Image: Mask Carnivale at Nelson Arts Festival 2024.

Reimagine Festival has just finished in Taranaki. Hawke’s Bay Arts Festival wrapped up on Sunday. Nelson Arts Festival AND Tauranga Arts Festival open today. Auckland Arts Festival announced their programme yesterday. Soon it’s going to be December (a festival in itself). January’s for music festivals, then will come Aotearoa New Zealand Festival of the Arts AND Fringe Festival in February, and so the year will start rolling. My brain is feeling stuffed, because even looking at one festival programme can be overwhelming. There are 50 shows and events in the Tauranga Arts Festival, and 28 in the Auckland Arts Festival programme. I’m not counting the rest.

So how is one to deal with the onslaught of potentially great things and not enough time or money for them all? Surely I’m not the only one who struggles, and so I thought, why not strategise?

When I was visiting those vast old European museums with a friend in my 20s, I would take forever in each room or hall, trying to take in each piece and coming away with a muddled mix in my head. He was a little more experienced and bored of stuffy grand museums than I was, and he had a suggestion to get himself out of constantly waiting for me. When you enter a room, quickly scan the works. A couple, or a few, will catch your eye. Go and spend time with these, and ignore the rest. Obviously, I was resistant. I always want to get the best value out of things, which on a basic level means trying to get as much as possible and not missing out. Perhaps the only thing that got me on board with the strategy was the fact that the museums were so big I’d never get around their entirety in a day. And so I scanned, selected and ignored.

The best way to do this for a festival programme is to have the printed pamphlet. You can flick through, dog ear and highlight. But if you haven't left your home-work-home prison recently, I guess the online versions will do, as long as you have a spot to save your shortlist. Sleep on it, and then buy your tickets the next day. If you think too much you’ll end up missing out.

If this sounds too hard, fine, I’ll share my own completely subjective shortlists!

Tauranga Arts Festival (on now!)

Damien Wilkins discussing his award-winning novel Delirious, in particular focuses on the final stages of life, loss, the comedy of the everyday.

Tangihanga, a drama-comedy where Kristyl Neho masterfully embodies over 30 characters.

Holding Ground, two dynamic dance works and a sensory terrain of light, sound, and movement.

Te Radar’s Cookbookery – have a laugh at our vintage food culture.

Waiata Mai, join the Tuatara Collective Choir at the Festival Garden.

Nelson Arts Festival (also on now!)

Body Story, the debut solo work by acclaimed dance artist Xin Ji.

Catherine Chidgey and Claire Mabey will chat about Chidgey’s new novel, The Book of Guilt.

Cinematographer, an immersive new show by Anthonie Tonnon.

Mana by Tāme Iti (it’s sold out, but worth emailing to get on the waitlist!).

Mask Carnivale – cute!!

Artist talk by John Vea on his show Seasonal Agreement that explores the complexities facing migrant workers in Aotearoa.

Auckland Arts Festival (March 2026)

Waiora Te Ūkaipō, a landmark piece of Aotearoa theatre following Hone, who moves his whānau  in search of a better life.

Dreaming from afar, an intimate grouping of visual artists from Aotearoa and overseas.

A solo exhibition by Tāmaki Makaurau-based Ammon Ngakuru.

Shanghai Symphony Orchestra, an historic collaboration of Eastern and Western traditions.

Werewolf, a horror-comedy experience that sold-out in Edinburgh.

A Place in the Sultan's Kitchen (or How to Make the Perfect One-Pot Chicken Curry), a sweeping family epic.

Marmite & Honey, a play set at a tangi over 24 hours.

Do you have your own strategy for making the most of an arts festival? Tell me about it! editor@thebigidea.co.nz

💥News on the wire

More magazines fall

Henry Oliver’s editorial for the latest issue of Metro reveals that he, food editor Charlotte Muru-Lanning (yep that’s the entire editorial staff), art director Sam Wieck, and commercial manager Lucy Janisch-Fitzgerald (yep, that’s actually ALL the staff on the payroll apart from a new general manager) will not be around for any future issues of the magazine. The first two were made redundant, and subsequently the remaining two resigned. Metro was a beautiful rarity in this day, age, and economy. A beautiful, fat, glossy, luxurious print magazine, with plenty of pages dedicated to arts and culture and the courage to cover the thorny political and social issues of our city. In other words, the best kind of magazine.

