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The Contact Festival Playground

The Contact Festival Playground

visual arts 27 Feb – 19 Mar

To celebrate the Festival’s 30th birthday, we’re building Wellington a fantastical family fairground perfect for anyone young at heart.

Arquitectura de Feria is a fairground from another time and another space
La Tercera
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Arquitectura de Feria

Arquitectura de Feria

Visual Arts 27 Feb – 19 Mar

A Catalonian fairground No. 8 wire-style, with seven fantastical hand-cranked rides put together from recycled material and scrap iron. Including a Ferris wheel where kids are propelled around on toilet bowls.
FamilyFreeNZ
Fly Me Up to Where You Are New Zealand

Fly Me Up to Where You Are New Zealand

Visual Arts 27 Feb – 19 Mar

Tiffany Singh has been working with schoolchildren from Wellington, Auckland and Christchurch since 2012, helping them turn their ideas into the many thousand flags in this award-winning installation. 
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Photobook New Zealand

Photobook New Zealand

Writers Week 11 – 13 Mar

See a special collection of New Zealand and Australian photobooks from artists and independent publishers. Speakers include Ying Ang, Ron Brownson and leading photobook expert Harvey Benge. 
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Once There Was a Tree

Once There Was a Tree

Visual Arts 26 Feb – 03 Apr

Andrea Gardner explores the tension between domesticity and nature, artifice and reality, the familiar and the unexpected. She investigates how we perceive nature in a contemporary context and the ever growing presence of man-made elements in the environment. 
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Art From the Heart

Art From the Heart

Visual Arts 20 Feb – 16 Mar

Artists and crafts people show work that expresses who they are and their approach to making art, including work they are deeply involved with now and special pieces from their collections.
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The Burden of Dreams

The Burden of Dreams

Visual Arts 26 Feb – 03 Apr

Margriet Windhausen and Paul van den Bergh both gained their art training in the Netherlands and have a unique voice in which the human figure becomes a vehicle for dreaming.

 
Free
Linie Line Linea – Contemporary Drawing

Linie Line Linea – Contemporary Drawing

Visual Arts 26 Feb – 20 Mar

Curated by Volker Adolphs at Kunstmuseum Bonn, this exhibition features 20 contemporary artists working in Germany, who explore different approaches to drawing. A New Zealand exclusive. 
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Unseen City

Unseen City

Visual Arts 21 Nov – 13 Mar

In the 1960s, as new motorways enabled suburban sprawl, Auckland’s population passed half a million. Unseen city is a snapshot of that moment, in photography, film and painting.
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Janet Frame Memorial Lecture

Janet Frame Memorial Lecture

Writers Week 12 Mar

The ninth New Zealand Society of Authors Janet Frame Memorial Lecture presents Dr Philip Temple sharing his experience of working on a biography of Maurice Shadbolt. 
Free
Liu Jianhua: Transfer

Liu Jianhua: Transfer

Visual Arts 20 Feb – 10 Jul

One of China’s best known contemporary artists, Liu Jianhua will present two full-gallery installations: a signature work of over 1,500 everyday objects cast in white porcelain, and a new work of glistening pools of gold-coated porcelain.
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Adam Portraiture Award 2016

Adam Portraiture Award 2016

Visual Arts 25 Feb – 29 May

Showcasing the enormous range of contemporary portraiture in New Zealand, this is the country’s premier portrait competition. 
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Grayson Perry / Kushana Bush

Grayson Perry / Kushana Bush

Visual Arts 20 Nov – 20 Mar

Turner Prize-winning artist, writer and broadcaster Grayson Perry CBE is a British institution. Like Perry, Dunedin artist Kushana Bush's intricate and colourful tragi-comic paintings comment on modern life but are loaded with references to arts of other times and places. 
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Ngā Toi / Arts Te Papa

