This year marks 40 years since Next Wave was created. While a lot has changed in that time, our support for early-career artists and bold and experimental practice has not.

In 2024, we have a fresh Artistic Directorate, who are preparing to welcome their Kickstart artists.

We also have our Young Artistic Directorate, who are collectively curating some of our most exciting events ever – including an All School LAB 40th birthday celebration!

Here’s a quick look at what’s coming up in the first half of 2024:

Radical Hospitality: 剉冰 + equatorial fruit-opening party

Sat 3 Feb, 4pm – 6pm | Testing Grounds (Queen Victoria Market)
Many peoples within our archipelago have their own version of shaved ice dessert topped with fruit or other glutinous or sweetened topping. Come and eat them and chat with All School EXCHANGE artists Tiyan and M@ about equatorial fruits – and surrounding concerns – at the overlap of their current research as artists in residence. There will be fruit-opening, screening of video works and an artist talk about their ongoing research around equatorial thinking, heat, language and methods of embodiment. Our Radical Hospitality events are about shared feasts as a vehicle for creative exchange.
RSVP here.

PHOTO 2024 x Blak Dot – FUTURE RIVER: When the past flows (outdoor exhibition)

1–24 March | Brunswick Mechanics courtyard (as well as Brunswick Town Hall courtyard
BlakDot Gallery will exhibit four visuals the windows of Brunswick Mechanics as well as as a display in the forecourt – all featuring female First Nations artists. This exhibition re-images and re-memorialises what lies beneath the concrete slab—thousands of years of story and life obscured. It draws attention to the role of the city as a besiegement, and how, through artistic intervention, we can allow the past to flow into the future once more. The project is curated by Kimba Thompson and features work by Maree Clarke (Yorta Yorta/Wamba Wamba/Mutti Mutti/Boonwurrung), Julie Gough (Trawlwoolway), Peta Clancy (Bangerang) and Jody Haines (palawa).

FUTURE RIVER: International Women’s Day Performance

Fri 8 Mar, 6pm–8pm | Counihan Gallery and Brunswick Mechanics courtyard
Our Young Artistic Directorate are co-curating a party in partnership with Brunswick Music Festival. This event begins at the Counihan Gallery with music by SOVBLKPVSSY and movement artist MaggZ performing a creative response to the exhibition, and later moves to the Brunswick Mechanics Institute Courtyard for a performance by artist, activist and musician Aseel Tayah.

All School LAB

24 – 26 May 2024 | Various locations
This year Next Wave turns 40! To celebrate, we are putting together a three-day program of artists chats, performances, eats, drinks and chinwags that centre the joy of gathering while never missing an opportunity to gently flip some power dynamics! And you best believe we’ll be partying, with Next Wave’s Young Artistic Directorate curating the party of all futures. Here’s to the next 40 years of Next Wave!