Though almost all its staff are gone, Metro has not folded. A note from the publisher in the magazine says that a pre-Christmas issue (departing editorial staff were not involved in this) is already underway. Board chair Sam Johnson told the Herald that “for now, we are engaging guest editors”. In an opinion piece on the weekend, The Spinoff editor Mad Chapman said what many of us onlookers are thinking: it seems those making decisions have no hands-on journalism experience, and guest editors don’t do the real work of making a magazine – they waltz into meetings with a few ideas, and then experienced staff do the real work behind the scenes. The 448th issue of Metro, with Oliver’s goodbye editorial, could well be the last proper issue of the magazine.

To add to the injury, yesterday Rebecca Wadey and Zoe Walker Ahwa, founders and editors of online magazine Ensemble bid the five-year project goodbye, at the same time declaring it the “most rewarding of our careers”. Ensemble is known primarily as a fashion magazine, which hasn’t stopped it from covering arts, culture and society. A few of its recent arts stories include: 

Not all is lost, but the reviewer in us might be 

A subversive, satirical short film from Awa Puna puts a queer lens on horror 
Rewind, repeat: 'Having it all, all, all' is a feminist archive on tape

When art finds its space

The artist's way to do New York City

Ensemble has been back in Wadey and Walker Ahwa’s ownership for a year, after a three-year stint under Stuff. While they say they’ve poured all their energy into adapting and refining the magazine, it proved not to be sustainable – emotionally, financially or creatively. Tragic. 

Judy Millar paired with high end NZ skincare brand

Judy Millar’s signature brushstrokes adorning the covetable packaging of new Emma Lewisham holiday gift sets prove that everything could, and should, be more beautiful – and that we should employ artists to make that happen. Of course it’s not about plastering art over everything and anything. Emma Lewisham is a NZ brand that is science-based, natural and pioneering progress in sustainability under a Climate Positive certification by Toitū Envirocare, and Millar says a shared “belief that how you create is inseparable from what you create” aligns the collaboration – she has lived off-grid for nearly four decades (!!).

A new essay collection shows Tāmaki Makaurau from many angles

Tāmaki Makaurau 2025: Essays on Life in Auckland is a chunky little book with 12 essays by writers in the city about the city. Edited by Damien Levi (Te Āti Haunui-a-Pāpārangi, Ngāti Tūwharetoa, Ngāpuhi) and published by Auckland City Libraries, the book invites readers to see different layers of Tāmaki Makaurau from different eyes. It feels like an antidote to the feeling (or fact) that everyone is leaving and Auckland sucks. If you’re here and want to listen to a few of the writers read their work or buy a book, the launch is tomorrow.

Fiona Samuel to spend three months in France as the 2025 Katherine Mansfield Menton Fellow

Fiona Samuel MNZM is an award-winning writer and director for television, theatre and film. She is known for consistently placing the lives and experiences of women at the centre of stories. The fellowship, managed by the Arts Foundation, allows a New Zealand writer access to the writing room in Villa Isola Bella where Katherine Mansfield once lived and worked in Menton, southern France for at least three months.

Emo really is back

Proto-emo bands of the late ‘90s and early ‘00s, Good Charlotte are on a world tour with Auckland as a stop in February, and they will be joined by Yellowcard. Given the cycles of fashion, the event might not look so different than it would have 20 years ago, bar some wrinkles here and there.

Official trailer for new Māori Gothic, Mārama, released

The trailer for Taratoa Stappard’s directorial debut is here, in anticipation of the film’s release in Aotearoa on 12 February 2026. Mārama has already screened in several festivals overseas, “a tremendous honour,” says Stappard. “Mārama is my Māori gothic love letter to our whenua, our tīpuna, and the stories that dwell in the shadows. To now return the film to Aotearoa, to the very place where it was born, makes this journey all the more meaningful”. Watch the trailer here

NZ artist wins grand prize at Larnaca Biennale

Interdisciplinary artist Karma Barnes has been awarded the prize at the largest and most recognised international art event in Cyprus. Her large-scale installation, CO-Lapses, is an scaled-up interpretation of the mud architectures built by wasps that inhabit her studio. Using 31 earth pigments and oxides locally sourced from Cyprus, she constructed suspended vessels that slowly release fine layers of limestone sand and pigment. The work, influenced by biologist Janine Benyus’s theory of biomimicry, uses natural systems not as symbols but as frameworks for sustainable design and adaptive thinking. 

