MEDIA RELEASE

Visual Art – AUS, BEL, DEN, FRA, GER, HUN, JPN, NED, NOR, NZ, UK, USA Exclusive Australian Premiere

Festival laser-focused on Blinc with five days to go

Over 250,000 people are expected to flood the riverbank precinct over 17 nights starting this Friday (27 Feb) for Adelaide Festival’s giant outdoor digital art gallery Blinc.

Blinc is the signature FREE event of the 2015 Adelaide Festival of Arts which also features 42 of the best international art events from around the globe. The festival is on track to generate a similar result to the 2014 event’s $64.3 million in total estimated gross expenditure and economic impact to the state of $25.3 million.

Opening Night celebrations begin with drinks available at Blinc Bar from 4pm, then a massive Fork on the Road food truck muster featuring 26 vendors from 5pm. The illumination of Blinc at 9pm is followed by a fireworks spectacular.

Blinc is city’s largest FREE event across the entire festival season. Festival goers have the chance to win weekly prizes by tagging their Blinc pictures on social media with the hashtags #AdlFest and #BendigoBlinc.

Blinc involves a dozen outdoor locations featuring large-scale projections, building-mapped projects, 3D motion graphics, LED installations, intimate and interactive experiences and a unique 30 watt laser work.

Both 891 ABC Adelaide’s Drive show with Michael Smyth and Evenings with Peter Goers capture the excitement in Elder Park from 4pm – 10pm as 891 broadcasts live with a special selection of Adelaide Festival guests.

Adelaide Festival of Arts in numbers: • 889 artists and writers from over 20 countries will take part in the festival. • Over Adelaide Festival’s 17 days and nights there will be 150 performances of 42 events. • 22 of the events are Australian premieres and 26 are exclusive to Adelaide. Seven of the events were specially commissioned directly by Adelaide Festival and four were co- commissioned. • 85 international and Australian writers will be in conversation over six days at Adelaide Writers’ Week, Australia’s largest FREE literary festival . • In 2014 , total gross expenditure in South Australia associated with the event (attendances, entertainment, accommodation etc. – including operational spend) was estimated at $64.3 million , 120,000 visitor nights were generated and total economic impact exceeded $25 million . • What starts where and when?

Adelaide Writers’ Week and the first ten festival shows begin their runs over the next seven days , starting today with local powerhouse State Theatre Company’s Beckett Triptych opening tonight (Fri 20 Feb) in their Scenic Workshop and Rehearsal Rooms.

Beginning Thurs 26 Feb In the Dustan Playhouse Irish actress Olwen Fouéré transforms prose from James Joyce’s Finnegans Wake into an undulating soundscape, inhabiting the voice of Dublin’s iconic river in the exclusive premiere of riverrun (IRE).

Her Majesty’s Theatre hosts Eric Mingus, Robert Forster, Gavin Friday, Camille O'Sullivan, Harper Simon, Elana Stone and Yael Stone starring in the exclusive world premiere of Tommy (USA) , a radical reimagining of The Who’s legendary double-album.

Beginning Friday 27 Feb The Festival Theatre will be home to gravity defying acrobats who levitate, build spectacular human pyramids and even walk upside down in the exclusive, eccentric and elegant Azimut (FRA).

A collection of seven original works, the broadest selection ever curated in Australia, from world renowned video and sound installation artist Bill Viola (USA) will be presented in three venues, the Art Gallery of South Australia, Queen’s Theatre and St Peter’s Cathedral Lady Chapel.

ABC Collinswood’s Studio 520 will be the base for one of the world’s most important living composers Gavin Bryars (UK) as he joins Aventa Ensemble (CAN) playing double bass in the Australian premiere of his latest chamber opera Marilyn Forever (UK/CAN). Finally, for the late night revellers, Thebarton Theatre will host Mogwai (SCO) and the Festival Centre Piano Bar will transform into a late-night hot spot featuring local DJ aficionados Soundpond.net a nd special guest artists including masters of mash-up and vinyl-spinning icons.

Beginning on Saturday 28 Feb Norwood’s Odeon Theatre will be home to a specially commissioned new version of Jack and the Beanstalk that will take children on a wild adventure into a world of magic beans, ogres and golden eggs.

The beautiful Pioneer Women’s Memorial Garden will host 85 international and local writers over six days of conversations for Adelaide Writers’ Week (Sat 28 Feb to Thurs 5 Mar).

For Editors: FREE Opening Night celebrations with Blinc and Fork on the Road Fri 27 Feb 4pm Blinc Bar opens 5pm Fork on the Road opens 8pm Power up projection with holding slide only 9pm Blinc switch on & fireworks *Note: the listed times are for Opening Night only, Blinc and Blinc Bar open later during the rest of the festival.

