RISING to the occasion
As vibrant cities go, Melbourne has well and truly earned a seat at the table of the spirited and spry. Its ever-willing residents are constantly presented with new opportunities for energising and engaging, and the rather clement arrival of winter can only mean one thing: RISING Melbourne is upon us.
This annual festival of new art, music and performance is the perfect lure, encouraging people to just keep moving as the colder months creep in, inviting them into the intricate and exciting world of the arts and what might be going on behind the scenes. With a program that boasts the best of new artists across the continent and globe, you’ll be sure to have any and all obligatory cultural activities sorted for the coming months.
It’s a hefty program to get through, so we’re taking the edge off by sharing a RISING guide for you and your party, just to get you started.
And of course, no cultural calendar is complete without its very own snack slot - and that’s where we come in. In celebration of RISING’s timely arrival, we’ll be rolling out Scallop & water chestnut dumplings with fragrant Szechuan black vinegar every night from 8pm, to ensure no show gets in the way of a hungry city goer.
Check these out:
Suki Waterhouse
The ultimate It-Brit, Suki brings with her an energy that hints at the edgy and commits fully to the ephemeral.The name of her latest album Memoirs of a Sparklemuffin tells you everything you need to know about this self proclaimed ‘model, actress, whatever’ and begs the question: ‘Ready to rock the lily pad?’ Whether you’re ready or not, we’ll be serving up anything with bubbles to match the folk-fairy’s sparkle.
1 Thackray Rd, Port Melbourne VIC 3207
Hamlet
It’s Hamlet, but like you’ve never seen it before and most certainly beyond anything the Bard himself could have imagined. Peruvian theatre company Teatro La Plaza offers an adaptation of the classic story - in rap form. Joyously deconstructed by eight performers with Down syndrome, it’s being rebranded as ‘tragi-comic’ theatre and is sure to shift your perspective on what ‘to be or not to be’ really means.
159 Monash Road, Parkville VIC 3010
intangible #form
Artist Shohei Fujimoto takes on the iconic Melbourne auditorium The Capitol and transforms it into an ‘explorable sea of red beams that syncopates with your synapses’, a first for this 100-year old theatre. A highly subjective experience, it’s sure to leave you and your party with much to discuss - we suggest doing so over dumplings.
113 Swanston St, Melbourne VIC 3000
Last and First Men
‘Based on the ground-breaking 1930 novel by Olaf Stapledon, Last and First Men was the directorial swansong from Icelandic composer Jóhann Jóhannsson. This dance performance unfurls against the backdrop of his film—an arresting, post-humanist meditation that he shot on 16mm black and white film, across windswept plains. Three performers merge and break apart against Jóhannsson’s stark and dreamlike images—orbiting each other like electrons—taking the sci-fi to cosmic new depths.’
31 Sturt St, Southbank VIC 3006
Legends (of the Golden Arches)
‘Two emerging playwrights take us on a bogus adventure through the golden arches and into Chinese hell.’
We couldn’t have said it better ourselves.
140 Southbank Blvd, Southbank VIC 3006
Japanese Breakfast
Known for their improvised recording studios (we’re talking warehouses, trailers, lofts), Japanese Breakfast have changed their ways, celebrated with the performance of their first proper studio release album, and in Melbourne for the first time in 8 years. Let curiosity guide and lead you to this weather appropriate stormy and broody performance by the playfully dark group.
1 Thackray Rd, Port Melbourne VIC 3207
Heartbreak Hotel
This exposé on the effects of heartbreak on our bodies and minds comes to us from the heart of Aotearoa New Zealand, after making waves at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival(huge). Dubbed a ‘cathartic comedy’, it addresses just how much we can intellectualise the feelings around a break up, all the while highlighting how very little remains to make sense, no matter the level of analysis. May we suggest a martini with this one?
100 St Kilda Rd, Melbourne VIC 3004
Mount Kimbie
No one does it quite like Mount Kimbie, with their explosive juxtaposition of sound and vocals, and this time they’re heading back to their post-punk electronica roots. Their latest album The Sunset Violent is deemed to ‘crank the fuzz while polishing the sheen and deepening the groove’ (their words, not ours) and we couldn’t be more here for it.
154 Flinders St, Melbourne VIC 3000
Marlon Williams
Performing his Māori-language album for the first time in Australia, Williams tells a story of the Māori proverb ‘he waka eke noa’ (we’re all in this boat together) but from his own, seemingly lonely perspective. It’s an exploration of self-doubt through self-discovery, and being performed alongside The Yarra Benders and Kapa Haka group, it’s sure to stir something deeper in us all.
90-130 Swanston St, Melbourne VIC 3000
The Butterfly Who Flew into the Rave
This experiential endurance piece packs the rave experience into tight punch as it explores the pull between societal mores and political structures and how easily they fade to grey under the influence of the right bpm, the lasting message being: don’t stop the dance.
Southbank Blvd & Dodds Street, Southbank VIC 3006
Image credits: RISING Melbourne