How Art Can Help Shape Our Regional Future

To mark the passing of a would-have-been-amazing 2021 festival, Cementa is joining forces Asialink Arts (at the University of Melbourne) to host an online symposium exploring the potential of art to impact the future of regional communities. Taking Cementa’s experience as an arts festival in the post-industrial town of Kandos as context, Asialink Arts will present two events as a part of The Spirit of ’21 online festival.

The festival on the 15th and 16th of October will feature workshops, artworks, performances, music, talks, and an array of online activities across the two days. The festival kicks off with a symposium presented by Asialink on the history of arts led regional renewal in Japan. Fram Kitagawa, founder of numerous regional arts festivals and initiatives in Japan will give the keynote speech followed by a panel of arts leaders from Japan and Australia discussing community led activation and the role of culture in regional regeneration, with a view to sparking broader conversation around how these strategies can be employed here in Australia.