Fork on the Road vendors: All Fired-Up Pizza Honey Puff Ladies Peace of Cake Bodri's Taste of Hungary Juice Quest Phat Buddha Rolls Burger Theory La Cantina Co. Sneaky Pickle Cheesy Street La Chiva Skwish Chimichurri Grill LocaPops Squid Inc. Conscious Lifestyles Los Pinchos TacoCat Delectaballs Low & Slow BBQ Taste of Spain Delicious Monster Mamachau The Little Cake Tin Four Seeds Papa’s Hotdogs

Event Details: Blinc Elder Park, Festival Centre, Torrens Riverbank and Pinky Flat Fri 27 Feb – Sun 15 Mar FREE Blinc Show Times 8pm Power up projection with holding slide only Sun – Thu: 8.30pm – Midnight Fri – Sat: 8.30pm – 1am

Blinc Bar Opening Hours Mon – Thu 7pm til late Fri – Sun 6pm til late (plus public holiday Mon 9 Mar)

Location Breakdown: *Denotes Adelaide Festival commissions

Northern façade of 2 King William Street *Digital Landscapes , 2015, 4 mins, digital render, sound. Sound design by Jay Hats (Joris Tillmans) Kirsten Swensen (NED) Digital Landscapes combines images with sophisticated algorithms to produce beautiful and unique moving images that captivate the audience.

*Taxonomy, 2015, 5 mins, animation. Music composed by Richard Lewis Sean Vicary (UK) Taxonomy is a fictive exploration of the life and works of Victorian naturalist Edmund Selous. Intricate animation techniques transport viewers to the inside of a museum display case as a narrative unfolds, questioning our relationship with nature and history.

The King , 2011, 3 mins, digital 2D animation. Sound by Solveig Sandnes Cecilia Westerberg (DEN) The King depicts a ghost-like king in an unsuccessful attempt to get into a building by climbing up the wall.

Space Monkey , 2015, video, sound Dawn of Man (USA) Space Monkey is an immersive digital experience that incites impromptu dance parties wherever he goes, from New York, Detroit, Los Angeles and Toronto to Adelaide.

Northern façade of Parliament House *A-Synchron , 2015, 7 mins, 3D animation, sound. Music composed by Autodigest Laszlo Zsolt Bordos (HUN) A-Synchron is a ground-breaking piece of 3D mapping projected on the Festival Theatre roof and Parliament House façade, creating a dialogue between these architectural landmarks, turning the spaces into astounding animated tableaux.

*Alive Violet Frequency , 2015, 9 mins, live action photography, sound Perry Hall and Elliott Sharp (USA) In Alive Violet Frequency , improvised imagery of sound waves through liquid paint creates incredible visuals enhanced by music that follows the turbulence.

*Light , 2015, 5:20 mins, digital animation, sound. Music by Bradford Catler Hartung and Trenz (GER) In Light Hartung & Trenz take an individual word as a visual image and abstract it into typographic patterns and forms, creating an immersive work that explores the significance of a single word. *Retina , 2014-15, 5 mins, with Jon Bat (UK), high definition video, 3D animation, sound. Composers Peter Morris and Mieko Shimizu Craig Morrison (UK) Retina transforms the façade of Parliament House into a wall of blinking eyes. Inspired by William Blake’s poem Auguries of Innocence, the work takes imagery from the Earth and the Universe to reflect on the limitless possibilities of the human imagination.

Think Tank, 2012/15, 5 mins, digital audio-visual sculpture. Casa Magica (GER) Think Tank makes Parliament House appear in dynamic visual structures pointing to the human brain and skull.

Festival Theatre roof (Visible on all sides of the Festival Theatre roof) *34º55’11”S 138º35’53”E , 2015, 5:20 mins, digital animation, sound Ryoichi Kurokawa (JPN) 34º55’11”S 138º35’53”E opens the gateway to an imaginary world where complexity and simplicity alternate and combine in a strange symbiosis.

*A-Synchron , 2015, 7 mins, 3D animation, sound. Music composed by Autodigest Laszlo Zsolt Bordos (HUN) A-Synchron is a ground-breaking piece of 3D mapping projected on the Festival Theatre roof and Parliament House façade, creating a dialogue between these architectural landmarks, turning the spaces into astounding animated tableaux.

*Dots for Adelaide , 2015, 7:08 mins, digital animation, sound. Music by Zinki Hartung and Trenz (GER) A new work commissioned by the Adelaide Festival, Dots for Adelaide is a visual symphony of dots and text inspired by influential artist Norman McLaren.

*Small World , 2014-15, 3 mins, digital animation of scanning electron microscope images. Sound design Ant Dickinson Jessica Lloyd-Jones (UK) Small World uses scanning electron microscope images of pollen, insect and mineral materials found in and around Adelaide to construct a visual interpretation of the region on a microscopic scale. Using images provided by the University of Adelaide microscopy department, the work transports the viewer through the very fabric of our world.

