If New Zealand summers are synonymous with music festivals, then spring is all about the arts. In October, Tauranga, Taranaki, Hawke’s Bay and Nelson will come alive with the sound of music, theatre, dance, comedy and talks about books.
As well as the chance of a great night out, regional arts festivals create a sense of place and pride for their communities. And they are a valuable touring circuit for our artists and some from overseas.
This year, possibly no one else has had to think more about what a regional arts festival can offer than Pitsch Leiser, Hawke’s Bay Arts Festival director since 2015. Leiser hoped that after the disruption of Covid – when the festival reduced shows and focused on the hyper-local – 2023 would be the year they bounced back with a vengeance.
“Needless to say when we woke up on February 14 [when Cyclone Gabrielle hit] and got a sense of the devastation in the following days, we realised very quickly how severe the impact was,” he says. “What became evident very quickly was that we needed to respond in a way that was meaningful for our communities.
“With the cost-of-living crisis and the post-Covid impact, ‘meaningful’ meant we felt we should work to make it more accessible, so we kind of went, ‘What if we make this festival free?’”
With support from funders and festival patrons, some of those affected by the floods have been able to receive free tickets to many of the shows. For others, ticket prices have been reduced. It has allowed the festival to give away 2000 tickets to two shows by international urban circus 360 AllStars, who also perform in Auckland and Christchurch.
“People just need a break,” says Leiser. “They need a night out. They need joy and to step away from the constant reminders and impact of what has happened to us. They need to be able to do that without having to think about, ‘How am I going to pay for it?’ It needs to be accessible in the sense that what they are choosing to do is relevant to them.”
These days, Jesse Griffin is mostly making television shows such as Educators. But the festival gives him a chance to pull on his boots and return to his alter ego, musical cowboy Wilson Dixon. Able to work the festival and comedy circuits, Griffin says he will strive to ensure Wilson’s Hawke’s Bay show – he also performs at the Tauranga Arts Festival – offers a philosophical perspective.
Growing up in Dunedin in the 1980s and 90s, Griffin recalls the impact shows by the likes of Tim Balme and Miranda Harcourt had on him. He says performing at regional festivals is always a joy because they tend to take over entire towns and create a buzz. Also, the audiences are receptive and welcoming.
Like Griffin, the Wellington-based trio behind surreal comedy circus show Rise of the Olive – Imogen Stone and brothers Zane and Degge Jarvie – cross genres. Their circus shows take them to national and international cirque festivals as the more comedic performances appeal to broader arts festivals. Fresh from Edinburgh, they’re performing in Hawke’s Bay and Nelson.
“It’s really special to be able to work in regional New Zealand, and getting to be part of a festival is a game-changer because they get behind a show with things like promotion,” says Stone. “Everywhere is different, with its own personality, but audiences are always warm and appreciative.”
This sentiment is shared by theatre-maker Kip Chapman, who takes his latest interactive space adventure show, Mission Control: Mars, to Tauranga and the Taranaki Arts Festival’s inaugural Reimagine this year. Audiences of up to 100 divide into teams of engineers, working together to solve logistical problems and start a colony on Mars. Each person gets a tablet, powered by gaming technology developed by Chapman’s company and digital designers Liquid Static, and they can be involved as much or as little as they like. He has taken a similar show, Mission Control: Apollo 13, around the world.
“We want audience engagement and some of our most engaged audiences are in the regions,” says Chapman. “There’s not as many entertainment options as there are in the main centres, where there’s so much on all the time. People are super stoked to see you.”
Shane Bosher, best known for his tenure at Auckland’s Silo Theatre, is in his first year as director at Tauranga Arts Festival. He says he is definitely not a kid at heart or a fan of interactive shows that demand audience participation, but he can’t wait for Mission Control: Mars.
“There’s just something in the alchemy of that company’s work that makes me want to participate,” says Bosher. “Life has been so turbulent of late – not just Covid, but extreme weather and the cost of living – so I’ve been thinking about making some joyful noise.”
Some of that joyful noise will come from Tauranga local Jason Te Mete. A seasoned musical director, Te Mete straddles the local and national spheres and is committed to working on large-scale community events.
These include the social sing-along Battle Chorus, where, under the guidance of Te Mete and fellow musician/performer Rutene Spooner, audiences (no singing experience needed) divide into two teams, learn some choruses then sing “every anthem in the Kiwiana songbook” to compete for the Battle Chorus title.
A week later, Te Mete joins forces with Bay of Plenty singer Ria Hall for Waiata Mai, a te reo family sing-along on the city’s waterfront. “When I say ‘Tauranga’, I wanted to ensure we’re talking about all of Tauranga,” says Bosher.
Inclusion and accessibility play a greater role at all festivals. Work is staged in a variety of venues, sometimes with touch tours, sensory sessions or audio-interpreted performances, and there is an emphasis on community, free or low-cost events.
More Māori and Pasifika work has become a cornerstone. Curated by award-winning poet Grace Iwashita-Taylor, Upu brings together Oceania poets and performers so audiences can hear “the voices dealing with colonisation, family, climate change, love, sex, religion, power and tourists”.