Breton Dukes is awarded the NZSA Peter and Dianne Beatson Fellowship

“It's hard being a writer. The self-doubt. The blank page – that blinking cursor! And let's be frank, this government and most of the previous ones don't care/haven't cared about the arts,” says Dukes in possibly the most relatable series of sentences ever uttered. Lucky for him, he’s won recognition and $10,000 so that he can set aside time to work on a collection of short stories.

Māori theatre company, Taki Rua Productions, unveils 2026 programme, Ake, Ake, Ake!

The 2026 season for the longest-running and pre-eminent Māori theatre company, based in Wellington, includes Māori and Pasifika storytelling, collaborations, a national tour, world premieres, and emerging and acclaimed talent. “It's a movement that will take our stories to the heart of our communities, from the biggest stages to high school halls, ensuring our unique voices resonate across the motu,” says chief executive Craig Fransen. The shows are:

Whakapapa by Willy Craig Fransen starring Maaka Pohatu and Hariata Moriarty (world premiere).

Kahukura Ao Lelei by Renee Iosefa directed by Anapela Polataivao (world premiere).

Rere Atu Taku Poi by Bea Joblin (based on the book by Tangaroa Paul).

Waenga, which will tour high schools across Wellington, Christchurch, and Dunedin.

Largest audiovisual digitisation project in NZ has finished

Over 400,000 items from the collections held by Ngā Taonga Sound & Vision, the National Library of New Zealand Te Puna Mātauranga o Aotearoa, and Archives New Zealand Te Rua Mahara o te Kawanatanga have been preserved through the project Utaina. 

The project focused on magnetic media (such as video and audio tapes) at risk of deterioration and obsolescence. Among the material digitised are TV shows Country Calendar, Koha, Shortland Street and Asia Downunder; sound recordings made by the NZ Broadcasting Service; footage of The Beehive being constructed, the Polynesian Festival in 1975; and an alternative recording of Ruru Karaitiana's wartime song “Blue Smoke”.

👔 Human resources

Te Papa restructure process is underway

Last Friday, RNZ revealed that 19 of 44 management roles are proposed to be axed under a restructure at Te Papa, and some new roles created. 10 roles have been reconfirmed, including those of the co-leaders, chief executive Courtney Johnston and kaihautū Arapata Hakiwai. This is the first of two proposals and two stages of restructuring. The first stage, focusing on tier two and three managers is to be completed this year, and the second, on the rest of the team, early next.

The restructure is tied to rising operational costs, including maintenance of ageing and highly specialised buildings.

Comings and goings

Anne Filimoehala has been appointed the Music Director at Sistema Aotearoa, a fifteen-year-old programme that provides free, inclusive orchestral music education to children at Ōtara Music Arts Centre. At the same time, they farewell outgoing Music Director Sarah Spence after about three years. Filimoehala was raised in a musical family, and entered the world of brass bands at the age of six. 

👀 Further reading and watching

We published an excellent and practical guide on how to tour without wrecking the Earth. 

Singer, theatre-maker and pacific storyteller Lila Crichton shares how he was born an introvert but raised to be an extrovert in his Shameless Plug.

Nick Ascroft, a poet, documents a week of not writing poetry over at The Spinoff.

Penny Ashton hated Shakespeare for much of her life, but now new love is sprung from old hate.

There’s a fabulous behind-the-scenes doco of the making of 50 Ways of Saying Fabulous, a poignant 2005 film about growing up gay in small-town New Zealand. “Big personalities, sensitive material, and budgetary constraints made it a complex shoot – this featurette is unusually honest and raw for a behind-the-scenes look,” says NZ On Screen writer Rosie Howells.

Claire Mabey and Stacy Gregg report back from two writers and readers festivals last weekend, Kupu Māori Writers Festival in Rotorua and Dunedin Readers & Writers Festival.

📧 Say hi!

Did you hate this? Love this? Do you have news, a scoop, or an otherwise interesting tidbit you’d like me to write about? Email me! 

editor@thebigidea.co.nz