Brisbane Festival blew me away on opening night. In fact, it almost blew quite a few of us away. And there were a few Marilyn Monroe moments for flouncy dresses.
It was a fine but windy night as VIPs heard artistic director Louise Bezzina’s final address to the faithful. When the festival is over, she leaves to run Brisbane Powerhouse. At the VIP launch, on The Landing at Queen’s Wharf, Lord Mayor Adrian Schrinner beamed because he had “poached” her to run Brisbane Powerhouse, Brisbane City Council’s premier arts and cultural venue.
After a mercifully short official event (just as well considering the stiff breeze), everyone trundled across the Neville Bonner Bridge (which was, I kid you not, swaying due to the gale) for the opening night event, Gems, by the acclaimed L.A. Dance Project.
This was a world premiere triple bill, a melding of acclaimed French choreographer’s Benjamin Millepied’s three related pieces – Reflections, Hearts & Arrows and On The Other Side – into a short season of contemporary dance heaven for enthusiasts.
Inspired by George Balanchine’s famous ballet Jewels, this was a far more cerebral opener than last year’s John Paul Gaultier’s Fashion Freak Show, which was a huge hit and very saucy. Gems is less flashy and not saucy at all – it’s more thoughtful with amazing music including pieces by Philip Glass and featuring musicians from Camerata – Queensland’s Chamber Orchestra – and the unassuming but brilliant pianist Yanfeng (Tony) Bai, who got huge applause when he joined the dancers on stage to take a few well-deserved bows.
Now, in case you are going to ask me what Gems is about, let me tell you up front – I don’t know.
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Does anybody know what any contemporary dance work is about? I think not. It can be about whatever you want it to be about, actually. When I interviewed Benjamin Millepied upon his arrival in Brisbane, he was adamant that his works are to be experienced rather than analysed. Fair enough.
Like Balanchine’s Jewels, this work was a collaboration with luxury jewellery house Van Cleef & Arpels. This triptych presents three separate works in one program for the first time. Another first for Brisbane Festival, so well done Louise Bezzina for bringing Millepied and his cast across the Pacific to our town.
This year’s program has some great dance productions and that seems to be a bit of a theme, but there’s so much more.
Lord Mayor Schrinner referred to September as Brisbane’s “magic month” and it is, with 23 glorious days of performance, public art and participation across the city. Running until September 27, the festival features 106 productions, 1069 performances and 2260 artists – with 21 world premieres and more than 43 per cent of events free to the public, transforming the city into a stage.
From bridges to riverbanks, skylines to laneways, Brisbane Festival 2025 turns the city itself into a canvas, playground and stage. Audiences can expect to encounter awe-inspiring, free public artworks and site-specific spectacles that reimagine the urban environment through light, sound and storytelling.
Anchoring this transformation is ANZ’s Walk This Way, a city-wide takeover by internationally acclaimed visual duo, former Brisbane boys Craig & Karl. Three of Brisbane’s major bridges – Neville Bonner, Goodwill and Kangaroo Point Bridge -are each wrapped in vibrant, large-scale designs that are bold, surreal and unmistakably joyful. The experience expands into the city streets with a self-guided Public Art Trail culminating in Craig & Karl: Double Vision, an exhibition at Griffith University Art Museum charting the artists’ global trajectory from local collaborators to international design icons.
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The opening weekend ignites with the much-anticipated Riverfire by Australian Retirement Trust, a city-defining pyrotechnic tradition that lights up the sky with fireworks launched from bridges, barges and rooftops in a synchronised display of power and precision. For the first time in Queensland, heavy payload pyrotechnic drones will be deployed as part of the display, launching almost 600 effects to create various thrilling formations.
A monumental outdoor ceremony set among giant floating whale bones on the Brisbane River, Baleen Moondjan, one of a program of Indigenous works, stands as one of the most anticipated events of the festival.
In his first major commission since leaving Bangarra, acclaimed creative visionary Stephen Page returns to his hometown to share a story of his grandmother’s Ngugi/Nunukul/Moondjan people of Minjerribah (North Stradbroke Island). A celebration of totemic systems and whale songlines, this original work fuses contemporary dance, language and storytelling with an all-star creative team including Jacob Nash and Alana Valentine.
Taking over the City Botanic Gardens is the evocative large-scale installation featuring thousands of candlelit sculptures, fire installations and glowing organic forms. Afterglow invites audiences into a dreamlike nocturnal world, combining art, nature and performance in a poetic journey through the senses.
Bookending the festival, and back by popular demand, is the beloved Skylore – Nieergoo: Spirit of the Whale, a First Nations-led drone spectacular developed with Tribe Group and Yuggera and Turrbal storytellers. More than 400 synchronised drones will create breathtaking aerial animations in a luminous celebration of culture and Country over three nights.
The festival’s theatre and cabaret program boasts a stirring chorus of voices: political, playful, personal and poetic.
Having captured the nation’s hearts with their fight to stay in Australia, Back to Bilo brings the true story of the Nadesalingam family from Biloela to the stage. This is the remarkable true account of one family’s ordeal and a story of how love and togetherness can win against crushing odds.
There’s GATSBY at The Green Light – a seductive blend of music, glamour, and theatrical decadence at Twelfth Night Theatre and, premiering at QPAC, The Lovers produced by Shake & Stir Theatre Co., puts a glitter-pop twist on Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream.
Among other theatrical offerings is one that is being whispered about as the possible sleeper hit of the festival – Francis Greenslade’s low-budget, darkly comic The Platypus, fresh from a sold-out Adelaide Fringe season. This play delves into the absurdity and heartbreak of love undone.
Brisbane Serenades also returns in full flourish, offering a vibrant series of free outdoor concerts that bring music to life in parks, gardens and neighbourhoods across the city. And the Festival Club at QPAC’s Melbourne St Green becomes Brisbane Festival’s beating, after-dark heart. A celebration of live music.
In the words of a famous cricket commentator – it’s all happening! Welcome to “magic month”. Enjoy.
Brisbane Festival continues until September 27. For the full program and to purchase tickets, go to brisbanefestival.com.au