AMELIA JEAN O’LEARY
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CODED
A Night of Queer Storytelling
Image by Joseph Mayer (QDP 2024)
Amelia Jean O’Leary welcomes the audience into her creative space as she gives an inside glimpse of her most recent creative projects. Performed by some of the most exciting and talented young dancers in Melbourne.
Witness three fifteen minute new First Nations femme queer contemporary dance works, choreographed by O’Leary, Including Ngambaa (Mother in Gamilaaraay), a trio; Winangaylanha ngaya nginunha (I love you in Gamilaraay) a group work and CODED a duet that explores the embedding of queerness within landscapes in fear of personification of physicalised queerness.
TICKETS HERE
WHEN 23-25 Jan | Thu-Sat 7pm
DURATION 50m
LOCATION Abbotsford Convent — Oratory
1 St Heliers St, Abbotsford
Cast and Crew:
Dancers: Emily Earther, Carmen Yih, Wendy Feng, Keia McGrady, Amelia J O'Leary & Cora Hughes
Lighting Designer: Giovanna Yate Gonzalez
Production and Stage Manager: Georgie Bright
Choreography and Sound: Amelia J O'Leary
COMING SOON
SAD EYES
Image by Luke Currie-Richardson
This new contemporary work leans into multiple perspectives of youthful, cultural functionality of femininity in society. Bringing up complications of politics, identity and environmental concern, through dance and storytelling.
This new First Nations lead contemporary dance work by O’Leary brings up important conversations on choice and action. Within an “Australian” context they dissemble the structures around them and try rebuild them and shift the narrative. This queries the importance of dance as a vehicle for change, what if we rebuild the engine? What if this work becomes the world we choose to live in? how can we shift the fantasy to reality? what are your politics? what do you value?
Performnace dates: 3-5 April 2025
Venue: Dancehouse
CLICK HERE TO SUPPORT SAD EYES
IN DEVELOPMENT:
CODED
Image by Joseph Mayer (QDP 2024)
CODED, a new First Nations femme queer contemporary dance work that explores the embedding of queerness within landscapes in fear of personification of physicalized queerness.
This work and research will attempt to decode the delicate weaving of resistance and fear to unravel and re-weave her queerness with love, acceptance, and openness. CODED will be created from the lens of Amelia’s Gamilaroi understanding of the world, spirituality, culture, and history; as well as her experience in queer communities and urban/suburban life. O’Leary was commissioned to develop her new work CODED for the Queer Development Program by Performance Space in Sydney May 2024.
Ngambaa I’m Tired
Ngambaa, I’m Tired (Ngambaa means Mother in Gamilarraay language). A Gamilaroi First Nations Queer artist, Amelia utilises theatre, dance, writing, sound and film to alchemise her diverse ensemble’s response to the increasing pressure to function and produce in a failing society. The company seeks original expressions that refuse the silent lack of care for their existence – a healthy prosperity of storytelling and dance that hopes to shift perspectives and create softnesss.
I LOVE YOU
‘Winangaylanha nagoya nginuha’ I LOVE YOU is a queer femme group dance work that explores the experiences of queer femmes, relationship, queer loneliness and culture. With a play on diverse realistic queer experiences and not just queer fantasy.
‘Winangaylanha nagoya nginuha’ translates to 'I love you' in Gamilaaraay)
TOGETHER
Together is an inter-cultural dance performance that conjures the ancestral presence of human
and non-human kin, through the meeting and co-existing of four pan-indigenous dance
artists.
This project is a collaborative and co-led initiative involving Bella Waru (Ngāti Tukorehe,
Taranaki Tūturu), Danni Cook (Ngāpuhi), Amelia O’Leary (Gamilaroi Yinarr) and Karlia Cook
(Ngāpuhi). It is grounded in the rich tapestry of kinship-based indigenous knowledge, linking
all of existence in mutually beneficial relationship across deep time and space. Through the
process of making and researching this work, we are constantly cultivating and deepening
our personal connection with ancestral beings that exist within and around our bodies,
alongside the meeting and journeying of our collective bodies. Existing together, journeying
together, honouring together.
https://www.instagram.com/ausdancetheatre/reel/C8n2d5lynEf/
PEGGY SUE
A theatre work conceptualised by Amelia Jean O’Leary in collaboartion with Melbounre Theatre Company’s First Nations Young Artist Program
Written by Amelia Jean O’Leary and Emma Salmon
Directed and Choreographed by Amelia Jean O’Leary
Presenting in Yirramboi 2025
PEGGY SUE follows the story line of Joan, a 23 year old blak woman who moves to a shared house in North Melbourne acting as a portal for self growth and discovery as well as a distilled representation of the settler colony.
