When Joanna Callaghan was pondering a move back to Australia after more than two decades in England, she did what any film lecturer would do; she made a movie about it.
The Sussex-based professor was born in Newcastle and raised in Singleton but has spent most of her life practising overseas. In her 2020 film, 'Records', she lays her life bare, concluding home is the people you live with.
The film will show at Newcastle's The Lock Up on Saturday night.
It began in 2018 with a six-week resident at The Lock-Up and an old box of possessions buried in her parents' cupboard. The box had not been touched for 20 years.
In coming back to the Hunter for the residency, Ms Callaghan said she was forced to grapple with her own identity. A lifetime of film work, compiled in 'Records', became her release.
"When I [opened the box] at my parents', I was facing these images of myself, these images of people I can't remember or places I don't remember going to. I thought, 'who is that person?'."
The box became a "motivation" for exploring life through records kept - a trait passed on by her father, a local historian.
"I had to think about if I wanted to come back and make my life here or if I'd already made enough of my life there that I couldn't come back," Ms Callaghan said.
The movie's "spine" is a family road trip with cameraman husband, Joachim Bergamin, and their son through central Australia.
"I was thinking about identity. I was thinking about being an Australian who is close to spending more times in another country," Ms Callaghan said. "It was really quite a dilemma to think about."
While weaving different histories, including deeply personal family videos, tales of Irish Catholicism and Australian colonialism, the film became an "archaeology" of changes in technology.
Shots were taken on super VHS, tapes, beta cam, early digital, 35 millimetre frames and modern cameras.
"It is a history of technology, in some senses," Ms Callaghan said. "It shows how the materials change over time."
Though the filmmaker is "nervous" about showing such a personal work in her hometown, director of The Lock-Up Doctor Warwick Heywood is "thrilled" to have the film screened.
"I was really pleasantly surprised when I looked at this film," he said. "It is a significant film. It deals with Australia identity and regional identities."
Ms Callaghan was supported by The Lock-Up during her 2018 residency, along with Arts Council England, the University of Sussex and the University of Newcastle.
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