Zaffé (/‘zafe/) is a new immersive performance, concept and direction by Stéphanie Ghajar. It invites audiences to take part in a Lebanese wedding party in Australia. It is a celebration. There is dancing, singing, and ululation, much like at the tradition the work is named for. Yet something is awry—the bridal party is absent, and toasts break down into poems of longing for all that is missing here: loved ones across the sea, places forever changed, moments lost to the past.

A unique collaboration between creatives Aseel Tayah, who moved to Australia in 2013, and Jason Tamiru from Yorta Yorta country. Ardna (Arabic for “our land”) is a storytelling and dance performance exploring physical connection to land. Drawing on both lead artists’ relationships to Country, the work invites us to interrogate and reflect on our connection to land and place through a series of dances, songs and other stories from both middle eastern and Indigenous Australia. Stéphanie Ghajar will be directing the development of the work.