Feast Festival
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Feast Festival is a LGBTI Festival held annually in the South Australian capital of Adelaide. The event is one of Australia's four major queer festivals, alongside Perth's Pride Festival, Melbourne's Midsumma and the Sydney Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras.[citation needed]
Feast was founded in 1997 a by group of arts and community cultural workers. Margie Fischer, Damien Carey, Helen Bock and Luke Cutler worked together to create a community arts festival for the lesbian and gay community in Adelaide. In 1999, cabaret theatre performer Paul Capsis performed at the festival's opening concert.[1]
In November 2009, the lineup of singer/songwriters for Sing Out at the festival included Emily Davis, Vicki Bennett, and Ziggie Zertophf.[2] In 2011 approximately 48,000 people attended Feast events, with another 40,000 tuning into the live radio broadcast from Picnic in the Park with Joy 94.9. Overall the festivals broadcast exposure reached hundreds of thousands through radio and television exposure. Feast currently averages 5,000 visits to its website each month, increasing dramatically during September - November each year (15,000+ per month).
Financial Difficulties
Feast Festival has faced increased financial difficulties in recent years. It's accumulated deficit has more than doubled, from $29,521 in 2013 to $79,175 in 2004.[3] In May 2015, Feast Festival made it's Artistic Director, Catherine Fitzgerald, redundant in what was described as "a recent review of operational response to financial constraints".[4] The decision, and subsequent festival, received criticism for lack of representation of the LGBTIQ community, including from festival co-founder Helen Bock [5]
The Festival aims to keep a balance between government funding, business sponsorship, earned income, individual giving and fundraising in supporting its revenue needs for each Festival and currently receives funding support from government as follows:
- South Australian Government through Arts SA and the SA Tourism Commission.
- Local Government through the Adelaide City Council.
A range of sponsors and partners also contribute on an annual basis.
Feast are founder members of the newly formed Festivals Adelaide.
The Feast Festival is sponsored by, amongst others, the Adelaide City Council, South Australian Tourism Commission, Coopers Brewery, Arts SA, Blaze Magazine
See also
References
- ^ Susan Archdall (28 April 2001) From the outside, looking in. The Advertiser (Adelaide) Pg. 15
- ^ Jeff Crawford (11 November 2009) Sort of like Oprah to music. Portside Messenger Page 20.
- ^ https://www.acnc.gov.au/Document?Seqn=301820&Ikey=C11A65FC-1D46-42E9-B767-45BCF171C5A2&Aseqn=1229860&noleft=1
- ^ http://www.adelaidenow.com.au/entertainment/arts/feast-festival-sacks-artistic-director-catherine-fitzgerald-and-drops-fully-curated-program/news-story/d770ed251db8f883db31b69a2af1492c
- ^ https://radio.adelaide.edu.au/feast-festival-controversy/