Events (12)
ABR Cultural Tours | Vienna 2024
ABR is delighted to present regular cultural tours in partnership with Academy Travel.
ABR Vienna Tour 2024 (sold out)
15-27 October 2024
‘The 2023 ABR tour of Vienna and its museums and galleries was led superbly by Peter Rose and Christopher Menz. Based at an excellent inner-city hotel, the tour was complemented by premium seats to two operas at the Vienna State Opera and several world-class concerts, including the Vienna Philharmonic at the famous Musikverein. This was an outstanding experience for lovers of fine art, architecture and music.”
Dr Alastair Jackson AM
This most successful tour was led by Christopher Menz, ABR’s Development Consultant and a former Director of the Art Gallery of South Australia.
The focus of the thirteen-day residential tour was art and music. It focused on the spectacular collections amassed by the Habsburgs over centuries, the musical heritage of Haydn, Mozart, Schubert and Beethoven, and the striking modernist architecture of the city. The tour also included excursions to Schönbrunn, Klosterneuburg and the Wachau Valley. The musical program included six performances in Vienna’s finest venues – the State Opera, the Musikverein and the Konzerthaus – and featured Australian artists Simone Young, Nicole Car and Barrie Kosky.
To find out more about the tour visit Academy Travel’s website.
ABR Cultural Tours | Adelaide Festival 2024
ABR is delighted to present regular cultural tours in partnership with Academy Travel.
ABR Adelaide Festival Tour 2024
1–9 March 2024
Following on from our successful 2022 and 2023 Adelaide Festival tours, ABR and Academy Travel hosted another cultural tour to Adelaide to coincide with Adelaide Writers’ Week and the best of the 2024 Adelaide Festival.
Inaugurated in 1960, Writers’ Week and the Festival are unmissable highlights on Australia’s cultural calendar. Through ABR participants enjoy special access to Writers’ Week events and some of the featured writers. Academy Travel is the only travel company to be a partner sponsor of the Adelaide Festival, guaranteeing access to excellent tickets and the opportunity to meet artists and directors.
There was also time to enjoy the collection and Festival exhibition at the Art Gallery of South Australia and trips to the Penfolds Magill Estate and the Adelaide Hills. Accommodation was at the Intercontinental Hotel, adjacent to Writers’ Week and Festival venues.
The tour was led by ABR Editor and CEO Peter Rose – an award-winning author – and by Christopher Menz, popular Academy Travel tour leader and former Director of the Art Gallery of South Australia.
This was a nine-day tour and the group was limited to just twenty participants.
ABR Cultural Tours | Vienna 2023
ABR is delighted to present regular cultural tours in partnership with Academy Travel.
ABR Vienna Tour 2023
13–24 October 2023
Following on from our successful pre-pandamic international tours, ABR and Academy Travel hosted a cultural tour to Vienna in late 2023.
Vienna is city of palaces and gardens, museums and music, tradition and modernity. For more than four hundred years it was the jewel in the glittering imperial crown of the Hapsburgs.
The city’s wealth, at its zenith, is illustrated in its magnificent architecture, extraordinary collections of fine and decorative art, and a musical legacy that includes some of the greatest names of classical music. As the empire waned, the city embraced modernity with the revolutionary art and architecture of the Secessionists and Sigmund Freud’s work in psychoanalysis.
Our 12-day residential tour, led by art historian Christopher Menz and ABR Editor Peter Rose, explored the city in depth, following in the footsteps of Mozart and Beethoven, Otto Wagner and Gustav Klimt, and took us into the surrounding countryside as we cruised the mighty Danube to the beautiful Wachau Valley and down to Bratislava.
Of course, in this city of music, our tour also included best possible seats to four selected performances.
ABR Cultural Tours | Adelaide Festival 2023
ABR is delighted to present regular cultural tours in partnership with Academy Travel.
ABR Adelaide Festival Tour 2023
3–11 March 2023
Following on from our successful 2022 Adelaide Festival Tour, ABR and Academy Travel hosted another cultural tour to Adelaide to coincide with Adelaide Writers’ Week and the best of the 2023 Adelaide Festival.
Inaugurated in 1960, Writers’ Week and the Festival are unmissable highlights on Australia’s cultural calendar. Through ABR guests enjoyed special access to Writers’ Week events and some of the featured writers. Academy Travel is the only travel company to be a partner sponsor of the Adelaide Festival, guaranteeing access to excellent tickets and the opportunity to meet artists and directors.
There was also time to enjoy the collection and Festival exhibition at the Art Gallery of South Australia and trips to the Penfolds Magill Estate and the Adelaide Hills. Accommodation was at the Intercontinental Hotel, adjacent to Writers’ Week and Festival venues.
