Western Terrace: Villages We Carry - A Living Community Archive

The Villages We Carry - A Living Community Archive is an immersive community gathering exploring how memory, storytelling, and everyday cultural practices preserve our connection to place. Inspired by the artist's own family roots in South Lebanon, the event transforms PHIVE's Western Terrace into a contemporary village gathering space where memory becomes a form of preservation. Through participatory mapping, family photographs, digitised VHS home videos, oral histories, and live music, visitors are invited to contribute their own stories, photographs, and memories, creating a living community archive.

While centred on the villages of South Lebanon, the project explores a universal idea: the places, people, and traditions that shape our sense of home. Community members with connections to South Lebanon are warmly encouraged to attend and share their stories, while people from all backgrounds are invited to participate, reflect, and celebrate the memories and experiences that connect us across cultures and generations. Whether you have family ties to South Lebanon, connections to another village, town or homeland, or are simply curious to learn more, everyone is welcome to contribute to a shared conversation about place, belonging, and the meaning of home.

Rooted in the traditions of hospitality and intergenerational knowledge sharing, The Villages We Carry - A Living Community Archive offers space for reflection, conversation, and connection. Together, we remember not only places, but the lives, relationships, and cultural traditions that make them home.

Bring a photograph to contribute to the archive

We're inviting guests to bring a photograph that connects them to a place they call home. This could be a family home, street, village, town, landscape, celebration. Your photographs will be professionally scanned on the day and returned to you, becoming part of a growing digital community archive that reflects the many journeys, memories, and connections that shape our communities. You'll also leave with a small gift of homemade bread and olive oil, honouring the South Lebanese tradition of never letting a guest leave empty-handed.

When: Wednesday 13th October, 6:00 – 8:00pm
Location: Level 3, Western Terrace
Registration: Spaces are limited with some seats and standing room. Registration is essential. As this is an outdoor venue, please dress accordingly. For access requirements please contact PHIVEtickets@cityofparramatta.nsw.gov.au 

Photo by Zeinab Mahfoud

The Western Terrace is a series of creative gatherings, performances and workshops taking place underneath the golden hour, as the sun sets, facing West, thinking West. Imagining the Western Terrace as an extension of their own homes, gardens and balconies, the series features artists, authors, filmmakers, musicians and community sharing domestic ritual collectively.