Ngā Toi / Arts Te Papa

Visual Arts 06 Nov – 31 Jul

During the New Zealand Festival, Te Papa is hosting a vibrant season of Ngā Toi | Arts Te Papa — the museum’s ever-changing showcase of works drawn from the national art collection, including NewZealand Photography Collected, an exhibition that showcases hundreds of Te Papa’s rare and fascinating photographs. 
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a (very) brief history of aotearoa

a (very) brief history of aotearoa

Visual Arts 24 Feb – 20 Mar

Four aluminium pieces, in pixelated “space invaders” shapes/QR Codes, form a Māori meeting house; a mitre; a crown; and the Beehive – interact with them and find out why they represent a (very) brief history of Aotearoa.  
Free
Come Running with Christopher McDougall

Come Running with Christopher McDougall

Writers Week 09 – 12 Mar

Get up and going this Writers Week with author Christopher McDougall who’ll be leading fun runs around the city followed by a group chat.
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The Attic

The Attic

Visual Arts

In this new permanent exhibition space, you can experience Ngā Hau, which combines installation art and the magic of cinema. 
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City Gallery Book Club: Writers Week & Influence

City Gallery Book Club: Writers Week & Influence

Writers Week 03 Mar

Join Emily Perkins and her party of writers and readers for a lively chat about literary influence. 
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Bottled Ocean 2116

Bottled Ocean 2116

Visual Arts 21 Feb – 15 May

Bottled Ocean 2116 presents an expansive translucent double-hulled waka. Floating in space, it is surrounded by imagined creatures of the deep created from recycled plastics.
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Julian Dashper & Friends

Julian Dashper & Friends

Visual Arts 05 Dec – 25 Apr

This show offers a tribute to key New Zealand artist Julian Dashper, presenting his works in conversation with works by other artists, including Colin McCahon, Rita Angus, Milan Mrkusich, Gordon Walters and Billy Apple.
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Ata: A Third Reflection

Ata: A Third Reflection

Visual Arts 21 Feb – 15 May

Professor Robert Jahnke’s Ata explores Māori creation narratives and Christian and prophetic imagery through light and reflection.
Free
Camille Henrot: Grosse Fatigue

Camille Henrot: Grosse Fatigue

Visual Arts 21 Nov – 13 Mar

French artist Camille Henrot’s encyclopaedic video Grosse Fatigue (2013) takes on the history of the universe. Henrotmashes scientific history and creation stories, the rationaland the mythic, computers and primitive mindsets.
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Privacy vs Patriotic Idealism

Privacy vs Patriotic Idealism

Visual Arts 21 Feb – 15 May

The loss of privacy through online monitoring and public surveillance has created a culture of Orwellian fear and paranoia. Kelcy Taratoa’s latest series of paintings grapples with pop-culture referents to unpack these anxieties.
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Featherston Camp Centenary Exhibition: 1916-2016

Featherston Camp Centenary Exhibition: 1916-2016

Visual Arts 23 Jan – 31 Jul

An estimated 60,000 men went through Featherston Military Training Camp between 1916 and 1918 – a majority of the New Zealanders who served overseas during World War I. This exhibition tells their story.
Free
The Presidents – From JFK to Obama

The Presidents – From JFK to Obama

Visual Arts 20 Feb – 15 May

Award-winning American photojournalist David Burnett is one of the few photographers to have photographed all US Presidents since John F Kennedy.
Free
Matthew Barney: DRAWING RESTRAINT

Matthew Barney: DRAWING RESTRAINT

Film, Visual Arts 26 Feb – 24 Apr

The first solo presentation of Matthew Barney's artworks in New Zealand, Drawing Restraint is a carefully curated display of his visual and physical enquiries of body and its limitations.
Free
Breaking Barriers

Breaking Barriers

Artist Talk, Theatre 15 Mar

The company Back to Back explain how their work smallmetal objects questions the assumptions of what is possible in theatre, along with the assumptions we all hold about ourselves and each other.
Free
Dancing for Your Life

Dancing for Your Life

Dance, Artist Talk 18 Mar

Meet members of the original Café Müller cast. Find out what it is like to dance with Tanztheater Wuppertal Pina Bausch, and to have worked with the late, great dance icon herself.
Free
Hooked on NZ Books Online Review Site Launch

Hooked on NZ Books Online Review Site Launch

Writers Week 10 Mar

A new review website for young adults.
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A Novel Approach

A Novel Approach

Artist Talk, Theatre 16 Mar

The ACB with Honora Lee author Kate De Goldi talks with Jane Waddell, who adapted the novel for Circa’s Festival production, about of bringing this beloved New Zealand story to life.

