Dialogue with the Deceased Father: Patriographical creative practice as a means of connection and self-exploration

As part of my recent PhD, I made a documentary film about the life and work of my father, the musician Roger Frampton, who was a key contributor to the development of Australian jazz. Motivated by the unresolved grief I held over his early death, the creative practice adopted for the film’s making proved to be transformative to this grief, as well as bring about a greater understanding of myself. By embracing the project as one of family history, I was able to connect with my father, make sense of his place in the world and ultimately forgive his shortcomings as a father. Paradoxically, it was through this process of connection with him that allowed me to achieve separation from him. This paper explores the field of patriography (‘story of the father’) in the context of creating the cinematic story of my own father. I offer the term ‘aural-visual patriography’ to categorise my film, and contemplate the works of other daughters who have told their fathers’ stories. I identify the complexity of the patriographical journey that derives from the father-daughter relationship, and ponder an appraisal of my film as a work of hagiography.