Entertainment
19 April, 2026
Indonesia’s sea links
THE Ironing Maidens have brought an immersive performance to Cairns, combining music and multichannel audio with photography to explore an Indonesian community’s connection to the sea.
CQUniversity PhD researcher Patty Preece, alongside creative partner Melania Jack, composed and produced ‘Sitting with the Sea’ to accompany photographic works by Vickram Sombu and curator Kurniadi Widodo for Dialog Lensa #6.
“This collaboration came about through an existing partnership between NorthSite Contemporary Arts in Cairns and Padepokan Seni Bagong Kussudiardja (PSBK), in Yogyakarta, Indonesia, developed during Regional Regional,” Ms Preece said.
“As part of Dialog Lensa #6, NorthSite and The Ironing Maidens were invited to Indonesia to collaborate with Indonesian artists through that exchange.”
The project was developed in Yogyakarta and first presented there in October last year before evolving into a new iteration for Cairns audiences.
“It was a deeply relational process from the beginning – working across cultures, practices and ways of knowing – and building the work through those relationships,” Ms Preece said.
“For this project, I composed and produced the music and multichannel audio for the live performance, working closely with Melania and in dialogue with the photographic work.”
The images document the Lamalera community in East Nusa Tenggara and their connection to land and sea.
“They carry a strong sense of cultural continuity, labour and care – and our role in the sound was not to illustrate or explain that, but to sit alongside it and open up space for listening,” Ms Preece said.
“In the sound design, I worked with field recordings – including whale song (sperm whales) – which I transformed into percussive and emotive elements within the soundscape.”
Ms Preece said the process was collaborative but mindful of representation.
“As white Australian artists, Melania and I are not from Lamalera, and we were very conscious of the tensions around authorship and representation,” she said.
The Sitting with the Sea (Dialog Lensa #6) performance was held on 16 April at Tanks Arts Centre, highlighting international collaboration and cross-cultural storytelling.
