Formerly known as Auckland Festival, Auckland Arts Festival or is an annual arts and cultural festival held in

Auckland Auckland (pronounced ) ( mi, Tāmaki Makaurau) is a large metropolitan city in the North Island of New Zealand. The List of New Zealand urban areas by population, most populous urban area in the country and the List of cities in Oceania by po ...

New Zealand New Zealand ( mi, Aotearoa ) is an island country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. It consists of two main landmasses—the North Island () and the South Island ()—and over 700 smaller islands. It is the sixth-largest island count ...

. The Festival features works from New Zealand, the

Pacific The Pacific Ocean is the largest and deepest of Earth's five oceanic divisions. It extends from the Arctic Ocean in the north to the Southern Ocean (or, depending on definition, to Antarctica) in the south, and is bounded by the continen ...

Asia Asia (, ) is one of the world's most notable geographical regions, which is either considered a continent in its own right or a subcontinent of Eurasia, which shares the continental landmass of Afro-Eurasia with Africa. Asia covers an area ...

and beyond, including world premieres of new works and international performing arts events.

History

The first Auckland Festival of the Arts was held in 1953, after four annual music festivals were held from 1949 to 1952. A bigger festival was planned due to the coronation of

Queen Elizabeth II Elizabeth II (Elizabeth Alexandra Mary; 21 April 1926 – 8 September 2022) was Queen of the United Kingdom and other Commonwealth realms from 6 February 1952 until Death and state funeral of Elizabeth II, her death in 2022. She was queen ...

. The festival continued annually until the 1980s and the last one was held in 1982. In September 2003 the inaugural event of the "new" Auckland Festival took place. Subsequently, the dates were moved to March and festivals were held in 2005, 2007, 2009, 2011, 2013, and 2015 before becoming annual in March 2016. In 2020 most of the festival's shows had to be cancelled as a result of the

COVID-19 pandemic The COVID-19 pandemic, also known as the coronavirus pandemic, is an ongoing global pandemic of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). The novel virus was first identif ...

. However, four concerts by the

Auckland Philharmonia Orchestra The Auckland Philharmonia Orchestra (APO) is a symphony orchestra based in Auckland, New Zealand. Its principal concert venue is the Auckland Town Hall. The APO is the accompanying ensemble for performances by New Zealand Opera, NZ Opera and th ...

were streamed live online. The 13th Auckland Arts Festival took place from 3 to 21 March 2021, although some events had to be cancelled as a result of Auckland entering into a lockdown in late February.

Shona McCullagh Shona Margaret McCullagh is a New Zealand choreographer, dancer, filmmaker and artistic director. McCullagh was the founding director of the New Zealand Dance Company and was appointed artistic director of the Auckland Festival in 2019. Biog ...

became the artistic director from 2021 onwards, taking over from Jonathan Bielski. The Festival is run by an independent not-for-profit trust, the Auckland Festival Trust. It is principally funded by

Auckland City Council Auckland City Council was the local government authority for Auckland City, New Zealand, from 1871 to 1 November 2010, when it and Auckland's six other city and district councils were amalgamated to form the Auckland Council. It was an elected b ...

Programme

The festival's main objectives are to engage Aucklanders in the arts, to support New Zealand art and artists, and to reflect what is unique about Auckland. Its program features many events including

dance Dance is a performing art form consisting of sequences of movement, either improvised or purposefully selected. This movement has aesthetic and often symbolic value. Dance can be categorized and described by its choreography, by its repertoir ...

music Music is generally defined as the art of arranging sound to create some combination of form, harmony, melody, rhythm or otherwise expressive content. Exact definitions of music vary considerably around the world, though it is an aspect ...

cabaret Cabaret is a form of theatrical entertainment featuring music, song, dance, recitation, or drama. The performance venue might be a pub, a casino, a hotel, a restaurant, or a nightclub with a stage for performances. The audience, often dining or d ...

burlesque A burlesque is a literary, dramatic or musical work intended to cause laughter by caricaturing the manner or spirit of serious works, or by ludicrous treatment of their subjects.

theatre Theatre or theater is a collaborative form of performing art that uses live performers, usually actors or actresses, to present the experience of a real or imagined event before a live audience in a specific place, often a stage. The perform ...

ballet Ballet () is a type of performance dance that originated during the Italian Renaissance in the fifteenth century and later developed into a concert dance form in France and Russia. It has since become a widespread and highly technical form of ...

visual arts The visual arts are art forms such as painting, drawing, printmaking, sculpture, ceramics, photography, video, filmmaking, design, crafts and architecture. Many artistic disciplines such as performing arts, conceptual art, and textile arts al ...

film A film also called a movie, motion picture, moving picture, picture, photoplay or (slang) flick is a work of visual art that simulates experiences and otherwise communicates ideas, stories, perceptions, feelings, beauty, or atmosphere ...

, and public forums, occupying most of Auckland's theatres, galleries and concert halls. The festival programme features international acts and the Auckland Festival Trust also commission up to six new works each year. In 2017 they presented the new opera ''The Bone Feeder'' at the ASB Waterfront Theatre with music by

Gareth Farr Gareth Vincent Farr (born 29 February 1968) is a New Zealand composer and percussionist. He has released a number of classical CDs and composed a number of works performed by the New Zealand Symphony Orchestra (NZSO) and Royal New Zealand Ball ...

, based on a book by Renee Laing. In 2021 the festival programme was greatly affected by travel restrictions because of COVID-19. The programme of 70-plus events were therefore all from New Zealand.

Festival Directors

Festival staff include chief executive David Inns who started in 2009 working previously at the New Zealand Festival in Wellington. Inns was also was instrumental in the annual music festival

WOMAD WOMAD ( ; World of Music, Arts and Dance) is an international arts festival. The central aim of WOMAD is to celebrate the world's many forms of music, arts and dance. History WOMAD was founded in 1980 by English rock musician Peter Gabriel, ...

being in

Taranaki Taranaki is a region in the west of New Zealand's North Island. It is named after its main geographical feature, the stratovolcano of Mount Taranaki, also known as Mount Egmont. The main centre is the city of New Plymouth. The New Plymouth Dist ...

, and was the director of the Taranaki Arts Festival from 1998 to 2002.

References

External links

Auckland Arts Festival
– official website
YouTube
- 2020 Auckland Arts Festival Highlights
YouTube
- 2013 Auckland Arts Festival Highlights {{authority control Festivals in Auckland Arts festivals in New Zealand