Dance

20 – 23 Jan

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Ngurragabu

Name: Ngurragabu
Start: 2027-01-20 18:00:00+11:00
End: 2027-01-23 19:30:00+11:00
Location: Carriageworks

Dalisa Pilgrim & Rachael Swain

Australia  

The earth rewilded, humanity reimagined.

Description

World Premiere  Marrugeku

A great human howl for the damage done to earth, this world premiere from acclaimed dance theatre company Marrugeku brings a haunting speculative future to life.

Envisioned in dialogue with Yawuru and Bardi custodians, choreographer Dalisa Pigram and director Rachael Swain’s latest work draws on a powerhouse ensemble of Indigenous and settler-diasporic performers from Australia, South East Asia and Melanesia to question the cost of survival. 

Set in a time of great middens and drowned Country, Ngurragabu [from the last night/next/tomorrow] catapults audiences into visual artist Abdul-Rahman Abdullah’s monumental petrified mangrove forest, inspired by past-future archipelagos connecting northern Australia to east Indonesia.

Techno-futurist music, immersive projections and a stunning set create a world unlike any other, where every movement asks how we might live differently with one another – and with the planet.

Urgent without losing hope, Ngurragabu rewilds the future as a place of radical possibility.

Ngurragabu... is part of the Dance Reflections by Van Cleef and Arpels program. Discover more here.

"The company consistently resists conformity."

ARTHUB

"One of Australia's most significant dance companies."

THE SATURDAY PAPER

Dance First Nations / Blak Out

Dalisa Pigram

Australia

A Yawuru/Bardi woman born and raised in Broome, Dalisa Pigram also has Malay and Filipina heritage. A co-devising movement artist with Marrugeku since its first production, Mimi (1996), she became Co-Artistic Director with Rachael Swain in 2008. Across Marrugeku’s major works, Dalisa has worked as choreographer, co-choreographer, performer and co-director, including Burning Daylight, Cut the Sky, Le Dernier Appel, Jurrungu Ngan-ga, Burrbgaja Yalirra, Mutiara and Ngurragabu. Her solo work Gudirr Gudirr received an Australian Dance Award and Green Room Award, and she received Creative Australia’s 2023 Dance Award. Dalisa is committed to maintaining Indigenous language and culture through arts and education, working closely with and for her community.

Rachael Swain

Australia

Rachael Swain is a director, dramaturg and performance researcher of Scottish/Irish/English descent. Born in Aotearoa/New Zealand, she lives on Gadigal land, Sydney. She is Co-Artistic Director of Marrugeku with Dalisa Pigram, directing and co-facilitating intermedial processes to create Marrugeku’s award winning productions. Rachael trained at the European Dance Development Centre, Arnhem, DASARTS Amsterdam and in film at UTS, Sydney. She co-curates Marrugeku’s dance and dramaturgy research laboratories. She is author of Dance in Contested Land (2020) and co-editor of Marrugeku: Telling That Story (2021). Rachael holds an ARC Future Fellowship (part-time) at UNSW, researching visual dramaturgies in intercultural performance.

Marrugeku

Australia

Marrugeku is Australia’s leading Indigenous intercultural dance theatre company, based in Broome, Western Australia and Carriageworks in Sydney. Marrugeku is dedicated to Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians working together to develop new dance languages that are restless, transformative and unwavering. Led by co-artistic directors choreographer/dancer Dalisa Pigram and director/dramaturg Rachael Swain, they co-conceive and facilitate Marrugeku’s productions and research laboratories, introducing audiences to the unique and potent structures of Indigenous knowledge systems and the compelling experience of intercultural performance. Marrugeku harnesses the dynamic of performance exchange drawn from remote, urban, intercultural and trans Indigenous approaches to expand the possibilities of contemporary dance.

Festival Sponsors

Credits

Concept – Dalisa Pigram and Rachael Swain with Patrick Dodson

Choreographer – Dalisa Pigram

Director – Rachael Swain

Created with and performed by – Zachary Lopez, Gusta Mara, Stanley Nalo, Jada Narkle, Darci O’Rourke, Taj Pigram, Bhenji Ra, Syarifuddin Sahari and Zee Zunnur.

Understudy – Malati Angus

Cultural Dramaturg – Patrick Dodson

Dramaturg – Hildegard de Vuyst

Landscape Futurists/Researchers – REALMstudios (Cate Wallace, Damien Pericles and Maximiliano Olivares Croxatto)

Composer – Corin Ileto

Additional music – Daniel Nuhan

Sound Designer – Michael Toisuta

Set Designer – Abdul-Rahman Abdullah

Costume Designer – Matthew Stegh

Digital Media Designer – Sohan Ariel Hayes

Lighting Designer – Damien Cooper

Associate Lighting Designer – Eben Love

Cultural Knowledge Circle – Bolo Angus (Bardi), Malati Angus (Bardi), Dianne Appleby (Yawuru), Theresa Ardler (Gweagal, Gadigal and Bidjigal), Bibido McCarthy (Bardi Jawi), Bart Pigram (Yawuru), Lloyd Pigram (Yawuru).

Song (Loorreen) – Lullumb recorded by Bolo Angus and Malati Angus

Production

Technical Director – Mitchell Dunn (FreeFlow Projects), Mike Smith (Sep 2025 - May 2026)

Production Manager – Meredith Rehberg

Stage Manager – Abby Dinger

Audio and Video Technician – Raine Paul

Lighting Technician – Eben Love

Company Manager – Denise Wilson

Computational Design & Circular Research Consultants – Arch_Manu / UNSW

Computational Design and Scenic Fabrication – Composite. Sydney (Richard Blackwell, Max Melamed, Louis Lamont)

Costume Assistants – Araks Nazarian and Ash Kok

LiDAR capture – Pete Hill

Produced by – Marrugeku

Executive Producer – Michaela Coventry

Creative Producer – Natalie Smith

Producer (Nov 2025 – March 2026) – Hazem Shammas

Image Credits

Marrugeku’s Ngurragabu (work in progress. Dec, 2025). Image – Prudence Upton.

Main image – Photo by Prudence Upton, edited by Matthew Sharah

Funding Credits

Ngurragabu has been assisted by the Australian Government’s Major Festivals Initiative, managed by Creative Australia, its arts funding and advisory body, in association with the Confederation of Australian International Arts Festivals Inc., Commissioned by Sydney Festival, Perth Festival, City of Melbourne through Arts House and YIRRAMBOI.

Ngurragabu is funded by the Australian Government through Indigenous Language and Arts Program and the Australian Research Council Future Fellowship Program; WA State Government through the Department of Creative Industries, Tourism and Sport with support from the Department of Primary Industries and Regional Development, the NSW government through Create NSW, the Shire of Broome, City of Sydney and the Feilman Foundation.

Marrugeku is assisted by the Australian Government through Creative Australia, its principal arts investment and advisory body and is supported by the WA State Government through the Department of Creative Industries, Tourism and Sport, and the NSW government through Create NSW.

Ngurragabu is supported by Carriageworks, Arch_Manu, The ARC Center for Next-Gen Architectural Manufacturing and Composite.Sydney as well as Nulungu Research Institute, University of Notre Dame and School of Arts and Media, UNSW.

Important Information

Festival Sponsors

Dates