SUPPORT AMELIA’S CREATIVE JOURNEY BY DONATING HERE
HOME
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AMELIA JEAN O’LEARY
AMELIA JEAN O'LEARY (she/they/yinarr) is a proud Queer First Nations Gamilaroi Yinarr from Northen New South Wales who is currently living in Naarm (Melbourne). Her dance practice is about human and spiritual experiencing, through complexity and adversity she finds ways to tell coded and poetically rich stories. Her dances are personal and personified from her multidisciplinary skills in theatre, film and sound design. Through dance she is trying to understand this world and herself deeper. Her practice and works have relevant questioning and provocations that are resilient and inquisitive.
After graduating with a Bachelor of Fine Arts (Dance) from the Victorian College of the Arts in 2021, O’Leary performed her first full-length work ‘Yinarr’ in Adelaide Fringe and Dancehouse in 2022. She was also a part of ‘Collision’ by Jo Lloyd presented at Junction Arts Festival and ‘Garabari’ by Joel Bray at Arts House in 2022. In 2023 O’Leary created two more major new works. Her second work ‘A Certain Mumble’ presented by Darebin Arts Speakeasy in Frame. Her third 'STAUNCH ASF' presented in Melbourne Fringe performed at the Meat Market in the BLAK LODGE as part of the Deadly Fringe program. She was awarded Best Emerging Indigenous Artist at Melbourne Fringe 2023 for ‘STAUNCH ASF.’
O’Leary has choreographed for Melbourne Theatre Companies Young First Nations Program’s show in Yirramboi Festival 2023 ‘One Day.’ As well as directing and choreographing for Ngali/ Richmond Fashion show. 2024 is an exciting year for O’Leary she was brought to Vancouver by Raven Spirit dance company to attend Matriarchs Uprising and is developing multiple works including SAD EYES and TWO GATHER. Most recently O’Leary is the movement consultant for Melbourne Theatre Company’s new work World Problems and she is nominated for a Green Room Award for STAUNCH ASF. O’Leary was commissioned to develop her new work CODED for the Queer Development Program by Performance Space in Sydney May 2024.
DANCE WORKS
STAUNCH ASFSTAUNCH ASF (2023), Amelia Jean O’Leary. Photos by Gregory Lorenzutti
This contemporary dance work immerses itself in Amelia Jean O’Leary’s experience of growing up as a Gamilaroi Yinarr in the suburbs and constantly having to reclaim her Blakness. O’Leary reclaims her autonomy, agency and ancientness through healing and expression.
What happens when you own all of you and nothing of you belongs to someone else? When your body is your body, your time is your time and your space is your space.
"To fight, to rest, to make decisions, to be ignored or crucified. I am sacred yet constantly demystified. Sculpted by the coloniser, wired by the ancestors. Dipped in nutrients, soaked in essence, this is my body right, my life, my dance, our dance." - Amelia O'Leary
Cast and Crew:
Dancer, choreographer and sound designer: Amelia Jean O'Leary @ameliaa.jeann
Set and costume: Savanna Wegman @savannaaas
Lighting design: Giovanna Yate Gonzalez @giovanna.yate.g
Stage and production: Georgie Bright @georgina.bright
Co-written with Emma Salmon @pussbah
O'Leary was awarded the Melbourne Fringe Best Emerging Indigenous Artist Award 2023 for STAUNCH ASF and nominated for the Breaking Ground in Dance Green Room Award.
This was so realized and so grounded. I felt really under its spell, like it was very, I was captivated immediately. -Carla, Across the Aisle (On STAUNCH ASF (2023)
I find all of those questions productive and have been reflecting very closely on this ever since. - Philip, Across the Aisle (On STAUNCH ASF (2023)
ACROSS THE AISLE https://open.spotify.com/embed/episode/6eUvHtKI6z7otYutqSU8tf?utm_source=generator
THE AGE https://www.theage.com.au/culture/theatre/mob-has-a-meeting-place-at-melbourne-fringe-s-blak-lodge-20231016-p5eckm.html
NORTH WEST CITY NEWS https://www.northwestcitynews.com.au/meat-market-transforms-into-a-diverse-hub-of-first-nations-art/
Banksia: Amelia Jean O’Leary on STAUNCH ASF at Fringe https://www.rrr.org.au/on-demand/segments/banksia-
amelia-jean-oleary-on-staunch-asf-at-fringe
STAUNCH ASF was developed with the support of Dancehouse and the Sidney Myer Fund. This project received Cash to Create through the Fringe Fund, as part of Deadly Fringe.
