Arts

Life of Brine (brine – water containing salts), is a surfer’s journey across our great land and venturing across many continents. In this memoir Phil Jarrett, a world class chronicler of surfing culture, brings us a multitude of stories that placed him in some of the most exciting moments in surfing history. For Jarrett, growing…

Contemporary relationships are in a state of rapid flux, with many of us confessing to feeling a little disenchanted with the monogamy-based dogma we’ve been fed by society, religion and the media. Award-winning actress and clown, Helen Cassidy, uses her critically acclaimed comedy show Erotic Intelligence for Dummies to take a long, hard, cross-eyed look…

Celebrating the seventieth anniversary of one of the world’s most prestigious couture houses, the National Gallery of Victoria has just opened their latest exhibition, The House of Dior: Seventy Years of Haute Couture. Exclusive to Melbourne, House of Dior includes extravagant display of more than 140 garments designed by Christian Dior Couture between 1947 and 2017….

After the international success of its first feature film Girl Asleep, Windmill Theatre Co., the award-winning South Australian theatre company, has announced today the launch of Windmill Pictures, a new arm of the company dedicated to developing and creating screen projects from their range of live theatre projects. The company has also announced it has successfully…

In 2016, My Fair Lady celebrated its Diamond Jubilee with a series of stunning shows around Australia, including a run at the Sydney Opera House. An encore season at the Capitol Theatre with most of the same principal cast and crew returns in 2017 and it still dazzles like a rare diamond. It is a reminder…

In the realm of Ellest a toxic and dangerous mist swarms across the land. Here, magic is forbidden, and those who practice it are disappearing. Drinking to dampen her emerging and unwanted powers, and to forget a turbulent past, nineteen year old Bleak plans to remain firmly out of the firing line. But when the…

Modern Jesus is an intriguing new play that reminds us that you only need a tiny spark to start a raging inferno. It is thought-provoking look at what it means to be 20-something in Australia today, although the themes would resonate with audiences anywhere in the West. But a couple of things hold it back…

Defeating Terror is a behind the scenes look at the hunt for the Bali bombers. Although, given the nature of the book, many of the names and situations, have been altered for legal reasons. The author, David Craig, was a senior officer in the Australian Federal Police (AFP), he has trained with international forces including the…

Dementia is a truly terrifying condition, one that attacks the very sense of self. It affects not only the sufferer but also those closest to them in the most distressing of ways. In Sydney Theatre Company’s production of The Father this distress is both portrayed and felt keenly, even when the play itself deliberately makes…

Make Nice have announced its full program for the Sydney based annual real-life conference for, by and about creative women. The Un-conference for Creative Women will run over three days from Friday 22nd to Sunday 24th of September. The full program line up features a range of inspirational women including Stanislava Pinchuk (Miso), Ann Friedman, Anna…

Celebrating 65 years of Parisian Glamour and inspired by the endless theme of femininity and sophistication, Australian audiences are currently experiencing the tantalising Parisian cultural phenomenon of Crazy Horse Paris for the first time ever as Forever Crazy is high kicking its way through Melbourne, Perth, Sydney and Canberra. Featuring the best of acts from…

After dazzling audiences and critics alike at its recent world premiere, produced by the renowned Glyndebourne Festival Opera, in the UK, Neil Armfield‘s production of Australian composer Brett Dean‘s masterpiece Hamlet, conducted by Nicholas Carter, is set to make its Australian debut in March, with an exclusive season at the 2018 Adelaide Festival. Hailed as…

Start booking your tickets to Brisbane theatre folk, it’s going to be a stellar year for treading the boards in the Northern state! Launching the Queensland Theatre’s 2018 program earlier this week, Sam Strong presented an exciting, bright, fresh season that celebrates diversity and Australian stories. Contained in their programme for the new year are four world premieres,…

Fiona Horne is a witch but she could also be considered an “onion.” In her memoir, The Naked Witch she strips away the layers and gives readers a raw and honest account of her life. This enables readers to delve deeper and deeper into different layers and just when you think you have her all…

America in the mid-1980s. In the midst of the AIDS crisis and a conservative Reagan administration, New Yorkers grapple with life and death, love and sex, heaven and hell. This new staging of Tony Kushner’s multi-award winning two-part play, Angels In America is directed by Olivier and Tony award winning director Marianne Elliott, and stars…

