The Unconformity is one of Australia’s boldest cultural festivals — and in 2025, dance and movement once again play a vital role in telling stories of place, resilience, and spirit.
Set against the rugged landscapes of Western Lutruwita/Tasmania, this year’s program features world premieres and site-responsive works that honour memory, identity, and the transformative power of community.
Highlights of Dance at The Unconformity
- Mature Artists Dance Experience (MADE) – Weaving Vibrant
Daily along Queenstown’s Orr Street, MADE brings a moving exploration of women as storytellers and weavers. This evocative performance flows through public space, transforming the everyday street into a living tapestry of movement and connection. - Tony Yap – Panjat Hujan (“Climbing the Rain”)
Malaysian-Australian artist Tony Yap performs a transcultural ritual that draws on Bugis shamanistic traditions and contemporary dance. Panjat Hujan embodies resilience and spirit, blending ancient ritual with contemporary expression in a deeply physical and spiritual performance. - Zoë Rimmer & Theresa Sainty – Kani mina milaythina-nanya?
While centred on cultural exchange, this participatory work invites audiences to contribute to a collective weaving practice that embodies rhythm, repetition, and embodied storytelling traditions — blurring the line between craft, ceremony, and movement. - Rise Up When She Calls
Uncle Jimmy Everett Puralia Meenamatta, Ruth Langford, and the Lutruwita Art Orchestra lead a powerful ceremony for Country. With song, movement, and ritual woven together, this performance honours land and culture in a profoundly site-specific act.
Why It Matters
The Unconformity is a festival that thrives on place and people — and dance is one of its most visceral languages. From daily performances weaving through the streets to transcultural rituals rooted in spirit and survival, these works embody the festival’s 2025 theme of respawn: renewal, resistance, and cyclical return.
For four days, Queenstown becomes a stage where movement bridges past and future, ceremony and community, tradition and innovation.
The Unconformity Festival runs 16–19 October 2025 in Queenstown, Lutruwita/Tasmania.
Full program and tickets at 2025.theunconformity.com.au
