Adelaide Fringe Festival

Adelaide Fringe
Frequency	Annually
Location(s)	Adelaide, South Australia
Years active	1960 onwards bi-annually, 2006 onwards annually
Inaugurated	1960
Previous event	February 24, 2012 (2012-02-24) - March 18, 2012 (2012-03-18)
Next event	February 15, 2013 (2013-02-15) - March 17, 2013 (2013-03-17)
Genre	Arts
Organised by	Adelaide Fringe Board
Website
www.adelaidefringe.com.au

The Adelaide Fringe is the largest annual arts festival in the Southern Hemisphere, held in the South Australian capital of Adelaide. For 24 days and nights during February and March, the annual open-access festival features more than 4,000 artists from around Australia and the world, featuring world premieres, hit shows and new artists. Over 900 events are staged in pop-up venues in parks, warehouses, lane-ways and disused buildings as well as established venues such as theatres, hotels, art galleries and cafes over the entire city.

The festival includes contemporary work in art forms spanning cabaret, comedy, circus and physical theatre, dance, film, theatre, puppetry, music, visual art and design. Adelaide Fringe begins with free opening night celebrations, including a street parade running down the centre of the city and parties at various venues. In the following three weeks the Adelaide Fringe is joined by WOMADelaide, a world music festival and the Adelaide Festival.

Street theatre artists from all over the world participate in four days and four nights of events as part of The Adelaide Fringe Street Theatre Festival.

The festival attracts interstate and overseas visitors: 6% percent of the Fringe’s 1,560,000 audience members are visitors to the city. As an open-access festival, anyone can perform or apply. Artists pay a one-off registration fee to the Fringe as well as pay the presentation costs of their performance, season, event and/or exhibition. To help participating artists present their work, the Adelaide Fringe provides information, facilitates and brings festival directors and producers from around the world to see artists' shows as part of the Honey Pot program.

The Adelaide Fringe is governed by the Adelaide Fringe Board. The Fringe and Festival of Arts are separate organisations, with different philosophies and intent. Artists from across the globe participate alongside home-grown talent, in all art forms. Adelaide Fringe also organises its own public events. The Adelaide Fringe does not actively seek out the events which form part of the Fringe Program and thus a vast variety of different performances can be seen.

History

The first Adelaide Fringe, in 1960, came about when a few artists decided to stage their own event in response to the exclusion of many artists from the curated Adelaide Festival of Arts. Activity recorded in 1960 included a mixture of 60 official and unofficial events. It was seen as an alternative to the 'mainstream' Adelaide Festival of Arts. The latter was seen to offer limited opportunity for local and smaller-scale artists. The Adelaide Fringe is an open access event, allowing anyone with ideas and enthusiasm to register in the program, and so to showcase their arts to the public. For many years the two events were inextricably linked and together created an atmosphere of electric excitement across the city.^{[citation needed]}

It continued to be held biannually, and in 1975 the AF became an incorporated association. In 2007, the AF became an annual event. The 2007 festival received funding from the state government of $500,000 and the change to an annual festival was described as an immediate success. From 2007 onwards, the Adelaide Fringe became an annual event in its own right.

In 2007, at the first annual Fringe, 130,000 tickets were sold through the FringeTIX box office system – with an additional 10,000 ticket sales by national ticketing partners. That years poster winner was Ryan Stephens

187,000 tickets were sold through the FringeTIX box office and their national ticketing partners in 2008. The final box office income was estimated to reach over $5.3 million – a majority of which revenue was passed back to Fringe artists. 281 Fringe venues sold tens of thousands of tickets on the door. Family Day became Family Weekend and doubled in size and attendances. The 2008 poster winner was Hat Morgan.

The following year, ticket sales equalled 2008’s Fringe with over 187,000 tickets sold through FringeTIX and other national ticketing partners (which doesn’t include tickets sold at the doors of 259 venues to walk-up Fringe-goers). In 2009, 2,800 artists brought life to 508 events in 250 venues across the city.The 2009 Adelaide Fringe featured 508 comedy, theatre, music, dance and visual art shows. The poster winner was David Blaiklock.

The Adelaide Fringe celebrated its 50th anniversary in 2010. Compared to the previous year ticket sales were 27% higher in 2010.

The 2010 poster winner was David Capriotti. In 2011, the Fringe Parade was cancelled due to rain. The 2012 festival ran from 24 February to 18 March. The advertising poster for 2012 was won by Sue Ninham.

Venues

The Adelaide Fringe is Australia's largest open access festival hosting thousands of artists from Adelaide, Australia and the world, all needing a space to present their work. Since the very first Fringe, venues across the city and surrounds have been supporting artists by providing or transforming their venues into visual and performing art spaces. In 2012, over 330 venues opened their doors to Fringe performing and visual artists. These venues ranged from the 2000 seat theatres to the corners and function rooms of pubs, clubs, council buildings, outdoor venues, churches, cinema’s and the odd alley way.

Because of Adelaide's very strict street layout within a square mile, venues are close together, forcing patrons to cross paths on the city streets. The city's surrounding parks provide venues outside of the established and converted venues within the city itself. With the Adelaide Festival and Adelaide Writers' Week all sharing the same spaces, there is significant opportunity for patrons to participate in events in all three festivals in those years they all run.

Ticket prices

The Fringe includes free and priced events. Details regarding the free Opening Night Street Party, Fringe Family events and more appear in the first few pages of the Fringe Guide, which is released online in December and in hard copy in January of each year. Priced events vary.

Artists

The Adelaide Fringe allows any type of artist, national or international, to perform, interact and play with their audiences. In 2012, over 920 performing and visual arts events were staged in over 320 venues across the city. Over 4000 artists registered, undertaking over 6500 individual performances, from 15 minute performances to multi-day events. There were over 1,560,000 attendances to Fringe events/venues across the 24 days of the festival.

Poster competition and launch

Amongst the festival's events is the announcement of the nation-wide poster competition winner, and the launch of the winning poster.

Parade

The opening night of the Fringe includes a parade through Adelaide city. The parade is free for groups to register to participate in, as well as for people to watch. Roads are blocked off and Fringe venues host opening night parties. A range of community organisations participate in the parade, ranging from Adelaide Roller Derby to the Royal Institution of Australia. The parade can be affected by Adelaide's extreme summer weather. It was cancelled in 2011 due to rain, while the 2012 parade happened on a 39°C day.

See also

• List of festivals in Australia

External links

• Adelaide Fringe
• Fringe Benefits
• Fringe Fever