Sydney Children's Festival

Kick your heels up at the Sydney Children’s Festival Opening Party on Saturday 3 October. The celebration will be led by Georgie Parker and the Sydney Children’s Festival Choir, who will have every foot in the house tapping. The celebration will continue with a huge dance party where kids can go wild and parents can enjoy a flashback to their partying days. Plus, there’ll be a sneak preview of Erth’s Amazing Room for curious kids.

There are oodles of fantastic workshops, performances and activities to get involved in throughout the festival. See the amazing Circa perform 46 Acts in 45 Minutes, warm up your vocal chords in free morning singing workshops, or kick start your acrobatic career in a week of workshops with Legs On The Wall!
 
Visit www.sydneychildrensfestival.com  to find out more.

What would kids do if they could do anything?

Erth, the creators of the famous dinosaur Petting Zoo, are looking for kids to be part of the creation of the Amazing Room – a new component of the upcoming Sydney Children’s Festival.
Erth are busily designing this crazy, silly play space, and are seeking some input from kids .

This coming Tuesday 21st July at 6.30 pm, come down to CarriageWorks with your child, aged 6 – 12years, and take part in a 1hr workshop where Erth’s Artistic Director, Scott, will be asking "What would kids do if they could do
Anything?". 

Yummy pizza and drinks with be provided. Email scott@erth.com.au by Tuesday to participate.
There's room enough for 10 kids plus their parents to participate and you must register with Scott to attend.

Sydney Children's Festival | CarriageWorks 27 Sept - 11 Oct

Sydney Children’s Festival is Sydney’s first official arts-based Festival for kids. It’s spans all artforms with contemporary and indigenous dance workshops, puppetry, visual arts and cartooning workshops, photography competition for kids, art exhibitions by kids, and a range of free, interactive installations and activities around CarriageWorks, plus two massive weeks of performances, special events and talks by popular children’s authors.

The focus of the festival is all on the child as artist and audience – it focuses more on encouraging the child to participate, rather than simply entertaining. Many aspects of the festival also focus on shared experiences between parent and child.

Festival highlights include
MEET DINOSAURS At The Petting Zoo meet Erth’s awesome prehistoric creatures, from cute baby dinos to teeth-gnashing giants. Ancient life-like dinosaurs are alive and mostly friendly (!) in this fun, educational and unique performance event that will delight children of all ages.

THE MEGAPHONE PROJECT
An installation of 24 megaphones...They are large, move, make a sound and a re very red, but they need you to make them come to life! Find out what happens to your voice when you lose it, and follow the sound trail of the big red megaphones as they migrate through the space.

WORKSHOPS
Hip Hop with Nick Power - Contemporary dance with Kate Champion - ATYP Documentary and Television reporting - Cartooning with Matt Ottley - Circus and Aerial skills - Visual arts workshops with Bess O'Malley from Pine St

COMPETITION
Calling all budding photo-journalists! The Festival are searching for the most talented up and coming snappers to win the chance to be an Official Festival Photographer… win a workshop with leading Australian photographer, Lisa Tomasetti, and your images exhibited at the festival.
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27 September - 11 October 10am - 4pm Mon - Sat
CarriageWorks 245 Wilson Street Eveleigh http://www.carriageworks.com.au/
To see a complete schedule of the festival visit the Official Festival Website.

Gondwana Puppet Theatre

Gondwana was presented by the Australian Museum, Sydney.

So there were only 12 performances for the July school holidays and guess what? they sold out. Children's theatre is alive and kicking.

This show was beautifully staged and executed, featuring Australia's amazing prehistoric creatures and land brought to life with full body puppets and large-scale inflatable plants.

The journey was a bit scarey for some of the younger children, you need darkness for puppets, which can be frightening. However it was a lovely journey seeing giant dinosaurs, insects, indigenous plants, life-size rocks and mammals.

The land masses changed shape, there was a bit of death and murder with flesh-eating dinosaurs nesting, feeding and fighting for survival.

Plus for my daughter the best part was the interactive session at the end, where Basil, featured as a performing animal. He was given eye drops, and fed leaves by various audience members. Plus we now know that his wife and kids live in New Zealand.

Performed by Erth Theatre Company, it was educational and great entertainment.

If you were one of the lucky ones to have seen the show, it was also great value.

Joanne Kee
Ceres Solutions