Since its inception, Perth Festival has been delivering a diverse arts program designed to attract people from all walks of life.

In 1953, The University of Western Australia’s Professor Fred Alexander had a vision for a ‘festival for the people’.

Professor Alexander, the founding Head of UWA’s Department of History, wanted to create an event for a community hungry for cultural nourishment after World War II.

“Keep up your standards and seek the best that is available to you wherever it may be found; but don’t allow the Festival to become the exclusive preserve of the ultra-highbrows who might be tempted to forget that it is primarily a festival for the people of Perth,” Professor Alexander said.

On 3 January 1953, the Festival opened with a Perth Repertory Club production of Dark of the Moon at UWA’s Sunken Garden.

The program also included British director Michael Langham’s production of Richard III, which had a cast of more than 80 people and unprecedented community engagement — local businesses contributed equipment, individuals made donations, St George’s Cathedral choristers filed through the coronation scene and the military provided explosives for a battlefield scene that spilled out into the audience.

The inaugural Festival featured concerts, plays and films under the stars at UWA's Somerville Auditorium. It attracted 42,000 people and met its £14,000 budget without extra UWA or Government grants.

The Festival has been celebrating Perth and Western Australia for almost 70 years and will continue to make a substantial impact, and drive innovation and social change in 2023.

"Our community is so privileged to witness the profound generosity of Noongar custodians who continue to share stories of their spiritual connection to this place, and who continue to welcome stories from around the globe to our shared home."Festival’s artistic director Iain Grandage

The Festival’s artistic director Iain Grandage faced unprecedented interruption to programming over the past two years due to the COVID-19 pandemic but says he found a silver lining.

“Inside the circumstances that we get dealt by the world is opportunity,” Grandage says.

“Already in the pre-pandemic 2020 Festival, we were leaning into identifying with place, so the circumstances of being a bubble inside a bubble, compared to the rest of the world, allowed us to continue to investigate and celebrate the stories of here. That has felt wonderful.”

Grounded on Whadjuk Noongar Boodjar, the Festival in 2023 continues the tradition of storytelling and cultural expression that has been practised on Country for thousands of years.

The 2023 theme is Djinda (Stars) and a spectacular free opening event will use cutting-edge technology and ancient storytelling to tell the Noongar story of Djoondal, the spirit woman with the long white hair who created the Milky Way and whose name lives on in Joondalup.

Over three nights audiences are invited to picnic at Lake Joondalup before enjoying Djoondal, an immersive show that links the stories of the cosmos and the beauty of the lake and its natural surrounds.

From the earliest years, the Festival has worked with world-class creative teams, linking WA artists with leading international artists and now borders have reopened that tradition of collaborations continues.

The Kronos Quartet is returning to Perth and has collaborated with Noongar composer Maatakitj (the moniker of Dr Clint Bracknell, who graduated with a PhD from UWA in 2016). The string quartet and the music-maker will deliver a world premiere under a sea of stars in Perth Concert Hall.

For Grandage, a cellist who graduated from UWA with a Bachelor of Music in 1994 and recipient of an Honorary Doctorate in 2017, music is integral to the performances he programs.

“I am always drawn towards works that have a strong musical element — be it theatre or dance, visual arts or contemporary music,” Grandage explains.

His love of music, fondness for collaborations and colourful artistic expression come together in the program’s big drawcard, Icelandic musician Björk’s Cornucopia.

^{Bjork Cornucopia}

Cornucopia will be a visually spectacular event with futuristic screens and wild images of nature that comes alive with her music, as she performs live alongside musicians and choirs of flutes and voices.

“There is an 18-voice choir made up of locals who will get to perform alongside Björk,” Grandage says. “Those kinds of moments, and the opportunities they represent are not only beautiful, but are emblematic of what the Festival does best — creating opportunity and celebrating excellence.”

The artistic director has programmed a series of music events around Björk’s show.

“That is when the Kronos Quartet are here, there is an extraordinary John Cage reinvention (The Cage Project) with Australian percussionist, composer and sound artist Matthias Schack-Arnott, and Linda May Han Oh is returning home to WA from New York with Ephemeral Echoes, a brand-new commission that is part of Genevieve Lacey’s Finding Our Voice project," he says.

Grandage, who has appeared on stage during past Festivals for Black Swan Theatre Company shows The Merry-go-round in the Sea, Cloudstreet and Plainsong, has also included a strong theatre element in the program.

“We open the Festival with Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde from the Sydney Theatre Company,” he says.

This adaptation of Robert Louis Stevenson’s gothic mystery has been transformed for the stage through live video and blurs the lines between good and bad and the artist and the audience.

And Black Swan State Theatre Company will present, Cyrano, Melbourne Theatre Company’s version of Cyrano de Bergerac. The reimagining of Edmond Rostand’s classic play by WAAPA graduate Virginia Gay is a gender-flipped retelling packed with music, wit and romance.

^{Virginia Gay, Cyrano}

The vast variety of theatre, dance, fine and contemporary music, and visual arts included in the Festival continues to showcase local creators.

Evenings under the stars return with films at UWA’s Somerville Auditorium and this season opens with the Australian premiere of Tim Winton’s Blueback, a classically Western Australian story adapted for the big screen by Robert Connolly. The Literature and Ideas program will pay homage to Djinda (Stars) and bring together writers, artists, comics, musicians, food critics and even a reality television star or two.

“We’re the privileged recipients of public money and part of the duty that comes with that is not only to be representative of a diversity of voices but also to generate and produce events which are free and accessible to audiences who are not necessarily attracted to the arts,” Grandage says.

The Festival appoints artistic directors for four-year tenures but due to the restrictions imposed by the pandemic Grandage’s position was extended for an extra year.

“My extension has meant that as we emerged from restrictions, I have had not one but two Festivals to curate with this renewed sense of international connection. And with those connections re-established, both Festivals are overflowing with extraordinary works of art,˝he explains.

Grandage hopes his and the Festival’s legacy will be to continue to host events that have broad appeal and engage community as well as recognising the stories of First Nation peoples.

“Our community is so privileged to witness the profound generosity of Noongar custodians who continue to share stories of their spiritual connection to this place, and who continue to welcome stories from around the globe to our shared home.” he says.

“The Festival celebrates this joining of the local to the international as we welcome back the world.”

Perth Festival runs from February 10 to March 5. More information at perthfestival.com.au