ABSTRACT
In this chapter I discuss ‘The Unending Absence’ creative practice project—my collaboration with Moya McFadzean, the Senior Curator at the Melbourne Immigration Museum, and sound artist Thembi Soddell. A series of scripted audio pieces provides an alternative interpretative thread through the Melbourne Immigration Museum’s permanent exhibition. The thread is essentially an attempt at translating emotional and psychological realities of being an immigrant for a museological context: speaking from inside the immigrant experience, audio pieces create pockets of affective intensity for the museum visitors and suggest vectors of resonance that exceed identification and recognition. In this chapter, I explore the different forms of memory mobilization and flow a project such as this might engender within the context of a museum.
