2009 Festival Weekend: 26-30 June 2009

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In 2009, the Alice Springs Beanie Festival celebrated its thirteenth event. It was, once again, to be our biggest festival to date. Over 12000 visitors came through the doors to participate and enjoy the 4 days of activities.
The lead up to the festival involved workshops to develop beanie making skills for the residents of Ernabella, Titjikala, Ntaria, Amoonguna Arts Centre, Mutitjulu, Alice Springs Aboriginal Hostels and many local schools of Alice Springs. These workshops were funded by an NT Arts Regional Arts Grant ($10000), and the Beanie Festival ($6000). The workshops were well attended and allowed for the active participation of Indigenous beanie makers and children in the festival.
The women created works of beanie art for the exhibition, and beanies to sell in the market place. The women were also invited to participate in the festival, some being paid to demonstrate traditional spinning, some teaching basket weaving and beanie making, and some visiting and experiencing the festival for the first time. The women also cooked kangaroo tail for visitors for the first time in fire pits, providing a fantastic cultural experience as women sat by a fire, talking and singing in language, spinning, crocheting and attending the cooking. The women who visited the festival from Mutitjulu were so inspired that they performed traditional Inma and painted themselves up and danced for all of our visitors. We paid the women for their performance and the visitors to the festival were enthralled with their performance. The women from the Ntaria choir drove into town on Sunday especially to sing for our visitors and see the festival adding yet another visitor experience. The women chose a beanie each to thank them for sharing their enchanting voices.
As a result of workshops held in Alice Springs a young Arrente lady, Sally Heffernan, offered to open the festival for the first time and she bravely stood in front of a crowd of 2000 and welcomed everyone to the festival. Also on the Friday evening family fun night. Hon. Karl Hampton MLA (Minister for Central Australia) opened the festivities, which continued with entertainment highlighted by the several local bands and entertainment, a parade of the winning beanies and stalls selling home-made tucker.
The exhibition was held in Gallery One of the Araluen Galleries for the first time this year. It comprised over 400 beanies from 380 beanie makers from around Australia, and the world (with new entries from Singapore, Finland, Russia, Holland and the UK) and highlighting works produced by the remote workshops.
In beanie Central over 6000 beanies were received and visitors purchased over 4000 beanies, contributing to over $174 000 of takings in 4 days. Visitors also participated in many textile workshops, enjoyed homegrown cooking at the teashop, went on bush beanie dinners, hot air balloon tours and a post festival tour to Uluru. And as tradition will have it visitors were invited to have a go at the Beanie Olympics or learn to crotchet their very first beanie.
Managing the large number of volunteers willing to help during the festival has grown to become a challenge. This year we had volunteer co-ordinators to manage rosters, explain jobs, issue aprons, go through OH&S procedures and generally look out for our volunteers. Over 150 people helped out over 8 days. We included a pre-festival information evening with a brief talk about what to expect in the days ahead and also a talk about some of the beanies and their stories as a tantaliser along with some wine and nibbles. We also had a volunteer’s dinner with thanks to the Gillen Club for subsiding the food and many other sponsors who donated prizes for the evening. Feedback from volunteers was good this year (see attached) with still room for improvement in 2010.
For NAIDOC week in July the Beanie Festival worked with the National Gallery of Australia and Ernabella Arts to send 10 Ernabella women to Canberra for 10 days of beanie making workshops. This provided further exposure for the festival. The women very much enjoyed their time as did the Gallery visitors who leant to make beanies and taste Kangaroo tails.
In 2009 our major sponsor Cleckheaton was unable to support us due to the financial down turn and we had to resort to the Alice Springs community to help us with prizes and sponsorship for workshops. We had a story run on the Rural Report ABC radio which went national (see attached) and we had a fantastic response and followed is a list of all those who helped us out with cash sponsorship and prizes.
MacDonnell Range Caravan Park,
Finke Desert Race,
Felt Magazine,
Yarn Magazine,
Desart,
Bill Robertson Optometrist,
National Road Transport Hall Of Fame,
Moving Pictures Photography,
Ashfords Australia,
Hon. Karl Hampton MLA,
Polkadot,
Trophy Central,
Youth Tracks GTNT,
Centralian Advocate,
Textile Fibre Forum,
Mayor Damien Ryan,
TourismNT,
Araluen Arts Centre,
Hon Warren Snowdon MP,
AJH,
Crowne Plaza,
Dymocks Bookstore,
The Avon Lady,
The Gillen Club,
Grace Removals,
Brushcraft,
XLCOM.

2009 also saw the continuation of the National Beanie Tour with the exhibition opening in Morwell, Cowra, Bega and Lake Macquarie, with more to come in 2010.
Plans are underway for the development of a script for a play called “A Head Full of Love” the story of the Alice Springs Beanie Festival to be read at the 2010 Festival and presented at the Darwin Festival in 2010.
Marketing has been another important job for the festival and beyond the enormous exposure gained through the tour we have website updates, magazine articles and advertising, radio advertising and interviews, TV stories.
Jo Nixon, Executive Officer Extraordinaire
Inside Beanie Central
 

Tim paying attention to the little details.
 
 
   
2009 Opening Night- What a night!
The Beanie Parade
The Giant Beanie
 

Performing under the giant beanie
The crowds relax at the festival