Wide blue skies, a windmill atop ochre coloured hills, and the token sheep of an outback station set the opening scene of the QPAC production The Elixir of Love firmly in Australian territory. The light-hearted opera, written in two acts by prolific Italian composer Gaetano Donizetti, premiered as L’elisir d’amore in Milan in 1832. This […]

Kokoberra woman and former Young Australian of the year Tania Major called for a better deal for indigenous people at the Brisbane launch of Generation One in Queen Street this week. Ms Major appealed passionately to the patriotic fervour of all Australians to acknowledge the plight of Indigenous people. “For so long in Australia, the […]

There was standing room only as intricately painted human canvasses paraded for an enthusiastic audience at the prize-giving of the “Australian Body Art Carnivale” in Eumundi at the weekend. Organiser Danielle Taylor said it was the pre-eminent, largest body art show in Australia. In its third year, the Eumundi spectacle has human body art competitions […]

Nash Theatre More than 2000 years since it was written, any modern staging of Antigone requires an element of creativity to make it fresh and relevant. The New Farm Nash Theatre’s current production is certainly creative. Director Jeff Zayer has put together an eclectic production that borrows elements of ancient Greek and Roman aesthetic in […]

Young Australian-born Pacific Islanders are losing their connections with their parents’ homelands according to Pacifika Festival president Caroline Crichton. The Pacifika Festival held at Deception Bay yesterday was designed to help young Islanders explore their heritage and identities. “I think that a lot of the older generation have come to Australia and thought that it […]

The author of a biography who used social media networks to promote his book saw it shoot to number 26 on the Amazon UK best-seller list. Douglas Rogers’ The Last Resort – A Memoir of Zimbabwe was released in the UK in April and by the end of the month had become the number two […]

Tickets to Queensland Theatre Company’s educational production of Waiting For Godot sold out last week, proving the 1949 play still has appeal for Generation Y. The play is a dense absurdist drama about two characters waiting on a desolate road for someone called Godot, who (plot spoiler!) never arrives. Queensland University of Technology Drama Discipline Leader […]

Break-dancers from across the nation and a healthy crowd gathered at King George Square on Friday night to compete in Battle City.

The Queensland Art Gallery’s collection of East Asian pottery is small, but shows the development of the form from its crude beginnings into the post-modern realm of conceptual art. The oldest pieces in the collection, Japanese and Chinese pottery and earthenware from 3500-2000BC, show the beginnings of pottery as a functional, sturdy craft, crudely decorated […]

Stark white rectangular plinths provide identical platforms for ten bronze busts from artist Ah Xian’s 2007 ‘Metaphysica’ series.

The Bridge Under Construction, Roland Wakelin, 1928 A partially-built Sydney Harbour Bridge and a street in what is probably Sydney’s North Shore. A crane perches on top of the unfinished arch of the bridge, and in the street in front of us two trams carry passengers, as people walk around. The painting confidently asserts that […]

This is a raucous play about the depraved and crazy antics of a flatshare in Brisbane.

When Murasaki Shikibu wrote The Tale of Genji a millennium ago, he probably didn’t expect to be lauded in the 21st Century as the author of the world’s first novel. Nor would the Japanese novelist have foreseen his Casanova-like character’s tales depicted on large scale artworks in faraway lands. The Queensland State Art Gallery is currently showing Tosa […]

Hats, hats and more hats, in every shape, style, colour and size imaginable. If this sounds like your idea of heaven then head to the Queensland Art Gallery, where the exhibition Hats: An Anthology by Stephen Jones, is currently running. The exhibition is a collaboration between London’s Victoria and Albert museum and one of the […]