How to start a new festival

Old festivals close but newcomers draw crowds. In a saturated market, how does a new festival get a foothold?
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Architecture in Helsinki will play the inaugural The Lost Lands. Photo by Michelle Tran.

From specialist film festivals and major international arts festivals, to weekend-long music celebrations and council-run activations of local shopping precincts, Australians love a good festival.

And while the music festival market has become crowded to the point of congestion, resulting in the closure of several such events in recent years (including Soundwave, the Future Music Festival, and the granddaddy of them all, the Big Day Out) other sectors show every sign of health.

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Richard Watts OAM is ArtsHub's National Performing Arts Editor; he also presents the weekly program SmartArts on Three Triple R FM. Richard is a life member of the Melbourne Queer Film Festival, a Melbourne Fringe Festival Living Legend, and was awarded the Sidney Myer Performing Arts Awards' Facilitator's Prize in 2020. In 2021 he received a Lifetime Achievement Award from the Green Room Awards Association. Most recently, Richard received a Medal of the Order of Australia (OAM) in June 2024. Follow him on Twitter: @richardthewatts