OTHER
FESTIVAL
HIGHLIGHTS
DESTROYED WORD
The 2012 Melbourne Festival got off
to a fiery start on the forecourt of the
Australian Centre for Contemporary
Art (ACCA), as Melburnians witnessed
the towering, typographic inferno of
subversive and political artist Santiago
Sierra. Destroyed Word – an epic visual
arts project, spanning two years and ten
countries, ended in a trail of destruction in
Melbourne.
Since 2010, Sierra’s project had traversed
the world, commissioning the construction
of giant letters from material of local
importance, and then publicly and
dramatically destroying them. Melbourne
Festival hosted the letter K, the tenth and
final letter in the Destroyed Word project,
revealing the unifying theme of Sierra’s
globetrotting work.
On a chilly evening and under the watchful
eye of the Metropolitan Fire Brigade,
2,500 Melburnians gathered around the
ACCA forecourt transfixed by the ten
metre artwork constructed of straw and
casting an ominous shadow across the
landscape as daylight turned to dusk. The
crowd included visual art aficionados,
Melbourne’s young creative community and
also parents with young children whose
delight and wonder were evident as the
performance unfolded. Everyone present
was curious to witness the burning of
this pyre and the semantic secret reveal
of Sierra’s work. With flames reaching
20 metres into the night sky, those brave
enough to patiently wait for the right
conditions to light the work, were not
disappointed by the revelation of the
artist’s unifying theme of KAPITALISM.
ARTIST TALKS AND
INDUSTRY OUTREACH
Each year Melbourne Festival brings an
astonishing array of talented international
artists to our city. It has always been part
of the Festival’s mission to connect visiting
international artists with their Australian
colleagues by providing a series of outreach
programs. In 2012, in association with
the Monash University School of Music,
students were given the opportunity to
take part in master classes with two leading
international musicians. Dutch composer,
Michel van der Aa and Korean-American
prodigy, Hahn-Bin, each spent a day
working with local students by providing
unique insights int o their creative process,
and generously sharing their professional
experience. Monash Unviersity violin
students prepared and performed a piece of
music for Hahn-Bin, receiving one-on-one
feedback from the virtuoso violin master.
Michel van der Aa, meanwhile, worked
closely with a small group of the music
school’s composition students, imparting
his knowledge of the world’s stage and
demonstrating contemporary opera’s
artistry and vitality.
This year the Festival welcomed back the
ever popular Ringside: Artist in Conversation
series. Supported by Festival partner Radio
National and moderated by presenters
Michael Cathcart, Alice Keath, Sarah
Kanowski and Daniel Browing, these daily
free talks saw a world class assembly of
artists step up to share their experiences
and creative approaches. This year’s
lunchtime series held at the Foxtel Festival
Hub included visionary photographic
artist Gregory Crewdson, renowned
dancer and choreographer Akram Khan,
activist-troubadour Billy Bragg, legendary
choreographer William Forsythe, American
indie rock maestros Text of Light and
even our very own Festival Directors Brett
Sheehy and Josephine Ridge, sharing
their insight into the exhilaration and
heartbreak of shepherding an international
arts festival from conception to completion.
The keenly-anticipated Artists in
Conversation series continues to bridge the
gap between performance and audience.
In 2012, in its new Hub home, the
series provided another opportunity for
Melburnians to witness some of the world’s
great creative minds spar and debate and
discuss.
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