With support from the Performing Arts Network of New Zealand, set up to foster a sustainable performing arts touring circuit, Upu travels to all the North Island festivals. Leiser describes it as one of the highest-quality shows on the circuit, saying it’s a unique opportunity to gain insights into high-quality writing and performances from the Pasifika arts community.
Introducing audiences to new works – art forms they may not be familiar or feel comfortable with – is one of the aims of a festival. Once your community trusts you, you have them for life. Lydia Zanetti is executive and artistic director at the Nelson Arts Festival, which, now in its 29th year, is the country’s longest-running annual regional arts festival. Nelson is described as a hub for arts, particularly strong in the visual arts, and the festival has contributed to that, as a whole generation of people in Nelson – and its surrounding districts – have grown up with it.
Zanetti says that creates demand for new experiences and work that some may see as more challenging. This year, for example, a textile installation by autistic artist Bailee Lobb, Sensory Self Portraits, incorporates large-scale, soothing sensory bubbles that audiences are invited to touch. Lobb will sleep in the Refinery ArtSpace gallery as part of the project, which explores “the pursuit of self-regulation and sensory supports”.
Tense, by Donna McLeod (Te Āti Awa, Ngāti Rarua) and Te Oro Hā, is a Māori theatre piece that uses pūrākau (Māori origin stories), taonga puoro, waiata and poetry to share the story of the Nelson Tenths, a contentious 1839 deal made between local iwi and the New Zealand Company, which is still subject to court proceedings.
Sometimes, festivals need to change to respond to community growth. Taranaki’s biennial arts festival started in 1991 and had a contemporary makeover in 2019. It has now grown into four niche festivals held over a two-year cycle. It started last November with Spiegel Fest, held in the Pacific Crystal Palace Spiegeltent, which is owned by a consortium of NZ festivals. Festival director Megan Brown says Reimagine will create new ways for audiences to engage with the arts – and that means taking it out of traditional venues. Arts laureate choreographer/dancer Ross McCormack’s dance/theatre work Artefact: How to Behave in a Museum will be performed in Puke Ariki Museum. There are two morning raves – at the Bowl of Brooklands stage and at Tataraimaka Hall – and a silent disco walk through downtown New Plymouth.
“We are all there for our regions,” says Brown, “and what we programme depends on what is happening in a specific region. We don’t ‘compete’ with one another because there’s real value in us talking and working together. It creates opportunities for artists in a much more sustainable way. The more we can do together, the better.”
The best of each event
Best Writers: Hawke’s Bay Arts Festival (October 13-29)
Most of the October events have a literary component (especially Nelson), but the Hawke’s Bay festival has an entire weekend of readers’ and writers’ sessions at the Havelock North Function Centre. They include Catherine Chidgey, Catherine Robertson, Sir Roger Hall, Joe Bennett, Dr Emma Espiner, Noelle McCarthy, Dr Monty Soutar, Michael Bennett, Whiti Hereaka and more.
Best Contemporary Music: Tauranga Arts Festival (October 19 - 29)
The city that goes crazy for jazz each Easter has a big music showing in its arts festival. It includes some of the ensemble that set Katherine Mansfield’s works to song on a 2020 album in Mansfield: In her own words (Unplugged); Finn Andrews backed by the NZTrio; 1960s girl group tribute trio the Up-Doos, as well as multi-festival tourists Theia, and Irish folk outfit Gráda.
Best Visual Arts: Nelson Arts Festival (October 18 - 29)
As well as a banquet of performances and authors, the Nelson festival offers exhibitions and workshops based mostly around the Suter Art Gallery, as well as Karen Sewell’s floating sculpture in the Christ Church Cathedral, which complements her show at Atelier. Also at the Suter will be Gathered Voices, the travelling exhibition celebrating the 60th anniversary of the Fletcher Trust Collection.
Best Outdoor Dancing: Reimagine Arts Festival (October 5 - 15)
The Taranaki event may be a minnow compared with the events to the east and south but if you feel like dancing outdoors, here’s the place. Among its events are two sessions of “cult morning rave experience” Morning People from sunrise at the Bowl of Brooklands stage and Tataraimaka Hall. For those who prefer their nightlife to be a bit later in the day, there’s the Silent Disco Citywalk for headphoned participants, who will show it doesn’t require the Naki to win the Ranfurly Shield again to cause dancing in the streets of New Plymouth.
Best Redefinition of a Festival: Te Tairāwhiti Arts Festival (September 29 - October 15)
The Gisborne event, which started in 2019, is now split into three – Rā, a Matariki season; its October dates under the banner of Whiti, and a third offering in late summer. The spread is a response to the local community, says festival director Tama Waipara. “Aotearoa’s arts festivals are based on the Edinburgh model – once a year, multi platforms – but we don’t have to be stuck in time,” says Waipara, who, as a musician, will perform at Tauranga. The only confirmed shows for October under the Te Tairāwhiti Arts Festival umbrella are two performances of the touring play Upu. – Russell Baillie
