WOW Festival

Bursting with live performances, interactive installations, incredible outdoor adventures and wondrous workshops, Casula Powerhouse Arts Centre's annual Way Out West (WOW) Festival returns this school holidays (10 -14 July 2019) for five days overflowing with crazy and creative family fun.

"From brand new kids' shows by leading entertainers, to crafty and educational workshops and free outdoor play, the WOW Festival returns in 2019 with a program brimming with adventure, discovery and just a little bit of magic," said Casula Powerhouse Arts Centre Director Craig Donarski.

"WOW Festival is about hands on fun and artistic exploration in all its forms. We have collected a huge array of wonderful activities and shows, all aimed at igniting imagination and sending kids on a creative journey of discovery. The 2019 WOW Festival program features over 230 chances to experience 18 performances and events, 22 workshops and four interactive installations, spread across 12 spaces in and around the Centre, over five days."

"Our program of shows are world class, with some of the very best entertainers on hand to keep kids engaged for hours at a time. But the Powerhouse also believes that art should be accessible to all, which is why free events make up a large part of the program, meaning effectively you could come to the Festival with a packed lunch, stay for the entire day busy with activities and not spend a cent," said Donarski.

Here are just some of the highlights for this year's WOW Festival:

FAMILY SHOWS

In Fire Bucket Elders Uncle Wes Marne (97years) and Uncle Max Dulumunmun Harrison with Moogahlin Performing Arts share their knowledge, wisdom and cheeky humour. Gather round the fire bucket to as these two master storytellers share dreamtime and creation moving backwards and forwards across place and time.

The Listies, Melbourne's maestros of kids' comedy are coming to the WOW Festival 2019 with a brand new show, Rolling on the Floor Laughing So Hard A Little Bit of Wee Comes Out! Packed with insane, interactive and irreverent escapades, this show will have audiences R.O.F.L.S.H.A.L.B.O.W.C.O (Rolling On The Floor Laughing So Hard A Little Bit Of Wee Comes Out)...bring a towel!

Another brand new show is Trash Test Dummies' Dummies Corp. With a rockin' soundtrack, unbelievable acrobatics and trademark Dummies frivolity, this circus-filled journey through the jungle is jam-packed with hilarity. Definitely not to be missed!

In an Australian premiere, Sydney-based collective Flatline present FIGURE OUT - a playful performance where dance, sound and drawing collide to expose the inner workings of the human body. Originally performed at Esplora, Malta's Interactive Science Centre in Kalkara as a part of the Malta International Arts Festival, this immersive show will have audiences' young and old seeing the body in a new light.

Step into the centre of a unique action adventure experience with Audio Play: The Turners. Equipped with a mobile phone and headphones players physically act out the story together, each guided by their own rich audio score and individualised instructions. This is a highly active and very immersive human tech experience; taking the imaginative, physical play that kids love.

Make the most of WOW Festival with Short + Hilarious, where three fabulous artists present three fantastic performances. Featuring a comedy magic show, a multi award winning ventriloquist and an educational adventure into the world of bubbles, these 30 minute shows are brimming with music, magic, and mayhem.

INTERACTIVE INSTALLATIONS

Casula Powerhouse's Turbine Hall is transformed into a giant maze of mystery with (A)MAZE. When kids enter (A)MAZE, they enter into a journey of light, sound, colour and surprise. With three rooms each having three encounters, they are all then separated by a labyrinth of transformations, (A)MAZE is a series of hidden adventures waiting to be discovered.

Orchestra Abstracta gives children the opportunity to create a unique orchestra of imagined sounds. Guitars, Piano's and even Harps are just some of the instruments kids can thread together to create a unique ensemble.

WORKSHOPS

Welcome to Art of Surprise, an all-encompassing art making experience for 4-12year olds. WOW has invited four contemporary artists to re-imagine and recreate the SWITCH Gallery into a site of surprises and delights. Learn a trick or two about cooking! Spiced with some stories at Radha's Kitchen; explore ideas of identity and culture by producing a symbol that resonates to an urban experience and/or childhood memory onto a satin mini-cape; draw with light using reflective materials in an accumulative collaborative installation; or get crafty and create fruity necklaces from repurposed materials.

WOW Festival favourite Colour Connect Create is back with four connected zones of creative encounters for ages 2-5. Here kids can create with slotting, folding, colouring, animating, mask making, 3D shapes…and much much more.

The WOW Festival Kids Reporters is a media training program for kid's 8-12years. Since 2011, CuriousWorks has been training kids in reporting techniques, video handling, and filming to document the Way Out West Festival at Casula Powerhouse Arts Centre.

Tiny tots are also catered for with an awesome program of contemporary art workshops for ages one and up. Bubs and Music is about introducing your children to the wonderful world of music. In this workshop, parents/carers get to make musical instruments, where they can create and learn all about the different aspects of music making. Bubs and Art is about introducing children to the wonderful magical art world. In this workshop, little ones get to explore paint and other mediums to make a creative imaginative artwork with their parents.

OUTDOOR PLAY

Way Out West Festival presents Outdoor Play Everyday! Each day at the WOW Festival kids of all ages can participate in free outdoor play. From multilingual storytelling, giant games of twister and even a virtual reality adventure, the Outdoor Play Everyday program is educational, free and lots of fun.

The WOW Festival is excited to welcome participants to its FREE Garden Program. The Garden Program is a series of workshops and events designed to inspire, inform and impress. Get dirty with worm farming and composting workshops, learn about native plants and potting at our bush tucker workshops or create a unique artwork using plants gathered on an informative walking tour.

In the hands of Junkyard Beats, ordinary household items are transformed into extraordinary musical instruments and unwanted junk comes alive in exciting and surprising ways! Junkyard Beats: The Box Show follows four characters during their daily activities in a world made of cardboard boxes and junk. The contents of an abandoned kitchen and wheelie bins become the greatest drum set in the world; Plastic bags are an amazing musical instrument and the human body becomes a unique sound machine.

This is just a tiny taste of a program bursting with creativity and play. So come one, come all to experience this most wondrous event out west, as Casula Powerhouse is transformed into an artistic playground packed with crazy and creative fun, explorations to embark on and brand new learning experiences.

Tickets will be available now via www.wayoutwestfestival.com.au