer Caleb Lewis, movement artist Angela Hill & CuriousWorks’ Elias Nohra. The workshops were held at Holroyd High School in Greystanes, Western Sydney, with drama students from years 10, 11 & 12. The workshops culminated in a multimedia performance at the Parramatta Riverside Theatres, devised & performed by the students. This project was spearheaded by Parramatta Riverside Theatres and led by CuriousWorks, with support from ArtsNSW & STARTTS. Dig deeper at http://detention.allaroundyou.com.au/

Digitalogic
Digitalogic was an initiative in 2010 by Casula Powerhouse Arts Centre to engage 5 disadvantaged schools in the Liverpool area with digital media workshops. These schools included Lurnea High, Miller Technology High, Liverpool Girls High, Ashcroft High and James Busby High. CuriousWorks facilitated the workshops with each school group, usually art or photography classes, empowering students to make short films from concept to completion. The project was concluded by bringing the 5 schools together for a screening of all the created films at Casula Powerhouse Arts Centre in April 2011. Digitalogic was supported by Arts NSW through the ConnectEd initiative. Dig deeper at http://curiousworks.com.au/search/?q=digitalogic .

All Saints
CuriousWorks ran filmmaking workshops with All Saints Catholic Girls School, Liverpool, where the students learnt the basics of filmmaking and developed their own short film, The Election. Watch the film:

Blacktown Arts Centre
A one-off holiday workshop at the Blacktown Arts Centre where young people use small stills cameras to create video works! Dig deeper at http://www.allaroundyou.net/video/video/search?q=blacktown+arts

Good Life
Short film clip made with young hip-hop artists Low-tee and D-minor, supported by Uniting Care Burnside. They uploaded their video to Youtube and it has received over a thousand hits!

Beat It Out
Beat It Out was an initiative begun by teachers from Miller Technology High School to engage students from their school as well as primary students from Cartright Primary and Miller Primary. The project focused on percussion and performance, while CuriousWorks worked with the groups to develop video pieces to tie the performance together, as well as training students to document the process. Dig deeper:

Butheram Goyoomgan
CuriousWorks paid a short visit to Woodenbong in rural northern NSW to join NORPA in their work with young Githabul people exploring their cultural dance. CuriousWorks shared video skills and recorded music during their visit. Dig deeper: http://curiousworks.posterous.com/river-of-life-by-jennifer-williams and http://www.allaroundyou.net/video/butheram-goyoomgan-dance

Appearances
Shakthi presented at many conferences and events in different parts of the country. Elias lectured media students at Macquarie University, and presented at the School for Social Entrepreneurs social media event at ICE.

New Media Training
Continued New Media Training program, sharing video and web building skills. As well as being open to the general public, these workshops included several sessions supported by STARTTS, supporting refugees in Australia, as well as a large Being Creative Online training event held as part of Penrith City Council’s Artist + Community Toolkit Workshop Series.

Spastic Centre @ ING
CuriousWorks ran a one-off workshop with the Spastic Centre at the ING Sydney Offices. Young people from the Spastic Centre paired up with mentors from ING Direct/Investment Management and ING Australia as part of the ING Ignition Mentoring Program. The group learnt some video basics and produced a video in a single session. Dig deeper: http://curiousworks.posterous.com/ball-game-video-with-the-spastic-centre-ing

Educators: Elias Nohra, Shakthi Sivanathan, Denise Gaberman, Mark Taylor