Perth International Arts Festival 2102 Announces Five Highlights

With preparations in full swing for the 2012 Perth International Arts Festival, incoming Festival Director Jonathan Holloway is thrilled to announce five advance highlights of the 2012 program, including two Australian exclusives, a spectacular outdoor public event, and fabulous offerings from the worlds of dance, music and theatre. 

Perth Festival Artistic Director Jonathan Holloway said: “These are five of the world’s most talented companies and individuals at the top of their game and are just a small part of the 2012 Festival line- up to be announced in November.”

James Thiérrée’s La Compagnie du Hanneton (France) combines humour, incredible physical feats and spectacular visuals in Raoul, a production of startling illusion that is operatic in scale. Raoul is the inhabitant of a shape-shifting structure under siege by a mysterious outsider who shares his face and form. His household appliances are attempting to pillage him and strange creatures abound. James Thiérrée is a performer of rarefied lineage and exceptional range, and his Compagnie du Hanneton has won four Moliere Awards, France’s highest achievement in theatre. 

Perth Festival is delighted to present an Australian exclusive, the Australian premiere performance of Place des Anges from Les Studios de Cirque de Marseille (France), who have been creating unforgettable aerial spectacles around the globe for a decade. This once-in-a-lifetime event sees angels land on St Georges Terrace and Council House in a breathtaking display that must be seen to be believed. Heavenly bodies glide, float and careen through the air, leaving a blaze of feathers in their wake.

The National Theatre of Scotland returns to Perth in association with Frantic Assembly, with a knock-out production from the explosive world of boxing. Featuring a pulsating soundtrack by electronic heavyweights Underworld, Beautiful Burnout (top image) explodes that very second when the guard drops, the eyes blink, and the hammer blow hits.

In another Australian exclusive for Perth Festival, legendary director Peter Brook turns his hand to Mozart’s comedic and adventurous A Magic Flute, in this grand culmination of his four decades helming the famed Théâtre des Bouffes du Nord (France). In Brook’s A Magic Flute, Mozart’s enchanting music takes centre stage, as a talented ensemble of young singers led by a single pianist fill the score with new life, energy and colour. This is raw, intimate operatic theatre at its very best. 

Choreographer Lucinda Childs (USA) revisits 1979, when three creative titans joined forces to craft what would become one of the great post-modern works of the 20th Century. Choreographer Lucinda Childs, composer Philip Glass, and visual artist Sol LeWitt mixed movement, music and film in a way that would change the world of dance forever. In 2012, Childs invites a new company of dancers to inject a youthful new life into this electrifying and simply beautiful work of music and motion. In this rarely seen signature piece, three dances are performed live, set to a projection of LeWitt’s performance on black-and-white film. 

Perth International Arts Festival’s mission to stimulate our culture and inspire our community through the highest quality arts is made possible with the generous help of our sponsors, supporters and donors. In 2012 we celebrate 20 years of Lotterywest support for the Festival. As our Principal Partner, Lotterywest enables the Festival to deliver diverse and high quality programs through literature, music, dance, theatre, film and the visual arts to a wide range of audiences.

Lotterywest Chairman Mr John Atkins said: “Through free and subsidised events, podcasts, broadcasts, disability access, technology and the web, Lotterywest’s ongoing support ensures the whole community can engage and enjoy a host of exciting Festival experiences.

The full program for 2012 - the sixtieth Perth Festival- will be launched on 2 November. Tickets will be on sale exclusively to Friends of the Festival from 6pm that night, with all tickets on sale 7 November.

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