This was a nine-day tour and the group was limited to just twenty participants.
Past ABR Cultural Tours
ABR is delighted to present regular cultural tours in partnership with Academy Travel.
2024 Vienna Tour
This most successful tour was led by Christopher Menz, ABR’s Development Consultant and a former Director of the Art Gallery of South Australia.
The focus of the thirteen-day residential tour was art and music. It focused on the spectacular collections amassed by the Habsburgs over centuries, the musical heritage of Haydn, Mozart, Schubert and Beethoven, and the striking modernist architecture of the city. The tour also included excursions to Schönbrunn, Klosterneuburg and the Wachau Valley. The musical program included six performances in Vienna’s finest venues – the State Opera, the Musikverein and the Konzerthaus – and featured Australian artists Simone Young, Nicole Car and Barrie Kosky.
2024 Adelaide Tour
March 2024
ABR was delighted to host a nine-day tour of Adelaide for ABR Patrons and supporters in partnership with Academy Travel. The visit from March 1–9 was timed to coincide with the very best of Adelaide Festival and Writers’ Week in 2024.
More information and photographs from the 2024 tour.
2023 Vienna Tour
October 2023
ABR was delighted to host a twelve-day tour of Vienna for ABR Patrons and supporters in partnership with Academy Travel. The visit from October 13–24 was led by art historian Christopher Menz and ABR Editor Peter Rose.
More information and photographs from the 2023 tour.
2023 Adelaide Festival Tour
March 2023
ABR was delighted host a nine-day tour of Adelaide for ABR Patrons and supporters in partnership with Academy Travel. The visit from March 3–11 was timed to coincide with the very best of Adelaide Festival and Writers’ Week in 2023.
More information and photographs from the 2023 tour.
2022 ABR Cultural Tour of Victoria
12–19 October 2022
Australian Book Review and Academy Travel were delighted to present an eight-day tour of Victoria. The visit to Victoria's regional galleries from 12 to 19 October involved visits to wonderful modern and contemporary collections at Heide and TarraWarra. Visits to galleries are complemented with visits to historic sites, such as Maldon and Barwon Park, and the landscapes that have inspired generations of artists, from the Dandenongs, to the Mornington Peninsula and the distinctively Australian bush of the goldfields.
2022 Adelaide Festival Tour
March 2022
ABR was delighted host a nine-day tour of Adelaide for ABR Patrons and supporters in partnership with Academy Travel. The visit from March 5–13 was timed to coincide with the very best of Adelaide Festival and Writers’ Week in 2022.
More information and photographs from the 2022 Tour.
2018 ABR German Cultural Tour
June 2018
ABR’s third international cultural tour, in partnership with Academy Travel, took us to Germany. The two-week tour was led by Christopher Menz and Peter Rose.
More information and photographs from the 2018 tour.
2017 ABR UK Cultural Tour
June 2017
ABR’s second international tour, in partnership with Academy Travel, was a twelve-day Shakespeare-themed visit to England.
More information and photographs from the 2017 tour.
2016 ABR US Cultural Tour
September 2016
Australian Book Review’s sixteen-day US tour – led by Peter Rose and Christopher Menz – took us from Washington, DC to New York City. It was the first of its kind undertaken by the magazine and was undertaken in partnership with Academy Travel.
ABR Adelaide Festival Tour 2022
Australian Book Review looks forward to a very different year for the arts from 2020–21. To mark the imminent reopening, we were delighted to announce a nine-day visit to Adelaide in 2022 for ABR Patrons and supporters. The tour was led by Peter Rose (Editor of ABR) and Christopher Menz (former Director of the Art Gallery of South Australia).
The visit from March 5–13 was timed to coincide with the very best of Adelaide Festival and Writers’ Week in 2022. For several years, ABR has worked with Academy Travel to create stimulating international tours for its supporters, and we will once again be working with them. Academy Travel has generously decided to support the Festival by becoming partner-level sponsors – the only travel company to do so. This gives them, and ABR, access to the best tickets to performances and the opportunity to meet artists at the Festival.
ABR had a strong presence at Writers’ Week, also hosting a reception. ABR has close links with many writers on the program.