A CERTAIN MUMBLE
A Certain Mumble (2023), Amelia Jean O’Leary. Photos by Sarah Walker
Presented by Darebin Arts Speakeasy in Frame March 2023
Amelia is a First Nations Gamilaroi dancer and choreographer. Janelle Tan is a Chinese Malaysian dance artist with a rich understanding of the diverse culture that surrounded her growing up. In “A Certain Mumble”, they step through the sticky terrain of conviction and confusion, voice and incomprehensibility, sisterhood and lineage, being watched and being understood.
In this intimate new dance work, these two young choreographers invite you into the murky realm between the certainty they hold in themselves, the perils of being misunderstood, and the subterranean rumblings that try to convince you you don’t belong here.
Cast and Crew:
Choreographer, dancer and sound artist: Amelia Jean O’Leary
Dancer and Collaborator: Janelle Tan Yung Huey
Lighting Designer: Giovanna Yate Gonzalez
Set Designer: Savanna Wegman
Stage and production manager: Georgie Bright
My Melbourne Arts A Certain Mumble interview http://www.mymelbournearts.com/2023/01/getting-inside-scoop-on-being-outsider.html
LGI Residency Blog https://lucyguerininc.com/news/lgi-residency-amelia-jean-o-leary
YINARRYinarr 2022), Amelia Jean O’Leary. Photos by Alliah Nival
Yinarr is O'Leary's first full length work, presented in Adelaide Fringe 2022 .‘Yinarr’ means ‘Aboriginal Woman’ in Gamillaraay Language. In this iteration of Yinarr, Gamilaroi Woman Amelia O’Leary provides a glimpse into her discovery and exploration of identity. This is a raw physical depiction of her internal vortex of identity and sisterhood that ripples into the physical, digital and spiritual worlds.
Cast and Crew:
Choreographer, performer, sound designer: Amelia Jean O’Leary
Lighting designer:Giovanna Yate Gonzalez
Performances:
Season in Adelaide Fringe March 2022.
Season in Dancehouse Season 2, 2022.
Reviews:
ARTS HUB https://www.artshub.com.au/news/reviews/dance-review-yinarr-2575970/
DANCE INFORMA https://dancemagazine.com.au/2022/09/peering-into-the-heart-of-the-work-amelia-jean-olearys-yinarr/
YINARR - Film
Yinarr the film (2020), Screen shot
Yinarr, 2020 (Film) orginally created for Resilience in Isolation grant through YIRRAMBOI FESTIVAL. Offering a 5 minute video solo dance piece 2020
Choreography, filming, editing and sound by Amelia Jean O’Leary
Screening History:
YIRRAMBOI FESTIVA 2020
Dance (Lens) Festival, running from 29 July—29 August 2021
NO CORRECT WAY - FILM
‘No Correct Way' is complete sense and chaos. No explanation needed. No way for it to be. Orbiting around discovery and honesty. Surrounding sisterhood and love. Creating a space and a home for women to be as they choose. Exploring the multiplicity and drama of being women. As the women take the space they embody various modes. Being completely open but shut. Let’s see how it feels, how it goes, how it will be, as there is no correct way for us to be.
Credits
Directed, created and choreographed by: Amelia Jean O’Leary Dancers and
Collaborators: Zoe Brown Janelle Tan Sarah Kosoof Molly McKenzie Gemma Sattler
Videographer: Alliah Nival Lighting: Makayla Hurinui
Editor: Amelia Jean O’Leary Sound: Amelia Jean O’Leary
Pianist: Emily Keane
Presented in MudFest 2021
Received Best Editing Award in MudFest Films 2021
PERFORMANCE WORKS
CELLO DANCE
Performed ‘Cello Dance’ in Sydney Fringe 2024 choreographed by Ella Havelka.
