A town campers’ perspective
26 September 2008
Mainstream media attention on town camps unfairly focuses on the sensational and the negative, according to a prominent Australian filmmaker and composer.
Vincent Lamberti said he believed it was imperative for Indigenous people to learn the skills necessary to tell their stories on film to break this stereotype.
“Through film, town campers gain the capacity to decide how their culture, identity and ideas are presented throughout the media landscape,” he said.
“Interest in these films continues to grow, screening around Australia and being licensed for broadcast on subscription television.”
Mr Lamberti will discuss these issues during the upcoming Charles Darwin Symposium in Alice Springs. The Symposium, titled Art works: Communities thrive, is designed to generate discussion and debate about the relationship between creativity and the health of Indigenous communities.
The one-day event is free to the public and will run from 8.30am to 4.30pm on Wednesday, 1 October at the Centralian Senior Secondary College Building, Charles Darwin University, Alice Springs.
Mr Lamberti was the driving force behind the establishment of the town-camp media enterprise, Apmere Ayeye (Camp Stories).
“Apmere Ayeye is based on a collaborative skills-transfer model that generates income and employment opportunities for town-campers,” he said.
“The idea behind Apmere Ayeye is to make films and music that empower individuals to take control of the storytelling process.”
Mr Lamberti has been living in Alice Springs since 2005, and although his vocation takes him around Australia, he focuses primarily on his work with town camp communities.
As a director he has recently completed documentary films exploring the impacts of the 2007 Intervention and the legacy of the 1967 Referendum, both projects in collaboration with a research team made up of town camp residents.
