- Bana Hankin
Bana Hankin was born in Mackay, Central Queensland. Bana is the youngest of six children and the only one born on the mainland of Australia. His parents come from St Paul and Yam Islands in the Torres Strait.
Bana spent his childhood growing up in the small township of Sarina just south of Mackay, where he was taught Torres Strait customs and traditional dancing by his parents and relatives.
Throughout his childhood and as a teenager, Bana and his family have been involved with "Sarina Culture Club", performing for schools, fairs, Mardi Gras events, major community festivals and traditional Torres Strait Island customary events.
In 2000 Bana moved to Sydney and joined the Descendance Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Dance Company. He quickly became adept in all three dancing styles the company was producing: traditional Aboriginal, Torres Strait Islander and contemporary dancing.
Bana was honored at the 2002 Gay Games opening ceremony, adorned in a massive Torres Strait Islander headdress and costume, heading the parade and being the spokesperson for his culture. The highlight for Bana was performing with Descendance in the opening ceremony of the Rugby Union World Cup in 2003 to an estimated television audience of over one billion people.
Since joining Descendance Bana has performed on most of the worlds great cruise liners, danced in the countries leading international conventions and corporate events, played in remote country towns and schools, and arrived onstage in a canoe down Lake Belvedere at Olympic Park, Homebush, for the Aboriginal extravaganza "Sydney Dreaming", Bana performed for Sydney Dreaming in 2002 and 2003, he walked out to a crowd of seventy thousand at Sydney Stadium to dance before a Sydney Swans game, danced in fusions with Spanish performers, and had a leading role as a contemporary dancer in the multi-cultural spectacular titled Descendance.
In 2004 he performed a leading role for Descendance at the Sydney Indigenous Arts Festival at the Riverside Theatre, performing in all three shows Mainland, Contemporary and Torres Strait Islander dance.