*Sharp Edged Sound Spheres, 2015, 5 mins, digital audio-visual sculpture Casa Magica (GER) Sharp Edged Sound Spheres recalls the Adelaide Festival Centre architect John Morphett’s characterising of the building’s roof design as ‘sharp edged clouds’ and explores its motif connotations and synesthetic potential.

*Swarm, 2014 , 4 mins, mapped high resolution video, sound Wendy Dawson (UK) Swarm is a captivating new work that completely covers the Festival Theatre roof in a digital swarm of honey bees, highlighting the behaviours, social structures and peril that the species faces today.

Inside and around Elder Park’s Blinc Bar Animate Retrospective , 86:26 mins, 17 titles Move on Up , 75:57 mins, 16 titles Animate Projects’ Random Acts , 42:14 mins, 15 titles Animate Projects (Various Artists) (UK) Animate Retrospective is 17 films that provide a snapshot of the 102 eclectic works that make up the AnimateTV Collection commissioned by Arts Council England and Channel 4. Move on Up is a program of dynamic, exciting, provocative and beautiful films made by animation artists in the UK over last 20 years. The films use a wide range of animation techniques and styles to explore ideas of place in different ways. Animate Projects’ Random Acts encompasses apocalyptic visions and monstrous tales in animated form. These 15 films collectively illustrate the spectacular craft that artists from across the globe are using today to share their enthralling stories, with techniques including rotoscoping, video, mapping, and printing on to film.

Murmur , 2013 interactive installation. Music by Splank. Production by Chelvavert. Murmur (FRA) Murmur , turning sound into light waves. As visitors talk into a specially built cone, their voice appears before them as splashes of light or radiating geometric forms. Made possible by a credit- card sized computer named the Raspberry Pi, this work manifests an unconventional and magical dialogue between the audience and the wall. primordial sound , 2014, 4:04 mins, 3 channel video projection, sound Madison Bycroft (South Australia) Each video in primordial sound produces its own sound and rhythms. Through drone, repetition, and a non-metered beat of chance, each of the three musicians contributes to an unending chorus.

Glitter Vomit , 2010, 5:36 mins, HD digital video She Blows Blizzards , 2013, 3:03 mins, HD digital video She Splutters Darkness , 2013, 9:38 mins, HD digital video Ray Harris (South Australia) Glitter Vomit, She Blows Blizzards and She Splutters Darkness , explore the body as a container filled with the mental and emotional stuffs that seep and project from it, exploding out behind our conscious will.

Unveiling the Veil , 2010, 6 mins, video Nasim Nasr (IRN/South Australia) Unveiling the Veil touches on the complexities within contemporary notions of shifting identities and cultural difference, as experienced between the artist’s past and present homelands.

*Taxonomy , 2015, 5 mins, animation. Music composed by Richard Lewis Sean Vicary (UK) Taxonomy is a fictive exploration of the life and works of Victorian naturalist Edmund Selous. Intricate animation techniques transport viewers to the inside of a museum display case as a narrative unfolds, questioning our relationship with nature and history.

Elder Park Rotunda Submergence, 2013-14. LED light installation. Music by Squidsoup and Ollie Bown Squidsoup (UK/NZ) Submergence is made from 8,064 individual points of suspended light that shift their luminosity to create a personal experience that is unique to each viewer.

Elder Park North Elephantastic! , 2011, digital render. 3D graphics by Jimundi Topla Design (FRA) Elephantastic! places an oversized elephant in the middle of a city, creating the element of surprise and throwing into question our relationship with nature. Flapping its huge ears and shuffling its enormous feet, the elephant appears out of a cloud of dust, a curious apparition to whisk you away on a jungle adventure.

Beneath King William Street bridge *Junction, 2015 , LED light-motion installation H C Gilje (NOR) Junction is a site-specific iconic piece that creates a hypnotic experience for the audience. Using thousands of minute LEDs, the work transforms an often ignored part of the cityscape through the play of light and shadow.

Torrens Footbridge Waterfall (best viewing from river south bank) *River Creatures, 2015, 4 mins, digital 2D animation Cecilia Westerberg (DEN) River Creatures is inspired by medieval imagery of Hellmouth and features the head of a strange creature projected on water, it’s mouth serving as a portal to another dimension.

Above the River Torrens (best viewing from Torrens riverbanks or Footbridge) *Requiem , 2015, laser Craig Morrison (UK) Using a powerful laser as a beacon, Requiem is a quiet and contemplative work created for the centenary of World War I and Gallipoli.

Pinky Flat The Influence Machine , 2000, site specific video and sound installation Tony Oursler (USA) The Influence Machine immerses audiences in a multimedia séance, with talking, ghostly characters appearing in clouds of smoke and the trees of Pinky Flat against a haunting soundtrack, delving into the history of telecommunication as a means of speaking with the dead.

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