Van Gogh Alive art experience to be centrepiece of Newcastle’s 2022 New Annual festival

Van Gogh Alive – the multi-sensory art experience that has globally attracted an audience of more than 8.5 million across 75 cities - will be the centrepiece of City of Newcastle’s second New Annual festival in September.

Van Gogh Alive features more than 3,000 high-definition images of the artist's work, projected at a scale that allows visitors a fresh approach to experiencing art.

Created and produced by Grande Experiences, Van Gogh Alive is co-produced by Andrew Kay in association with BBC and Alex Fane in the Grand Pavilion.

Andrew Kay of Andrew Kay Management notes “Van Gogh Alive has been an international hit, thrilling audiences across the globe since the first experience launched at the Art Science Museum in Singapore in 2011.”

For Newcastle, the experience will be presented in a specially designed 2,300-square-metre gallery known as The Grand Pavilion, which will be set up at Newcastle's premier major event space, Foreshore Park.

Newcastle Lord Mayor Nuatali Nelmes said attracting Van Gogh Alive is a coup for Newcastle that will enhance the city's reputation for hosting world-class events while boosting the local economy by attracting thousands of visitors.

Mayor Nelmes enthused "we're excited to partner with Andrew Kay Management to bring the impressive Van Gogh Alive to a regional city for the first time in Australia as part of our New Annual festival.

“Spanning across a ten-day period and featuring over 50 events across the city, New Annual will showcase local and visiting artists sharing music, dance, theatre, performance, and visual art in a celebration of creativity.

"The versatility of Foreshore Park ensures we’re able to attract major events such as this unique immersive experience in Newcastle, which will attract an influx of visitors to our city at a time when the local tourism industry needs it most and as local operators and businesses recover from the pandemic."

Newcastle artist James Drinkwater described Van Gogh, who was his favourite painter as a child, as being "in the pantheon of the greats" and welcomed the opportunity to see this show in Newcastle. He said the city was "coming of age" culturally and believed an event such as this one would make art more accessible to the wider community.

Drinkwater adds "this event is a marker of the times and acts as a conduit between the wonderful and complex social spectrum of Newcastle.”

Bruce Peterson, owner of Grande Experiences advised “after mesmerising a global audience of over 8.5 million people and selling-out cities all over the world, including Rome, London and Beijing, we’re incredibly excited that Van Gogh Alive now comes to Newcastle. This is an unforgettable cultural experience for all the family.”

Van Gogh Alive provides audiences with the opportunity to plunge themselves in the life and work of Dutch Post-Impressionist painter, Vincent van Gogh, through a vibrant symphony of light, colour and fragrance, set to an evocative classical soundtrack.

An interpretive area provides an educational introduction to some of Van Gogh's most famous paintings, before the cutting-edge technology of the SENSORY4 TM Gallery transports visitors inside the artist's greatest works, with images projected onto virtually every surface.

Newcastle will host Van Gogh Alive from 21st September until 23rd October at Foreshore Park, while the New Annual program will run from 23rd September to 2nd October throughout the city.

Further information about City of Newcastle’s flagship cultural festival is available at newannual.com https://www.newannual.com/

Ticket information for Van Gogh Alive is available at vangoghalive.com.au 

Image: Van Gogh Alive Sydney