MPavilion  

Welcome to MPavilion 2020!

This year we are doing things a little differently, with a hybrid approach featuring both virtual and in-person events. Our November program is entirely online, while December to March will be delivered both online and in COVID-safe locations, in alignment with Victoria’s evolving COVID-19 roadmap. Our virtual opening night will bring you a performance by Noongar violist Aaron Wyatt of a specially commissioned piece by Deborah Cheetham AO, the first BLAKitecture event of the 2020 season, and a video message from MPavilion founder Naomi Milgrom AC, past MPavilion architects, and some of our nearest and dearest collaborators. Join us to celebrate apart, together. 

OPENING NIGHT PROGRAM

Opening Conversations, 6.30PM

Viewed optimistically and approached boldly, Milgrom notes “this challenging moment in history has created new programming possibilities—opportunities that will open up different conversations, ideas, and connections about our city, our public spaces, and the world.” In a series of dynamic and uplifting personal reflections and discussions, Milgrom and a group of eminent guests will officially launch MPavilion 2020. As well as sharing their own stories about what MPavilion means to them, each speaker will discuss MPavilion’s wider role as a cultural laboratory, and explore the way its upcoming program is supporting creatives and reviving art and design in an environment reshaped by the pandemic.

Wooroongi Biik

Composing her seventh piece for MPavilion, Cheetham felt the work needed both points of difference, and of continuity: “as we emerge from the chaos of 2020, it’s important to recognise that we live on a continent with the longest continuing music practices in the world, and that we continue to draw strength from the land into which the Boon Wurrung people have poured their knowledge and wisdom for more than 2,000 generations. For this reason, I’ve called the work Wooroongi Biik (Strong Country), in recognition of the resilience of the Boon Wurrung and all First Nations people who have withstood the greatest existential threat of all—colonisation.” Woroongi Biik is written for solo viola, and will be performed by Wyatt, the inaugural director of Ensemble Dutala, Australia’s first Indigenous chamber ensemble.

BLAKitecture: With(out) Engagement, 7pm

MPavilion’s fourth annual BLAKitecture forum brings together Indigenous built environment practitioners on the Yaluk-ut Weelam land of the Boon Wurrung people. The forum aims to centralise Indigenous voices in conversations about architecture, the representation of histories, and the present and future states of our built environments. BLAKitecture series With(out) Engagement will kickstart our 2020 season of MTalks.