Our festival spark continues

Perth Festival, founded and brought to you by UWA

Find out more

In 1953 UWA Professor Fred Alexander brought to life his vision of a ‘festival for the people’

As with UWA’s involvement with the community, the Festival has been growing ever since. From its humble beginnings as a community arts experiment to the international extravaganza it’s become, Perth Festival has always been a pride and joy of our university. Perth Festival now stands as Australia’s premier curated arts festival and one of the greatest in the world.

Be inspired – join us on campus and across Perth for the 2021 Festival season.

UWA - Proud founder of the Perth Festival.
Sommerville auditorium entrance in the evening

Lotterywest Films at UWA Somerville

For more than half a century, Perth Festival has presented award-winning, first-run world films at the University’s picturesque UWA Somerville Auditorium. As glorious summer sunsets coax our imaginations into the evening, bring a picnic and sit back with friends and strangers alike to share cinematic dreams full of new voices, new stories and new ways of seeing the world under the stars. The films run from late November 2020 to April 2021.

Learn more about the history of one of the amazing Perth Festival venues at UWA's Somerville Auditorium.

Contemporary dance routine

Start your Perth Festival adventure here!

Find out whats on

Artistic vision

Our Time. Our Place. This is what our art should speak of. This is where our heart resides.

The 2020 — 23 Perth Festivals will be celebrations of place – our city, our river, our State and our state-of-mind. They will be inclusive and immersive – euphoric affirmations of who we are and where we stand.

We affirm the primacy of Indigenous culture, a culture that sings the songs of our very geography – Noongar Boodjar.

Over the next four years, we will capture an ever‐expanding orbit of stories from the local to the global. Our Festivals will be irreverent, playful, compelling and honest. They will speak to everyone. They will reflect the vast array of cultures and circumstances in contemporary Australia and be the glue that binds people together in the face of divisive nationalism and individualism.

We will broaden the Festival footprint across metropolitan Perth to present events and re-imagine traditional venues in unexpected ways.

The Festival will expand its year-round contribution to Perth’s cultural life and be central to supporting the next generation of creative thinkers. We will commission and present works that give voice to this generation and we will commission acclaimed national and international artists to collaborate with our local artists.

We will commission and present works at the cutting edge of technology, namely in the virtual realm. But also to honour and develop the deep traditions of Festival’s presentations – free large-scale opening events, its fine music program, its films.

Our aspiration is to create a Festival for all – to present art that speaks to many, which balances popularity with integrity and creates an inescapable sense of celebration for everyone.

It’ll be ours.

Iain Grandage
Artistic Director