Dr Dominique Sweeney

Dominique is a lecturer in acting at CSU.

Dominique trained and works as a performer. His education included two years in Paris at L'École Internationale de Théâtre Jacques Lecoq. His performance work has seen him on stages, screen and other locations throughout Australia. He taught and directed at Sydney Theatre School and worked as an Environmental Education Ranger in Centennial Park, Sydney. In 2012 Dominique devised and applied a drama program for autistic and multiple disability students at Wairoa school in Bondi.

Dominique is a core member and chair of the board of Theatre Kantanka, a company that specialise in site specific performance. He also works with Fine Line, a Lecoq based ensemble.

Dominique teaches first and third year acting classes. The subjects start with an introduction to acting then develop an awareness of various actor training systems which include a performance based on the Commedia dell’arte. Dominique teaches and directs the third years in Stage and Screen Project focusing on a contemporary Australian Theatre production alongside short film productions and a live TV series. Dominique also teaches in Professional Practice in Communication and Creative Practice.

Subjects include:

• Fundamentals of Acting
• Techniques of Acting
• Live Studio Collaboration
• Studio and Location Practice
• Stage and Screen Project
• Professional Practice in Communication and Creative Industries

Dominique is currently working together with Dr. Lyndon Ormond-Parker and Professor Aaron Corn on an ARC project from 2018-21 titled Aboriginal remote narrowcast TV and the audio-visual archive.

This project aims to investigate the world’s best practices in community narrowcast digital TV and contemporary methods for the long-term storage of both digital and analogue audio-visual cultural materials. This will assist in the long-term preservation of Indigenous languages and culture and will investigate whether health promotion and other messages in Aboriginal languages community impacts on community well-being.

Dominique has a B.Ed in drama/dance/philosophy from Deakin University (Rusden). Working, directing, devising and performing with masks led to his Ph.D. thesis and film at ANU entitled "masked corroborees of the northwest". The thesis is grounded in northwest Australia looking at a range of corroborees that incorporate the use of masks. It concerns performance objects that connect bodies to country, cultural knowledge and ancestors. Masks also reaffirm the political status of people in their country.

Research Areas:

• Aboriginal remote narrowcast TV and the audio-visual archive
• Traditional Aboriginal public performances
• Motion Capture Acting
• Jacques Lecoq acting pedagogy
• Place based acting pedagogy

• Performance Studies International
• Australian Drama Studies Association
• MEAA Equity

Grants

• Aboriginal remote narrowcast TV and the audio-visual archive Australian Research Council (Canberra, Australia) 2018. Grant: grant.IN180100014.
• Record anthropologist Kim Akerman discuss Songlines Charles Sturt University(Wagga Wagga, NSW, Australia) 2016.
• CSU Establishment Grant  Charles Sturt University(Wagga Wagga, NSW, Australia) 2017.
• Masked Corroborees of the Wurnan AIATSIS (Canberra, ACT, Australia) 2005.
• Masks of NW Australia AIATSIS (Canberra, ACT, Australia) 2004.

Journal Articles/Book Chapters

• I Wonder ... Indigenous Corroborees and Masked Dances in Northwest Australia Building Sustainability with the Arts: Proceedings of the 2nd 2016 National Ecoarts Australis Conference 2017.
• Alan Griffiths’ Balmarra. In L. Seear & J. Ewington (Eds.), Brought to Light II: Contemporary Australian Art 1966–2006. Brisbane: Queensland Art Gallery. 2007.
• Taking ethnographic film back. Being There: After-Proceedings of the 2006 Conference of the Australasian Association for Drama.
• Theatre and Performance Studies. doi:http://hdl.handle.net/2123/2515.
• Masked corroborees of the northwest - ‘stand up in my head’ 2010, ANU, PhD.

Conference Papers

• An introduction to masks in Australia Daegu, South Korea, July 2018 Performance as Network : Arts, City, Culture, Performance Studies International Conference (PSi).
• An introduction to ’masked corroborees of the northwest'. Shanghai International Symposium on Theatre Studies, Nov 2017.
• I wonder... In between and across: mediating realit(y)ies in performance and performance ethnography, Jul 2016,  Performance Studies Conference, Sydney University.
• I wonder... EcoArts Australis 2nd National Conference, Australia, Feb 2016.
• Taking ethnographic film back Australasian Association for Theatre, Drama, and Performance Studies Annual Conference (ADSA 2006), Australia.

Creative Works

Dominique has been a professional actor, creator and director on stage and screen Internationally. Since commencing at CSU his recent work includes:

• Norm in Alex Buzo’s Norm and Ahmed performed at Bolton Skatepark, directed by Robert Lewis, Feb 2018
• Ghost in The Human Glove,  HR Gallery, Wagga Wagga, Lewis/Sweeney, April 2017

Please see here for an extended version of Dominique's CV.

Film/DV

• Shelter Building Getting Dirty 2015
• OOSH Climbing Getting Dirty 2015
• Nature Mentors Getting Dirty 2015

Masked Corroborees of the northwest PhD film screened at:

• 2009 Moscow Ethnographic Film Festival
• 2009 Nordic Ethnographic Film Festival, Koper
• 2008 Amsterdam, Beeld voor Beeld Ethnographic Film Festival
• 2008 Bruges, Beeld voor Beeld Ethnographic Film Festival