Pilepileta

The definition of Pilepileta in Wemba Wemba language is to shine and glitter.

As an indigenous and queer artist, Sheree Stewart does just that in her new debut solo show Pilepileta. It is a heart wrenching and an imaginative spoken word performance. 

Stewart is unabashedly raw, upfront and honest! Brought up in a small town in the Mallee region of Victoria in the early nineties, where life for the locals was hard and work was scarce with industries drying up, along with the remoteness factor that continued to cripple the community.

Her mother was indigenous to the area and her father was a white man. Stewart and her younger brother were consistently subjected to a life of violent domestic and sexual abuse.  Her teenage years were equally confronting with perpetual racial slurring, homophobia and continuous bullying by her red neck community. 

Stewart was regularly sheltered by her Nan, a respected elder in the community, who instilled in her the need to tell her story. Without her she claims her life would have inevitably taken a wrong turn and her story would not be with us today.

Stewart is carefree and at ease with herself; she draws you into her hard reality, while reflecting an innocence encapsulated by her own Dreamtime, that includes Bunjil  - creator deity and cultural hero, depicted as a wedge tailed eagle - the stories that have been handed down by her grandmother, passed on by moiety ancestors.

She tells us that hers is a big story and it takes courage to share. She wants to shed light on the beautiful and powerful strength that is gained despite her grim world and having the odds stacked against her.

Raw Super 8 footage of her childhood stomping ground, narrated by Stewart, offers a feeling of nostalgia, memory and connection. Connection she feels is a binding force that reunites you with yourself and country.

Flora Georgiou