ABR Cultural Tour to Germany 2018
Munich to Berlin: Art, music, & literature
Australian Book Review in Germany
June 2–15, 2018
ABR’s third international cultural tour, in partnership with Academy Travel, took us to Germany. Once again the tour was led by Peter Rose, ABR Editor and CEO, and Christopher Menz, ABR Development Consultant and former gallery director. The two week tour commenced in Munich at the beginning of June and then headed north, visiting Bayreuth, Weimar, Dresden, and Berlin where it concluded. It was a great success with a marvellous itinerary that included walking tours and visits to art galleries, museums, and libraries, as well as taking in opera and musical performances, capped off by major literary event at the Australian Embassy in Berlin. The highlights were many but included visits to the Glyptothek, Alte, and Neue Pinakotheks in Munich; Goethe’s House and the Duchess Anna Amalia Library in Weimar; and the magnificent collections and buildings of Dresden (including the rebuilt Frauenkirche) and Berlin. Among some great opera performances, we were fortunate hear Simone Young twice, first conducting Janáček’s From the House of the Dead in Munich and then a superlative Tosca, staring Elena Stikhina, in Berlin. Other musical highlights in Berlin were Offenbach’s Bluebeard at the Komische Opera and a concert by the Berlin Philharmonic in Simon Rattle’s final season, which included the world première of Notturno inquieto by Brett Dean. During the final week, the Australian Embassy in Berlin hosted a special literary event ‘Australians in Germany – A Cultural Exchange’ at which writer Anna Funder and artist Brook Andrew were in conversation with Peter Rose. Around one hundred guests enjoyed the stimulating exchange and the Embassy’s hospitality.
ABR Cultural Tour to the UK 2017
Shakespeare: Australian Book Review in England
June 14–25, 2017
ABR’s second international tour, in partnership with Academy Travel, was a twelve-day Shakespeare-themed visit to England. We visited Stratford-upon-Avon, the Glyndebourne Opera Festival, and London. Highlights included performances of Antony and Cleopatra and Salome by the RSC in Stratford, Brett Dean's new opera Hamlet in its premiere season at Glyndebourne, and Romeo and Juliet at Shakespeare's Globe in London. The tour included a fascinating walking tour of Stratford, as well as visits to Charleston, house of Vanessa Bell and Duncan Grant, and to Middle Temple Hall, where Twelfth Night was performed in 1602. In London we also visited the National Portrait Gallery, The Wallace Collection, the Courtauld Institute and the British Library. The tour was led by Peter Rose and Christopher Menz.
Endorsements from ABR’s 2016 US tour.
‘My recent experience travelling on the east coast of the United States with the inaugural ABR tour group was a truly exceptional one. The knowledge and expertise of the tour leaders meant our itinerary took us to places, and even introduced us to people, not usually accessible to ordinary travellers. In all, it was truly memorable!’
‘ABR’s small group tour to the United States in 2016 focused on literature, history, art and theatre. The program was well-thought-out, varied and balanced. The tour leaders were attuned to particular interests of individual group members and helped them where necessary to further explore those interests in the different venues we visited. One of the excellent features was the number of private viewings and guided tours specially tailored for our group.’
ABR Cultural Tour to the USA 2016
Australian Book Review in the United States
Australian Book Review’s seventeen-day US tour – led by Peter Rose and Christopher Menz – took us from Washington, DC to New York City. It was the first of its kind undertaken by the magazine. Our aim was to take ABR on the road with a party of keen readers and supporters. The tour began at the Australian Embassy in Washington, where the Editor was in conversation with Geraldine Brooks (newly gonged at the Ambassador’s residence an hour earlier) and Anna Funder, before a capacity audience.
Along the way we visited writers’ homes (Emily Dickinson, Mark Twain, Louisa May Alcott, and Edith Wharton’s opulent The Mount), great libraries (Morgan, Beinecke, Library of Congress, the New York Public Library), and several new or reopened art museums, including the Met Breuer and the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York, and the magnificent Art Museums in Cambridge, as well as several museums that weren’t known to everyone in the group (Smithsonian American Art Museum, The Phillips Collection, Wadsworth Atheneum, Philip Johnson’s Glass House, Yale Center for British Art, and the Clark in Williamstown, with Tadao Ando’s superb new extension).
There was also much theatre and opera, all in a spirit of enquiring conviviality. We met writers, librarians, publishers, journalists, curators, and diplomats. Two highlights on our penultimate day in New York were visits to the offices of the New York Review of Books (where Peter Rose and Robert Silvers exchanged copies of their magazines) and Farrar, Straus and Giroux, whose president and publisher, Jonathan Galassi, spoke about his new books and his keen interest in Australian writers.
Photographs from ABR's US tour
Proust and Montaigne
Proust and Montaigne – Writing the Self, May 15 at 6.p.m
Francophiles, essayists, and Proustians will not want to miss a joint ABR and Melbourne Library Services event to be held in the East Melbourne Library on Wednesday, 15 May (6 p.m.). Noted French scholars and enthusiasts Véronique Duché and Colin Nettelbeck (who reviews Camus’s Algerian Chronicles for us in the May issue) will be in discussion about Montaigne and Proust, with particular references to convergences in their remarkable works. This is a free event, but reservations are essential: rsvp@australianbookreview.com.au.
Please note this event is now booked out.