Yidaki; Didjeridu and the sound of Australia

Novatech brings ‘theatre, magic and wonder’ to the South Australian Museum

‘Yidaki: Didjeridu and the Sound of Australia’ was an exhibition told in the Yolngu way. The story was told through video, sound and vibration.

Dominating one wall was huge immersive vision of the Yolngu country, building to a climax of a breaking storm, complete with lightning, revealing the true creative power of the yidaki.

The South Australian Museum had the vision for the exhibition, but needed to bring it all to life, using lighting, sound and visual effects. To create this unique experience, they turned to Novatech.

The brief was to build a forest, a world, an exhibition that celebrated sound as an object. The question was “How do you use sound as a thing and how do you create an experience where you make people feel like they’re walking through someone else’s world?”

From the first planning meeting, it became apparent that Novatech had the skills, the qualities, and the background to not only understand what the Museum was trying to achieve, but develop solutions that were efficient and manageable.

The exhibition was divided into eight major sections, all telling a different part of the Yolngu story. LCD screens, theatrical lighting, curved projection screens, hidden loudspeakers triggered by proximity, and the museum’s own ‘thunderboards’ were all part of the AV toolbox that Novatech used to bring the exhibition to life.

The Museum outlined what they wanted to do and Novatech worked out a way to deliver it, in a unique and creative way. Novatech took easy questions, which had hard answers, and turned them into something viable for the audience, that could also be easily managed within a Museum.

The exhibition needed to work every day, without fail, and Novatech delivered a level of responsiveness that many other companies couldn’t.

The technology powering the exhibition has been built to run automatically and fault free, and is already road-cased and tour-ready, as the Museum is in talks to present Yidaki in Japan and other countries.

The exhibition was ambitious and Novatech delivered the solution in a spectacular way, demonstrating they are more than a live event or concert production company – they are also leading the way in the arts arena.

‘Yidaki: Didjeridu and the Sound of Australia’ runs at the South Australian Museum until July 16 2017.