The Heart Atlas

OVERVIEW:

*UPDATE* This Gofundme is now closed but we are continuing our fundraising on Documentary Australia https://documentaryaustralia.com.au/project/out-of-the-mud/

Synopsis:

‘Out of the Mud’, a locally produced feature-length documentary, examines the ongoing crises emerging in the aftermath of the catastrophic floods in the Northern Rivers in February and March of 2022. Thousands of people lost everything overnight, and communities were in great part left to their own devices to survive. Amidst the grief and trauma of what had unfolded, they also inherited a housing crisis that preceded them, an ill-designed, under-funded, under-resourced and red tape-ridden system of response and recovery, they emerged from this disaster to a world of new problems.

And seven months in, with a third La Nina on the horizon, there still remains great ambiguity around a plan for these people. Grant money isn't getting to people, buy-back + landswap schemes remain obtuse, and most barely have enough resources to survive, let alone rebuild, or rebuild better.

While the floodwater may have receded, the Northern Rivers has anything but recovered.

Act 1 of our documentary focuses on the "disaster after the disaster" as I call it, the deteriorating situation in the Northern Rivers, it shows the face of this disaster and the very real struggles that thousands continue to face after these floods.

Act 2 takes our documentary into the web of red tape, seeking answers and insight into the hold-up around solutions, grants, options, and a plan for the Northern Rivers.

Act 3 is focused on vision, and solutions, bringing community and experts together to re-imagine the future of the Northern Rivers together. While at the moment it feels like a gaping wound, the reality is the Northern Rivers could be a guiding light for the rest of Australia, how to adapt in a changing climate and work with nature rather than against it.

This documentary is aimed to raise awareness about the plight of the Northern Rivers and draw more support to the region.

We are approximately 1/3rd the way through filming and are currently fundraising to support the rest of our production.

DETAILS:

My name is Olivia Katz, and I am the founder of The Heart Atlas, a platform for impact-driven stories focused on humanitarian, environmental and social justice issues. Our stories are dedicated to truth, justice and the preservation and protection of nature and humanity.

The Heart Atlas was born of the blacksummer bushfires in 2019, in Australia. A vision emerged from the ashes of blackened forests and charred landscapes, streets where homes no longer stood and land that lay barren, deserted, lifeless. Perhaps in part, to mitigate my own grief around the immensity of what had been lost and what was happening to our planet, I endeavored to bear witness to the atrocities of this disaster and bring them to light, as honestly as I could.

Since that time, The Heart Atlas has been steadily growing, slowly but surely.

And on February 28th 2022 when the Northern Rivers floods unfolded, the worst floods on recorded history in the region, with harrowing scenes of people stranded on roofs surrounded by rushing water, heroic rescues in tinnies and kayaks, animals floating away, lives washed down the river, mud and muck and utter destruction -- I felt called to the frontlines.

At first, it was relief work, connecting people to resources, delivering supplies, coordinating, and doing welfare checks -- the first couple of weeks, I barely took any photos. But as the weeks wound on, and things only worsened on the ground, I realized that this was a story that was going to need to be told. Because despite the awe-inspiring efforts of community groups and civilians to rescue one another and then to help one another recover--the damage was too deep, the scope was too broad, the need had no bottom to it and the Northern Rivers sat like a gaping wound. People were suffering and day by day, things were only getting worse for many. The region needed a comprehensive, coordinated, well-funded, well-trained, recovery response and plan, the region desperately needed their government. And they still do. We still do

‘Out of the Mud’ examines the ongoing crises emerging in the aftermath of these floods; a housing crisis which preceded the floods –further compounded by the region’s now thousands of internally displaced peoples, a rapidly deteriorating mental health crisis, an entirely new population of residents financially destabilised, and dehumanised by a response bound in bureaucracy and red tape. The crisis this region now finds itself in is an entirely new crisis than that of the floods and while the floodwater has receded, the Northern Rivers has anything but recovered.

Many Northern Rivers communities remain in a state of emergency.

While graphic images of the floods showed clearly a region in crisis, this phase of the disaster looks quite different. Quiet streets and quiet suffering, shell-shocked, and reckoning with the immense grief and unknown, a confounding tangle of hoops to jump through in starting over, and some who have yet to even begin the process, all unfolding behind closed doors.

This film sheds light on what life looks like on the inside, for those who have lost so much in these floods, in some of the region’s most deeply affected areas– Coraki, Woodburn, Tucki Tucki, Bungawalbin and Lismore, and offers insight into the lives of those attempting to reconcile and rebuild on the other side of this disaster.

The scope of such devastation is too significant for any single region to manage and recover from on their own, and so, the documentary supports the very evident need for greater State and Federal Government support - informed by the wisdom of local community groups who have been at the frontline of the rescue and recovery from day one.

The team is approximately 1/3rd the way through filming and are currently fundraising to support the rest of their production. The next phase of filming will involve directed advocacy and a deeper investigation into the web of red tape this region’s recovery is tangled in, seeking answers and insight into the hold-up around solutions, grants, options, and a sustainable plan for the Northern Rivers.

How the funds will be used:

1.) These funds will provide remuneration to our team for their ongoing work on Out of The Mud; inclusive of the filming, production, edit, sound and distribution.

2.) If we raise funds in excess of our goal, those will be used to support future work of the Heart Atlas (we have big dreams!).

We sincerely hope that this documentary will serve to raise more awareness about the plight of the Northern Rivers and our communities and provide a tangible and actionable vision for the future.

So, Thank-YOU. ❤️

Olivia Katz

Founder of The Heart Atlas

Web: www.theheartatlas.com

Instagram: www.instagram.com/theheartatlas

Facebook: www.facebook.com/theheartatlasproject