Poet, writer and performer Koraly Dimitriadis is one artist taking a fresh approach towards funding her creative pursuits.

Rather than waiting for opportunities to find her, she’s decided to take matters into her own hands and draw from her audience to fund her upcoming theatre production by hosting a test screening of Koraly: A Mockumentary ‘I wonder if they’ll make a TV show’.

Set to screen this Sunday 5 June in Melbourne’s CBD, all proceeds will go towards making her one-woman show, Koraly: I say the wrong things all the time, a reality.

With the show being produced with the assistance of Cypriot actress and director Olga Aristodemou, logistically Koraly knew she would have to be innovative to make it all happen Down Under.

“I wanted to use my art to fund my art. So the mockumentary is a project that I’ve been working on and I thought I could test screen it to raise the funds,” she tells Neos Kosmos.

A black comedy, the mockumentary is an attempt to capture the person, and identity, behind the poems.

“It follows my journey through family life, men, dating, and also tries to capture the comedic journey of making a TV show while struggling with the perils of life,” and features artists the likes of award-winning novelist Maxine Beneba Clarke and acclaimed cabaret performer and comedian Amy Bodossian. It also includes snippets of behind-the-scenes footage from one of her short films shot with Koraly’s mentor of seven years, writer Christos Tsiolkas.

Along with what is expected to be a 60-minute screening, the night will also unfold with performances by actors who make an appearance in the mockumentary, and there will be a chance to mingle, with Koraly encouraging audience feedback.

The upcoming play, at which the funds are being directed, is set to screen at La Mama Theatre in November and will continue on the artists’ thematic exploration of the struggle women face in claiming their own identity in the face of societal and cultural pressure.

“The theatre show goes hand-in-hand with my screen projects. I want to empower women to claim their identity, particularly women who have suffered repression as I have,” she says of her experiences in the arts.

And through her fundraising efforts, the author of bestseller Love and Fuck Poems is proving to be a woman of action, who heeds her own advice.

“I’ve stopped waiting for opportunities and funding that will never come. If I was still waiting for a publisher for my poetry book it would still be unpublished. Now rights have been sold to the UK and Greece because I self-published. We need to make our own opportunities.”

As part of a special promotion for readers of Neos Kosmos Koraly Dimitriadis is giving away tickets to the first five people that message her on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/KoralyDimitriadis/?fref=ts. For more information and to purchase tickets, visit https://www.eventbrite.com.au/e/screening-koralya-mockumentary-i-wonder-…