Next Wave Festival

By Kathryn Lewis

A new era of Australian art is being celebrated this month at the 34th annual Next Wave Festival, the culmination of 31 arts productions premiering in venues across Southbank.

This year, ritual is the chosen theme – paying respect to Australia’s Aboriginal heritage and elders.

Aboriginal culture will ripple through events on the busy program as well as a free event held at a different location every day.

A different performer will lead the performance each day, aiming to engage the community to take time out from their hectic lives to connect and reflect.

“At a moment that feels more divided than ever, this festival captures the unsettled mood of our times. It is full of energetic conversations and interrogations that play out in both earnest and light-hearted ways, with important moments of release from that intensity, with our keynote project Ritual, and a lot of parties,” festival program director and CEO Georgie Meagher said.

This year, for the first time, 15 projects in the festival got a head-start through Kickstart Helix, Next Wave’s flagship development program, providing budding artists of any kind with the space, time and money to create and present their work.

Performances and workshops will be held at Testing Grounds, the Arts Centre and Southbank Library as part of the festival.

Azja Kulpinska and Timmah Ball have recently launched a zine, Wild Tongue Vol. 2-How Should an Artist Be? They will be hosting a series of zine-making workshops throughout the month at Southbank Library.

The zine discusses the struggles and privileges of life as a creative practitioner. Those heading along should be ready for open discussion about racism, ableism, transphobia and a myriad of other taboo topics.

Over at Testing Grounds, artist Danielle Reynolds has put together canine choreography, or freestyle dog dancing, to bring together dog and owner in a performance combined with costume and music.

The performance celebrates the intimate connection that is shared between the two and delights in it with utter absurdity.

nextwave.org.au