Highlights of the OzAsia Festival program this year include two contemporary dance works: tiaen tiamen Episode 1 which explores Taiwanese indigenous culture, direct from sell-out performances in Taipei and Infinitely Closer from Singapore’s leading contemporary dance company T.H.E. The piece explores the notion of freedom via movement with technology and invites the audience to explore their own sense of freedom by being in the same space as the dancers – on the stage of Festival Theatre.
Music and theatre combine with Canadian composer Ngo Kong Kie who brings the moving I Swallowed A Moon Made of Iron to OzAsia Festival a powerful work inspired by China’s worker-poet literary movement. Award-winning vocalist, producer and multi-disciplinary artist Rainbow Chan makes her theatrical debut drawing on her Weitou (first settlers of Hong Kong) ancestry and the plight of the women who had to leave their families upon marriage in the beautiful work The Bridal Lament.
Sunny Kim leads a supergroup of exceptional musicians as they perform songs on motherhood and migration in Mothertongue Motherland. 1988 delivers a musical and visual feast of memory, history and nostalgia and Saudara Sound System delivers hip hop Balinese gamelan.
Theatre standouts include Paradise or the Impermanence of Ice Cream which makes its Adelaide debut after wowing audiences earlier this year at Sydney Festival. Jacob Rajan’s solo performance channels seven characters in a production infused with laughter and exquisite puppetry and is guaranteed to blow your mind and melt your heart.
Yumi Umiumare brings her epic solo piece Buried Teabowl – OKUNI and A Notional History comes to Adelaide after touring extensively through Asia and Europe. Comedy lovers can rejoice too with the return of The Special Comedy Comedy Special a one-night extravaganza featuring a line-up of some of Australia’s best comedians including Michael Hing, Jason Chong, Jennifer Wong and many more.
OzAsia Festival
19 Oct – 5 Nov 2023
