Summary

Souvenir programme for the EOAN Group Seventh Opera Season, September 1967 at City Hall, Cape Town. Sylvia Boyes is listed in the chorus ladies on the back page. Sylvia joined the EOAN Group in 1966 and performed in a variety of operas. She met her future husband, Lindsay Motherwell, through the Eoan Group's production of 'South Pacific'.

Inside, Madam Butterfly, La Traviata, and L'Elisir D'Amore are listed as the operas of the season. There are messages from the Trust and the chairman, explanations of the operas, and photos of the director, producer, principals and other key workers. There are ads throughout the booklet, and on the back page is a list of the names of all the chorus members, dancers, and other credits.

Sylvia Boyes (a South African-born orphan) and Lindsay Motherwell (a Melbourne-born drummer) met in Cape Town, South Africa in 1967 through their theatre connections. They fell in love but due to apartheid laws were forced to leave South Africa to marry in London. They subsequently relocated permanently to Melbourne in 1970.

Physical Description

Souvenir programme, front cover is hot pink and has a white lino-cut style image of a conductor on it. Across the bottom is a banner which says "OPERA" in big pink letters, with details of the in English above the title and in Afrikaans below it.

Significance

Statement of Historical Significance:
This collection provides a significant opportunity to represent political and personal freedom as a motivation for migrating to Australia within the international context of both apartheid in South Africa and the end of the White Australia policy in Australia. The personal narrative is well documented and the objects provide a material way to follow the lives of both Lindsay and Sylvia, both separately and where they coincide in South Africa and onwards together to Melbourne. While this is ultimately a love story, it plays out through the collection against the backdrop of apartheid South Africa, sixties London and an increasingly multicultural Australia.

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