Bernadette Trench-Thiedeman is an artist working with writing, performance, puppetry, film. animation, painting and sculpture. As a first generation Australian with Sri Lankan/Austrian cultural heritage, her work is concerned with multi-voiced narratives, social-political histories and the role that memory plays in the understanding of individual and collective identity. Her work seeks a deeper understanding of the interconnected web of multi-species relations, and explores the poetics of these entangled relations. She uses writing and art-making as a political act of unearthing hidden histories and imagining possible futures, through speculative fiction, fantasy, narrative non-fiction and memoir. Having collaborated for many years with artists who have diverse sensory needs, she is interested in live performance as a space that utilises all of the senses to create powerful, transportive experiences. She works with First Nations artists and storytellers on screen and stage works that give focus, voice and agency to all lifeforms. Over 15 years these experiences have shaped her understanding of her practice and the land upon which she works.
She has toured regionally and internationally with the Snuff Puppets, Black Hole Theatre, Theatre Kimberley and Big Mama Productions. Her film and animation work have been broadcast on ABC Asia, NITV and SBS, screened at the Art Gallery of Western Australia, Perth Institute of Contemporary Arts, Australian Cinemateque GOMA, and the Art Gallery of South Australia. Bernadette has worked with organisations such as the Flying Fruit Fly Circus, Warmun Arts Centre (WA), Mangkaja Arts (WA), Waringarri Arts Centre (WA) and the Kimberley Aboriginal Law and Culture Centre (WA), Art Project Australia (VIC) and Arts Access Victoria (VIC)
Since 2015 she has led the Big Country Puppets project for Theatre Kimberley in remote Kimberley communities which feature site specific giant puppetry performances in collaboration with local elders, artists, young people, Aboriginal Rangers and scientists. These performances give focus to local ecological knowledge as well as traditional stories and utilise endangered Aboriginal languages and song. In 2023 and 2019 she co-produced, co-wrote and co-directed 'The Shorebird Quest' a site specific romantic comedy musical with giant illuminated shorebird puppets on the shores of Roebuck Bay, Broome in conjunction with Jaime Jackett, Karen Hethey, Eduardo Maher, Gwen Knox, Chris Hill, Aboriginal Rangers, Theatre Kimberley and Broome community members
In 2022 her work 'Phantasmagoria' premiered at Theatreworks Melbourne, directed by Cathy Hunt and supported by Creative Victoria. She was lead visual artist and animator for 'This Is Mo'Ju' commissioned for the ABC Arts 'Rap It Up Series' produced by Marhouba Productions. She produced six animations with Nyoongar artists and elders from Kepa Kurl/Esperance about their relationship with Sea Country for Parks Australia. In 2021 her collaborative animation with senior Gooniyandi artist Mervyn Street and Natalie Davey was commissioned for an exhibition at the WA Museum Boola Bardip. She produced animation and projected visuals for Flying Fruit Fly Circus' 'Girls with Altitude' national tour. In 2020 she produced animation for 'The Serpents Tale' directed by Mark Jones, commissioned for the Martuwarra Council. This traced the multiple dreaming stories of the river from its source to its mouth, told by 5 different language groups.
In 2018 she completed a Master of Writing for Performance at the Victorian College of the Arts with High distinction. In 2019 she devised and performed 'The Last Lighthouse-keeper' for Black Hole Theatre, which toured Melbourne venues.
Her collaborative animation 'At First Sight' with Miriwoong artist Peggy Griffiths-Madij was screened at the Perth Institute of Contemporary Arts, at the Australian Cinematheque - Queensland Gallery of Modern Art and at the Art Gallery of South Australia for Tarnanthi in 2019.
In 2020 she produced the Kimberley Coronavirus animation in collaboration with Kimberley based Aboriginal artists, the Kimberley Aboriginal Medical Service and Nirrumbuk Environmental Health and Services. This animation was translated into five Aboriginal languages from the Pilbara and Kimberley. It screened on NITV, reaching over 30,000 people online and played in medical clinics across the Kimberley and Pilbara.
In 2019 her illustrations were commissioned by the WA Community Arts Network for the Noongar 'Lullabies' album artwork and she worked with ScreenWest and Ballardong Wadjuk Yok/Walyalup artist Yabini Esther (Kickett) McDowell on animations for the Yagan Tower screen space in Perth. A series of 6 animations she produced with Gija artists from Warmun Arts Centre were exhibited at the Art Gallery of WA, commissioned as part of the Desert River Sea program. She undertook a commissioned residency at the Allerhandverein Arts Centre in Mecklenburg-Vorpommern region, Germany in August 2019.
In 2016 she spent 2 months at the NES Artist Residency, Iceland, where she undertook a creative development for her theatre and image making practice. Her illustrations have been published in 3 editions of of the comic anthology collection ‘Tango’ edited by Bernard Caleo, and in the Tango Collection 2009, published by Allen and Unwin
CONTACT:
email : [email protected]
MEDIA LINKS:
Big Country Puppets 2021
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-06-26/big-puppets-performance-mulan-great-sandy-desert/100240830
Lurujarri Dreaming" an animated documentary
www.abc.net.au/radionational/programs/awaye/lurrujarri-dreaming/4545938
Patient : Sculpture/installation for the Melbourne International Food and Fine Festival
Feast your eyes on this - Epicure - Entertainment - theage.com.au