Arts
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Welcome to ABR Arts, home to some of Australia's best arts journalism. We review film, theatre, opera, music, television, art exhibitions – and more. Reviews remain open for one week before being paywalled.
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Recent reviews
The birth of a new opera is always exciting. Unlike a play or a sonata, an opera brings together a variety of art forms, with performers and creatives drawn from many different backgrounds. The libretto of Christopher Sainsbury’s The Visitors draws on a new, more gender-balanced version of an existing play, Jane Harrison’s The Visitors (2020), currently running in Sydney and Wollongong.
... (read more)Photography has held humanity in its thrall since its nascent years. Celebrated and contested, the photograph is said to have inherent power, making it both a vital, and also dangerous, medium. This exceptional and ambitious new exhibition at the NGV, Photography: Real and Imagined, illuminates why we have an unwavering fascination.
... (read more)Sophie Rowell’s first year as Melbourne Chamber Orchestra’s Artistic Director continues to impress with its attractive and intelligent programming and strong musical leadership on stage.
... (read more)Sometimes, through no deliberate strategy on the creators’ part, a film taps the Zeitgeist and takes off. Writer-director Noora Niasari’s début feature, Shayda, a very personal film that explores the courage and resilience of an Iranian woman escaping domestic violence in Melbourne, was already in post-production in September 2022 when the women-led uprising erupted in Iran, after the killing of Mahsa Amini by the morality police known officially as the Guidance Patrol.
... (read more)