9 February 2024
Immersive digital experience arrives in Laos
Her Excellency Megan Jones, Australian Ambassador to the Lao PDR, was joined by Lao Government officials, Ambassadors, development partners and local organisations at the launch of the immersive digital experience Walking through a Songline at Lab de Lines in Vientiane.
Walking through a Songline is a pop-up digital experience based on part of the National Museum of Australia’s internationally acclaimed exhibition Songlines: Tracking the Seven Sisters. Songline or Dreaming tracks map the routes of Ancestral beings as they travelled across Australia, creating the land and its people.
Songlines: Tracking the Seven Sisters showcases five First Nations songlines from Australia’s Western and Central Deserts. It uses over 300 paintings and photographs, objects, song, dance and multimedia to narrate the story of the Seven Sisters and their creation of the continent as they travelled from west to east.
“Through Walking through a Songline, Australian First Nations people are sharing many stories with you – our neighbours and our friends” said Ambassador Jones. “I’m particularly pleased to bring it to Laos this year, Laos’ ASEAN Chair year, which marks 50 years of ASEAN-Australia dialogue relations and the 30th anniversary of the Australian-funded first Thai-Lao Friendship Bridge” added Ambassador Jones.
Walking through a Songline was produced by the National Museum of Australia in partnership with Mosster Studio. It has the ongoing support of the traditional Aboriginal custodians and knowledge holders of this story.
As visitors walk through the multi-sensory digital installation they are immersed in ancient Aboriginal Australian knowledge communicated through new technology. “This exhibition will speak to you with beauty and power. It also provides us with an opportunity to bring people together in cultural exchange,” said Ambassador Jones.