The winners of the 2017 Art Music Awards were revealed overnight in Sydney, with 11 awards being doled out across a range of national and state categories. Celebrating the works of Australian composers, educators and performers, the Art Music Awards took place at the City Recital Hall for its seventh year. Liza Lim emerged as a double-winner,…

A decade since her last stage musical, Tina Arena will take on the role of Eva Peron in Evita at the Sydney Opera House in September next year. The much loved Australian star will join legendary Director Hal Prince, winner of 21 Tony Awards, in re-creating the original West End and Broadway production created by Tim Rice…

Since 1993, Yamato have performed in 53 countries around the world, reaching over 6 million people, making them the most prolific Japanese performing art group to tour internationally. Yamato are the epitome of the Japanese spirit and bring new life to the traditional Japanese taiko and wadaiko drums by paying respect to its rich history…

Six years ago, the world lost a musical soul that will forever leave an imprint on your heart. Amy Winehouse was a young singer-songwriter at the peak of her career when it all came tumbling down. Tragically, we lost her but her music truly does live on. Amy Winehouse: A Family Portrait is a personal…

From little things big things grow. Paul Kelly could have sung this about Australia’s very own, Dame Nellie Melba. This famous soprano grew up with rather modest beginnings before she forged her own fabulous career. She eventually took the world by storm and become a renowned opera diva. The Hayes Theatre are playing host to…

Jonathan Harker has been sent to deepest, darkest Transylvania, to do business with the mysterious Count Dracula, who wishes to move to England. But the Count has goals far more sinister than merely purchasing property in Victorian London. Trapping Jonathan in his castle, he reveals himself to be a vampire, plotting to make England his…

As a well armed far-right movement in America raises its ugly head in Charlottesville, leaving one oppositional protester murdered, Pauline Hanson turns up to Parliament in a Burqa. As her terribly offensive action is passionately berated by George Brandis, of all people, fourteen people are murdered in Barcelona, mowed down by a car in one…

The Sydney Dance Company are currently touring Australia with double performance of two individual but complementary pieces; Wildebeest with choreography by Gabrielle Nankivell and Frame of Mind by Rafael Bonachela. I caught the production last week as it arrived in Adelaide. In the opening scene of Wildebeest,  a lone figure slowly unravels and expands in a…

Originally an Australian theatre review site, StageMilk has now become one of the world’s largest acting websites. Its founders, WAAPA graduates Andrew Hearle and Luke McMahon have now added an online drama school to the site’s offering- one that is now attracting the attention of actors from all over the world. We caught up with…

Open House Melbourne is always a captivating event full of history, mystery and intrigue, and I was delighted to participate in this years exploration. On one weekend of the year an array of buildings around Melbourne open their doors to the public, who don their explorer hats and gain access to spaces that would usually…

If ever there was a play to see in your lifetime it has to be Edward Albee‘s Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?. The Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright creates work that errs on the edge of voyeurism and what reality actually is. Funnily, when people asked Albee what this famous classic was about, he often said it was about…

Melbourne Fringe Festival is back for its whopping 35th year allowing our creative culture to flourish within the margins of diversity. Fringe is not a weird place as some may think; it is a play and space that is accessible to everyone, providing opportunities to thousands of artists each year. The aim is to nurture artistic…

The Underbelly Arts Lab and Festival is returning for its 10th year, taking place at the National Art School in Darlinghurst from 7-8 October. A two week Lab period will host 116 artists from around Australia and showcase twenty one ambitious new projects from 25 September until 6 October. Ticket holders will be able to…

Trigger Warning: this post describes sexual violence. Siren is a work of fiction. But it’s also a story that feels disturbingly real. This book is by a Melbourne writer and academic named Rachel Matthew. It’s a searing look at a crime involving an underage schoolgirl and the reverberations this act has on the victim and…

It’s Bris-been another great year of arts, music and experiences in Brisbane but nothing compares to the Brisbane Festival. Sadly, there won’t be another public holiday for it (thanks anyway, Ekka Show) but it will give you 21 days of interactive features, theatrical performances, high-flying acrobatics and international music acts. But how do you choose…