From the Gadhu
‘From the Gadhu’ The Australian Ballet ‘s education show; choreographed by Ella Havelke 2024.
Multitude by Tamara Cubas
Participant in Risings Festivals Multitude by Cubas 20232.
Garabari
Garabari by Joel Bray, presented by Chunky Move and Joel Bray Dance
1-10 Dec at Arts House 2022
Collision
Collision by Jo Lloyd presented at Junction Arts Festival 2022
Spotlight on Shadows
Spotlight on Shadows
by Shinjita Roy as part of The National Gallery of Victoria's Triennial Extra 2021
VCA PERFORMANCESChapter 7
by Danielle Micich, 2021
As part of Atlas | gadhaba kurrawan. VCA 2021 graduate season.
WAXby Daniel Riley, 2021
As part of Atlas | gadhaba kurrawan. VCA 2021 graduate season.
10 degrees
Created by VCA Dance Graduates 2021
Continuous Present
Amaara Raheem and Ying-Lan Dann, Testing Grounds, 2021.
WOW
by Alice Dixon and Caroline Meaden, 2020 Dancer in WOW, VCA Second Years performance season
Nuti (VCA remount )
by Meryl Tankard, 2020 Dancer in VCA Second Years remount of Nuti.
The Object Is the Sound
by Anna Smith, 2019
Victorian College of the Arts Four Directions series
EXPERIENCE
2024
Trainee at The Australian Ballet in the Education and Outreach team June 2024-December 2024.
Performed ‘From the Gadhu’ The Australian Ballet ‘s education show; choreographed by Ella Havelke 2024.
Performed ‘Cello Dance’ in Sydney Fringe 2024 choreographed by Ella Havelka.
TOGETHER development residency in collaboration with Karlia Cook, Danni Cook and Bella waru; at Australian Dance Theatre June 2024
Developed a new work CODED for the Queer Development Program by Performance Space in Sydney May 2024.
Nominated for a Breaking Ground Dance, Green Room Award for her work STAUNCH ASF, 2024
Movement consultant for Melbourne Theatre Company’s new work World Problems, 2024
Invited to Vancouver hosted by Raven Spirit dance company to attend Matriarchs Uprising, 2024
Guest teacher for Melbounre Theatre Company’s Youth Programs , 2024
SAD EYES development and showing at Lucy Guerin Inc January 2024.
2023
Curated and performed in her own 'Now Pieces' at Dancehouse, 2023
Awarded the Melbourne Fringe Best Emerging Indigenous Artist Award 2023 for STAUNCH ASF
STAUNCH ASF presented in Melbourne Fringe 2023 performed at the Meat Market as part of Deadly Fringe's Blak Lodge.
Against the Wind, an Immersive Meditation on Country, 2023
By Jody Haines
Choreographed by Zoë Brown-Holten and Amelia O'Leary
Yirramboi Chunky Move teaching artist, 2023
ONE DAY by Melbourne Theatre Company’s First Nations Young Artist program, presented in Yirramboi festivals 2023. Choreographer.
Ngali/Richmond fashion show performance. Choreographer March 2023.
A Certain Mumble by Amelia O’Leary
Presented in Frame Dance Festival 2023, supported by Darebin Speakeasy program.
Dancer, choreographer and soundscape artist
2022
Garabari by Joel Bray, presented by Chunky Move and Joel Bray Dance
1-10 Dec at Arts House
Collision by Jo Lloyd presented at Junction Arts Festival 2022
Yinarr performed in Dancehouse Season 2, 2022.
A Certain Mumble development supported by LGI through a studio residency at WXYZ Studios.
Multitude by Tamara Cubas
Participant in Risings Festivals Multitude by Cubas
Yinarr the Film, Presented in the Wyndham Art Gallery 2022.
Selected as a finalist in the Wyndham Art Festival.
Yinarr by O'Leary, 2022
O'Leary's first full length work, Adelaide Fringe 2022.
2021
WAX by Daniel Riley, 2021
As part of Atlas | gadhaba kurrawan. VCA 2021 graduate season.
Chapter Seven by Danielle Micich, 2021
As part of Atlas | gadhaba kurrawan. VCA 2021 graduate season.
Victorian College of the Arts Bachelor of Fine Arts (Dance), 2019-2021
Studying Contemporary dance with subjects such as improvisation, dance lineages, choreographic skills, career planning and classical ballet.
