The Cuba Street Carnival was a street
parade and creative celebration in
Cuba Street, Wellington
Cuba Street is a prominent city street in Wellington, New Zealand. Among the best known and most popular streets in the city, the Cuba precinct has been labelled Wellington's cultural centre, and is known for its high-per-capita arts scene the ...
,
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 ...
that was intermittently held from the 1980s and saw crowds of 10,000 - 20,000 people. It stopped in 2009 due to a lack of funding, and was revived in 2015 under the name
Cubadupa
CubaDupa is New Zealand's largest outdoor arts and music festival, celebrating the unique character of Cuba Street, Wellington. It attracts up to 100,000 people.
The festival is managed and produced by the non-profit Creative Capital Arts Tr ...
.
History
The Carnival was originated and was run many times in Upper Cuba Street by
Martin Wilson through the 1980s and in 1995. Another was held on 7 and 8 December 1991 including the Whirling Circus. and another in 1993.
Chris Morley-Hall re-launched the carnival in 1998. The
festival
A festival is an event ordinarily celebrated by a community and centering on some characteristic aspect or aspects of that community and its religion or cultures. It is often marked as a local or national holiday, mela, or eid. A festival ...
involves hundreds of artists, performers, street
buskers
Street performance or busking is the act of performing in public places for gratuities. In many countries, the rewards are generally in the form of money but other gratuities such as food, drink or gifts may be given. Street performance is pra ...
, a night street parade, and a street market. The Carnival was inspired by the
Notting Hill Carnival and other raucous street parades and
fairs. While it ran, it attracted crowds of approximately 10,000 to 20,000 people.
The event became
biennial
Biennial means (an event) lasting for two years or occurring every two years. The related term biennium is used in reference to a period of two years.
In particular, it can refer to:
* Biennial plant, a plant which blooms in its second year and th ...
in 2009, in order to avoid clashing with the
New Zealand International Arts Festival.
Among the acts to have played at the festival are
Fat Freddy's Drop
Fat Freddy's Drop is a New Zealand seven-piece band from Wellington, whose musical style has been characterised as any combination of dub, reggae, soul, jazz, rhythm and blues, and techno. Originally a jam band formed in the late 1990s by mus ...
,
Trinity Roots, and
The Black Seeds
The Black Seeds are a reggae inspired musical group from Wellington, New Zealand.Campbell-Livingston, Cecelia (2013)The Black Seeds, rooted in reggae, '' Jamaica Observer'', 27 November 2013. Retrieved 1 December 2013 Their rocksteady song "O ...
.
Notable parade performers have included samba bands Wellington Batucada and
AKSamba.
Revival
In 2011, the Creative Capital Arts Trust was established to run both Wellington's Fringe Festival and the Cuba Street Carnival. However, a date for the Cuba Street Carnival was not set. In 2012, the trust was approached by the Wellington City Council to formulate an event development plan to run the festival again.
In 2014, the Wellington City Council set aside $250,000 towards a new Cuba St festival in late March or early April 2015, which would cost about $500,000 in total.
The revival is called CubaDupa.
References
External links
* https://web.archive.org/web/20060615020517/http://www.cubacarnival.org.nz/
*
Footage from the 2004 Carnivalat Te Ara
Parades in New Zealand
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