The idea of the outsider is, of course, a concept shared by all living beings; the jellyfish and the silverback gorilla alike have trained themselves to distrust a stranger. But there is something particular about the Australian suspicion of otherness, a ruddy and avuncular mask that hides an abiding, almost pathological, wariness...

In this fortnight's Update: Young cast announced for STC's Lord of the Flies; Solaris being set to stage at Malthouse Theatre; Cast revealed for Opera Australia’s new Ring Cycle; NGV releases 30,000 HQ images to the public; giveaways, and more!

Some of the fascinating, indeed, frustrating aspects of the operas of Claudio Monteverdi include the lack of certainty in regard to both the authenticity of the various musical sources that have survived, and to exactly how these operas were performed, factors that influence performance choices made today ...

In 1959, Miles Davis entered Columbia’s 30th Street Studio in New York, with his sextet, and recorded what many consider to be the greatest jazz album of all time: Kind of Blue. It was an inspired idea to program a performance of this music, in celebration of the album’s sixtieth anniversary, at the twenty-second Melbourne International Jazz Festival ...

What makes this Monet exhibition different from any other Monet exhibition? This was the question at the forefront of my mind as I approached the National Gallery of Art’s exhibition Monet: Impressionism Sunrise. As one would expect, it is an exhibition about painting – colour, brushstroke, the rendering of light and dark by artists who ...

In this fortnight's Update: Opera Australia announces digital Ring Cycle; Paul Kildea named new Artistic Director of Musica Viva; ABR's new column, Epiphany; Fogarty Literary Award winner announced; Griffith Review names winners of The Novella Project; the ABR FAN poll; and giveaways!

‘When I see a flower, it reminds me of who I am,’ says poet and performer Edwin Lee Mulligan, staring at the audience. ‘Others can stop my dignity but can’t stop my bloom.’ So begins Ngarlimbah, the first performance in a triple bill of solo works by Marrugeku, an Indigenous dance company based in Sydney and Broome ...

‘Terrible rage.’ It starts as a question; rhetorical, perhaps. ‘Terrible rage.’ It grows into a statement of fact, an undeniable proof. ‘Terrible rage. Terrible rage. Terrible rage.’ Eventually – in a slow but frightening crescendo, followed by an equally slow but heart-wrenchingly pathetic decrescendo ...

With the release of Rocketman, Dexter Fletcher’s free-wheeling, surrealist musical saluting Sir Elton Hercules John, it’s clear the rock-and-roll biopic Hollywood’s new idée fixe. The film follows the release of Bohemian Rhapsody (2018), the award-winning celebration of Freddie Mercury ...

On 24 May 2019, an excited Melbourne audience witnessed a night of spectacular entertainment and magnificent music in the Australian première of Rossini’s 1825 opera Il Viaggio a Reims, exuberantly reimagined by Damiano Michieletto. Il Viaggio is an opera with multiple backstories. It was Rossini’s first commission ...