Festival of Colour Wraps

Sixty-eight performances in seven towns and 10 venues with 12,000 tickets sold and 31 performances sold out – audiences and organisers alike have declared the fourth Festival of Colour a huge success.

The highlight of the Festival was the world premiere of Rita and Douglas, a mesmerizing performance telling the tragic love story between Rita Angus and Douglas Lilburn. The story was brought to lifethrough Rita Angus’ letters, read by Jennifer Ward-Lealand and Lilburn’s music, played by Michael Houstoun. Throughout the performance, images of Angus’ stunning work were projected onto the stage. Rita and Douglas was written by Dave Armstrong and directed by Conrad Newport.

In keeping with the Festival’s ethos of developing new work, Riverside Drive was commissioned with Graeme Tetley aswriter, Sara Brodie as director and a cast of locals. The show played to a sell-out house for each of its six performances and highlighted the young talent of Jordaine Wilson and Matthias Inwood. Both had challenging roles in the play that was both funny and moving as it told the story of teenagers growing up in the 1950s and the strife surrounding the Mazegarb Report.

Aspiring Conversations featured a number of highlights including the powerful talk by Moana Jackson on Treaty claims, the lively discussion between Joe Bennett and Rod Oram on New Zealand’s clean green image and Lloyd Geering’s fascinating discussion on changing attitudes towards God. These thought-provoking talks were balanced by the unforgettable performances of Latin American dance in Olé Ola and outstanding musical performances by the likes of Micheline, Anna Coddington and The Phoenix Foundation.

Festival director, Philip Tremewan, said he was delighted with the response to the Festival.

“One of the things I love about the festival is that everyone has a different favourite show which is what the festival’s all about,” he said. “But this time some of the favourite shows were Aspiring Conversations – people were bowled over by Lloyd Geering or Moana Jackson and that’s really exciting as the presenters are engaging the hearts and minds of the audience.”

“Also what’s great is that people are prepared to trust that what’s on the programme is going to be really good and they can try something new and different,” he continued. “It’s a wonderful feeling for us running the festival – we know we’ve got to keep the quality up but we also know people will take the risk and try something new.”

The Festival of Colour will return in April 2013 and was generously supported by Central Lake Trust, Otago Community Trust, Creative New Zealand and Aurora. For further information visit www.festivalofcolour.co.nz.