📅 Thursday 13 August 2026
🕒 3:30 pm – 5:30 pm
📍 QUAMPI Arts & Culture Centure - 14-16 Ballow Road, Dunwich
💲 FREE (book via Opening Event link below)
Makers of Meaning is a documentary series that asks the question, 'How Has Art Saved You?'.
To be human is to navigate a flawed world with our own quiet wounds, friction, and life pivots.
Makers of Meaning embeds with a diverse slate of everyday regional and multicultural Australian artisans who demonstrate that the creative process is not a passive hobby, but a vital therapeutic necessity.
Through the immersive, meditative ‘flow state’ of hands-on craftsmanship, these creators find a sanctuary to recharge their minds, process life’s challenges big and small, and transform the reality of the human condition into beautiful, tangible art.
Craig Clarey Navigating the sudden, devastating loss of his sister, what began as a single, intimate amulet crafted for her coffin transformed from a private act of mourning into a life-sustaining necessity. Having now created dozens of sculptures across his island home, Craig uses the physical, rhythmic act of making to process his grief and carve tangible meaning from his loss. In his workshop, the sensory focus of shaping raw timber and found materials acts as a meditative shield, allowing his mind to ground itself and transform the heavy weight of mourning into an extraordinary island legacy of personal resilience. Directors’ Statement (Tom Francis & Danielle O’Brien)
As creatives and partners, we have always believed that real, profound stories live within the everyday people around us. Every human is beautifully flawed, and we all carry our own quiet wounds and triumphs. With Makers of Meaning, we wanted to unpack a universal truth: that making with our hands is a vital antidote for the human condition, to process life, deal with pain, and both mentally and spiritually recharge.
Tom Francis and Danielle O’Brien are both creatives and educators who witness daily the power of art to transform. Tom has a long background in film production and directing, while Danielle's passion is in visual arts, working as painter, sculptor amd photographer.
Together they established a successful art gallery in Paddington and are raising two teenage sons while juggling creative lives. Makers of Meaning is their first time partnering on a film project, with Danielle conducting the interviews and capturing B-roll while Tom weaves his magic behind the camera.
Makers of Meaning is not just about the art objects created—it is a celebration of the flow state, and the absolute necessity of making to help us navigate the human condition.
Tom Francis - Writer / Director
Location
QUAMPI Arts & Culture Centre - 14-16 Ballow Road, Dunwich
Accessibility: We are an event friendly to all genders, generations and cultures. The venue is accessible to those of differing abilities and mobilities.