POWERHOUSE COLLECTION

Audience kit made for distribution at the Sydney Olympic Games Opening Ceremony

Object No. 2001/84/27

The audience of around 110,000 people was central to the Sydney Olympic Games Opening Ceremony, particularly in raising the festive atmosphere that illuminated the event. Audience kits, distributed to each spectator at the Ceremony, helped to raise this spirit and to encourage a degree of audience participation. Later, the kits would serve as enduring mementos of the evening. The key object of the kit was a yellow globite case, reminiscent of those that once prevailed in Australian schoolrooms. Its random display of Sydney 2000 stickers complemented this childhood theme. Inside the case were green and gold socks, a torch, cheer band, lapel pin, program, postcard, cards, earplugs, stickers and a Kodak CD Rom. The torch and cheer band - set with movement- sensitive lights - illuminated the darkened stands during the Ceremony, while socks appeared prominently on the sea of waving hands. This particular kit was part of the surplus supply that remained with SOCOG after the event. Most examples were posited on seats before the ceremony and were claimed by spectators as they took their positions. Described by the NSW premier Bob Carr as 'the greatest spectacle Australia has produced', the opening ceremony of the Sydney 2000 Olympic Games took place at Stadium Australia, Homebush Bay on Friday 15 September 2000. Though the ceremony featured anthems, speeches, oaths, flags, pop singers and a marching band, its daring conceptual sequences ('Deep Sea Dreaming', 'Awakening', 'Nature', 'Tin Symphony', 'Arrivals' and 'Eternity') will be remembered as the major imaginative works. Each segment commenced without interruption, following on from the last to form an overall narrative. The purpose was to project a national image to a worldwide audience, to form the world's vision of Australian culture. This image embraced tolerance, social progress, multiculturalism and reconciliation, as well as nature, history and creativity. Designed to stimulate emotional responses from the audience, these segments delivered a refreshing mixture of youth, naivety and larrikinism.