10 degrees created by VCA dance students, 2021
Yinarr by Amelia O’Leary presented in Dance (Lens) Festival, running from 29 July—29 August 2021
Awarded Best Editing Award for No Correct Way from Mudfest 2021
No Correct Way Presented in Mudfest 5-13 August 2021
Dance North Secondment Participant 2021
Boonwurrung Ngargee
Engaged as Workshop Assistant, Mentor and Performer working with program participants developing their own original content for learning and performance
Evoke by Evocative Feminine Architecture (Amelia O’Leary, Molly Mckenzie and Gabrielle Fallon) 2021.
Performed at Out of Bounds presented by Lucy Guerin Inc and Phillip Adams BalletLab
2021
Yinarr 2021 by Amelia O’Leary
Performed at Out of Bounds presented by Lucy Guerin Inc and Phillip Adams BalletLab 2021
Spotlight on Shadows by Shinjita Roy as part of The National Gallery of Victoria’s Triennial Extra 2021.
Performer in Spotlight on Shadows
2020
an episode of inconveniences by Amelia O’Leary and Molly McKenzie
Original short Film created as part of Student Works 2020
Two Rooms Directed by Gilda Jones, 2020
Choreographer and dancer for Graduate Student film Two Rooms
WOW by Alice Dixon and Caroline Meaden, 2020
Dancer in WOW, VCA Second Year’s end of year performance season
Nuti by Meryl Tankard, 2020
Dancer in the VCA Second Year’s remount of Nuti
Micro Toxic, 2020
Original short Film created as part of Independent Contract 2020
Yinarr, 2020
Successful in receiving a Resilience in Isolation grant through YIRRAMBOI FESTIVAL to develop a 5 minute video content of original solo dance piece
After Time, 2020
Created a short dance film including all sound, editing and performance
Drmngnow’s Survive, 2020
Performer/Dancer in music video
2019
Crunchy, 2019
Original creation and presentation for Victorian College of the Arts Student Works
Melbourne Theatre Company’s First Peoples Young Artists Program, 2019-2022
Engaged as Workshop Assistant, Mentor and Performer working with programparticipants developing their own original content for learning and performance
The Object Is the Sound by Anna Smith, 2019
As performer in Victorian College of the Arts Four Directions series
Tanderrum 2019
Performer in opening presentation of Melbourne International Arts Festival
Yinarr, 2019
Creation and public presentation of an original dance piece, including video projections, for The Wilin Centre for Indigenous Arts and Cultural Development’s Fan the Flames as a part of the Deadly Fringe Festival
Dance Training and Awards
Melbourne Fringe Best Emerging Indigenous Artist Award 2023 for STAUNCH ASF.
Insight Intensive Force Majeure November 2024
Victorian College of the Arts Bachelor of Fine Arts Dance 2019-2021
Awarded the Choreographic Grant Scholarship from the Victorian College of the Arts 2021
Awarded Best Editing Award for No Correct Way from Mudfest 2021
Melbourne Theatre Company's Indigenous Scholarship program 2017
Dance Network 2010-2017HOME
ABOUT
DANCE WORKS
PERFORMANCE WORKS
EXPERIENCE
WORKSHOP & CLASSES
CONTACT
WORKSHOPS AND CLASSES
Amelia’s dance classes consist of a generous somatic warm-up, an imaginative improvisation and indulgent phrases that all aim to calm the nervous system and allow your body to move in a more aware, open and grounded way.
Amelia’s workshops aims in activating and relaxing the body and reenergizing the playful imaginative mind with an outcome of abstract creative task making. This workshop offers people with the tools to tap into the endless possibilities of creative potential that can be expressed through the body. O’Leary uses natures elements to create a understandable connection of how nature moves in various ways so do we.
Workshops vary depending on duration, experience and age of the group. O’Leary works with all ages, skills, experience and artforms. For example O’Leary has worked with mental health originations, professional theatre and dance companies, public schools and counsels. Some people enjoy this workshop as it allows them to reconnect with their mind and body in a playful and grounding way.
Other institutions enjoy these workshop as it welcomes creatives to be inquisitive, expressive and helps them to create movement they can put into the work they are making. O’Leary has also ran these workshops then helped choreographer which has created a beautiful outcome of people telling interesting and abstract stories through their bodies.
CONTACT @ ameliajdance@outlook.com if you are interested