Free
Slow Reading Club

Slow Reading Club

Writers Week 13 Mar

Come along to Library Bar for a slow-reading session. Switch off, bliss out and read for an hour.
Free
Beatnik Publishing Launch Party

Beatnik Publishing Launch Party

Writers Week 12 Mar

Attend the launch of Three Words: An Anthology of Aotearoa/NZ Women’s Comics.
FreeNZ
Art Can Change the World

Art Can Change the World

Artist Talk, Visual Arts 28 Feb

Tiffany Singh discusses the role of social practice in the changing face of the arts, and collaboration in her work including her huge flag project Fly Me Upto Where You Are New Zealand.
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Being Joni Mitchell

Being Joni Mitchell

Artist Talk, Music 13 Mar

Director Shane Bosher and singer Julia Deans talk about how they approached Joni Mitchell’s astonishing songbook in their homage to the legendary artist, Both Sides Now.
Free
Awa Press Launch Party

Awa Press Launch Party

Writers Week 12 Mar

A celebration of the publication of Dispatches from Continent Seven: An Anthology of Antarctic Science. 
Free
Victoria University Press Launch Party

Victoria University Press Launch Party

Writers Week 10 Mar

Damien Wilkins' new novel and poetry collections by Claire Orchard and Andrew Johnston are launched.
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Sketch to Stage

Sketch to Stage

Artist Talk, Theatre 03 Mar

Theatre Stampede and Nightsong Productions are known for their ingenious staging of theatre work. Find how they brought Te Pō from sketch to stage.

Free
Do I Belong Here?

Do I Belong Here?

Artist Talk, Theatre 10 Mar

Chunky Move’s brilliant Complexity of Belonging explores identity inthe age of social media. Join Anouk van Dijk and some of the cast to discuss their extraordinary work.

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Double Vision

Double Vision

Artist Talk, Music 04 Mar

Discover how the creative collaboration between composer Ross Harris and librettist Vincent O'Sullivan enables them to achieve a single artistic vision, and how new opera Brass Poppies came into being.
Free
Talk to Her

Talk to Her

Film, Dance 13 Mar

Pina Bausch appears as herself performing in Café Müller in Pedro Almodóvar’s typically unrestrained comedy-drama of obsession, moral jeopardy and sexual transgression.
FamilyFree
Le Grand Continental®

Le Grand Continental®

Spectacular, Dance 26 Feb

A 30-minute dance spectacular performed by 150 volunteers aged between 10 and 75. Afterward, the crowd will be asked to join in for a giant freestyle dance party. 
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Page Turners

Page Turners

Theatre 06 Mar

The stories of Wellingtonians – and trouble-makers – Te Rauparaha, Robin Hyde, Nancy Wake, James K Baxter and Carmen Rupe told from the set of a three-metre-high pop-up book. 
Free
Dancing Dreams: In the Footsteps of Pina Bausch

Dancing Dreams: In the Footsteps of Pina Bausch

Film, Dance 28 Feb

A delightful study of amateurs giving their all, this documentary follows 40 students from high schools across Wuppertal as they prepare for a public performance of a Pina Bausch dance work.
Free
Sila: The Breath of the World

Sila: The Breath of the World

Music 05 – 06 Mar

For this unique composition by “one of the most original musical thinkers of the new century” (The New Yorker), Orchestra Wellington musicians are set loose from a conductor’s baton and scattered around Civic Square.
Free
And the Ship Sails On

And the Ship Sails On

Film, Dance 06 Mar

Pina Bausch plays one of the passengers on a luxury liner shortly before WWI. From its bravura opening, in which sepia-tinted silent movie footage slowly acquires colour and sound, the film is a tour de force.

 
Free
Born in a Barn

Born in a Barn

Theatre, Music, Artist Talk 29 Feb

In this artist talk, learn about the theatre company Kneehigh from Mike Shepherd, director of Dead Dog in a Suitcase.