White Night highlights for Melbourne and Ballarat
- Written by Victorian Government
White Night Melbourne will return to the streets, laneways and gardens of the city centre from dusk till dawn on Saturday 18 February, 2017 and the inaugural White Night Ballarat will follow on Saturday 4 March, 2017 in the regional hub just an hour and a half from Melbourne.
The event is set to transform the cities we know and love under the ephemeral cloak of night. From sunset to sunrise local, national and international artists, musicians and performers will weave a spell over the cities in a celebration of culture and creativity. The event transforms the impossible into the possible through installation, lighting, exhibitions, street performances, film, music, dance and interactive events for 12 brief hours.
With Artistic Director and Executive Producer David Atkins at the helm, Melbourne’s fifth and Ballarat’s first White Night promise to be a night to remember.
White Night Melbourne highlights include:
A monstrous fire-erupting Pyrophone Juggernaut at the Melbourne Museum Plaza. The Pyrophone Juggernaut is the largest hand-operated, multi-octave, fire organ in the world and built entirely from reclaimed metal and industrial salvage. This massive metallic beast bellows an unearthly music of heart pounding rhythms, all powered by monstrous jets of erupting flame. Operated by multiple musicians and performance artists the Pyrophone Juggernaut promises an infernal spectacle like no other!
Flinders Street buildings will come alive from The Forum Theatre to Chapter House with Electric Canvas’ Fractured Fairytales projections, a selection of children’s favourite fairytales, inspired by the Shrek films and the original Rocky and Bullwinkle cartoons of the 60s and 70s.
The majestic domed La Trobe Reading Room at the State Library of Victoria will be transformed into an epic underwater 360 degree spectacular with Seadragon’s Lair. Sheree Marris, Brad May and Lisa Greenway have created a world-class animation with soundscapes and underwater cinematography to create a living canvas in Melbourne’s own marine metropolis.
For anyone who has ever wanted to cut a rug on Collins Street, the 12-hour dance marathon is back! Swing City presented by VicHealth will be set to the swinging sounds of big band music from the 30s, 40s and 50s, courtesy of big-band legend John Morrison and everyone is invited to join in!
Birrarung Marr will burst to life with Alex Sanson’s flower-like kinetic sculpture of vast proportions Spherophyte which unfurls before your eyes. As you gaze into the beauty of the giant Spherophyte the 48 moving arms come alive under lights, ‘breathing’ in an endless, effortless cycle, folding and unfolding as shapes intersect, combine and dissolve.
Fresh from their collaboration with Portuguese creative studio OCUBO at White Night Melbourne 2016, the Pitcha Makin Fellas return with a powerful collection of 24 portraits celebrating Indigenous faces of Ballarat at St Paul’s Cathedral. Black Face (Real Face) is a series of black-on-black portraits and with the use of three different gloss values of black paint means that as you move around the paintings, they change and therefore there is never one right spot from which to see them.
Floating high above the city in Hosier Lane, forward-thinking creative studio John Fish have created a majestic sky jellyfish, The Medusa. Elusive, beautiful and mysteriously alien, her tentacles will gracefully flow down from her dome-shaped bell head, from which coloured light pulsates and illuminates her body.
White Night Ballarat highlights include exclusive to Ballarat artwork such as:
Nights of Gold which explores the nightlife of Ballarat during its “roaring days” of the gold rush. The Electric Canvas presents an architectural projection across several prominent buildings along Lydiard Street, encompassing three distinct themes relating to mid-1800s nightlife in Ballarat.
Wadawurrung Walking with Waa invites you to take a walk through time from the Aboriginal Creation Story to the present day. Aunty Marlene and her daughter Deanne Gilson will project their paintings onto the walls of Ballarat, presenting their stories that include an Aboriginal perspective of the goldmining era. Accompanying the historical walking tour, Aunty’s son Barry Gilson will sing Wadawurrung songs in the language of his ancestors.
Crate Expectations is a playful robotic sculpture made from vintage packing crates, moving furniture and disembodies limbs, performing a choreography of warped sound and sequenced lighting to draw audiences from the dark night into its warm, dreamlike glow. Crate Expectations will roll through the streets, seeking out and responding to audiences throughout the night.
More Than 1 Nation is a unique collaboration that sees the stunning patterns and colours of the Pitcha Makin Fellas’ paintings, cut outs and stamps transposed by The Electric Canvas onto the former Bank of NSW building in Ballarat, constructing a visually beautiful tale of redemption, honour, triumph and renewal.
The 2017 media kit, footage and images are available here.
Media contact: Kerry O’Brien: kerry@kob.com.au, + 613 8590 3251 or + 61 418 256 503
