In 2023 Sweltering Cities approached the Bindi Bosses, a progressive, matriarchal South Asian Fusion Arts company based in Warrang (Sydney) that seamlessly blends Traditional South Asian Classical and Folk dances with influences from South Asian Cinema and Street dances from around the world, to collaborate on a new project. The Bindi Bosses had previously worked with Sweltering Cities’ Board member Dr Rachael Jacobs to explore the impact of rising temperatures in South West Sydney through dance in the ‘Signs’ project in collaboration with First Nations artist Boori Monty Pryor.
The purpose of the new project was to diversify and challenge the ‘business as usual’ representations of heatwaves in Australian cities by using South Asian dance and music to tell the real story of heatwaves in Western Sydney in an innovative way. Too often, heatwave media coverage is accompanied by pictures of people at the beach, and heatwave stock images are either of thermometers or people melodramatically sighing at fans. Heatwaves can be deadly, and it’s communities in places like Western Sydney and hot suburbs across Australia that are facing more and more dangerous summers as temperatures rise. That’s why we teamed up with Bindi Bosses to examine through art what extreme heat looks like in our communities and what can be done for more liveable, sustainable and equitable cities.
The Project
BRIEF: Show the effects and impact of heat across Western Sydney through art in a way that also captures the culture of people living in that region.
EXECUTION: BINDI BOSSES assembled a team of Western Sydney-based South Asian artists to conceptualise, produce and feature in a series of videos and images that depict the feeling, impact and effect of rising temperatures expressed through original music composition, choreography, acting, traditional Tamil folk dance and drumming, Bharatanatyam classical dance and visual art.
OUTCOME: 3 x Videos and a series of 7 x Stock Images that express the impact and effect of heat in a culturally diverse and specific way.
The videos tell three stories:
The feeling of rising temperatures at the beginning of a baking hot day. Climate change, over development and land clearing mean longer, hotter summers and more severe heatwaves that increase the risk of heat-related disease and death.
The story of one young girl’s wait at a hot bus stop with no shade or shelter in Sydney’s Western Suburbs. You can read more about our Busted Bus Stops campaign here.
Finally, the last story shows a woman cooking over a hot stove in summer as she feels the rising heat affect her mind and body.
The Final Product
Read more about the process on our Instagram account
