Image Credit: Craig Gaston
The Castlemaine Fringe Festival brings its signature creativity to the State Festival with It’s A Kind of Wonder - a wearable art exhibition that transforms fashion into fantasy. Curated by Jody Galvin, Azzy Jay, Kya Moore, Ellen Doyle, Madeleine Somers, Martin John Lee, Andi Herman, Melissa Clark, Michelle Newton, and Kaz McMullan, the exhibition showcases […]
We are born with an innate drive to play. Ask someone to remember how they played as a child and it’s like unlocking a cupboard full of treasures and surprises. Play is necessary to lead a balanced life, yet as the pace of daily life accelerates, we are playing less – both as children and […]
Created by Black Hole Theatre, Someone in the Dark is an immersive adventure for children and families - a gently spooky, wonder-filled performance about facing fears and finding courage. Set in the wild and designed to be experienced as a small group journey, the work combines puppetry, soundscape, and visual storytelling. Children step into a […]
Daydreaming subverts the world - Raoul Vaneigem, The Revolution of Everyday Life. The Situationist Travel Agency (STAA) continues the tradition of subverting and repurposing city maps, adopted by the Situationist International in 1957. At STAA, we play with the conventions and banality of international travel. The familiar and yet strange spaces in between here and […]
Pause, ponder… and get making at Buda this State Festival. In the Company of Small Things is a series of exhibitions and installations that invite audiences to slow down and look closer. This series of four workshops are led by key members of the Buda team – Sarah Frazer, House Curator and Ryan Garratt, Garden […]
The installation concept, developed by two local Castlemaine artists, Alvin Darcy (Yorta Yorta and Taungurung, Ngarigo and Walbunja) and Brodie Ellis, has both artists working in in parallel. They created two independent installations - exhibited in dialogue - while researching the Leanganook/Mt Alexander mountain site on Djaara Country in Central Victoria. This parallel practice approach […]
Orchestra of Extinction is a long term project in which Keegel and her collaborator sound artist Amanda King explore the habitat of threatened species. During immersive field trips they gather audio visual material that encapsulates each habitat as well as environmental traces such as plant saps, beeswax, soil and leaves. What they discover is then […]
In order to effect change, you need a groundswell, a groundswell of opinion, a surge of emotion, a desire for new thinking. This exhibition celebrates artists who want to build a groundswell for change whether that be environmental, cultural, personal or political. The exhibition pairs historical objects including embroidery, ceramics and metalwork from the Castlemaine […]
Pause, ponder… and go rummaging at Buda this State Festival. In the Company of Small Things is a series of exhibitions and installations that invite audiences to slow down and look closer. Discover new artworks by local artists Dianne Longley (Trentham) and Clayton Tremlett (Castlemaine), interpreting Buda’s House and Garden in new and exciting ways. […]
Carson Country Band, La de Das, Spectrum, Wendy Saddington, Chain On his eighteenth birthday Harley Parker was given a camera by his grandfather, and went to a music club, the Thumpin' Tum, for the first time. His love of photography and music took him on a journey of discovery and delight. Just One in the […]
Two of Australia’s most revered musicians — harpist Marshall McGuire and recorder virtuoso Genevieve Lacey — reunite for Bower Birds, a performance of intimate conversation between strings and breath. The pair, long-time collaborators, bring decades of shared history to the stage, performing music that flutters between Baroque delicacy and contemporary invention. Each piece feels like […]
Vocalist Parvyn Singh and multi-instrumentalist Josh Bennett unite in an exquisite concert blending Indian classical, folk and contemporary influences. Together they create a sound that is as intimate as it is expansive — shimmering sitar, soulful voice, hypnotic rhythm. Longtime collaborators on stage and in life, Parvyn and Josh are renowned for their effortless interplay […]
Few voices cut as deep into Australian rock as Broderick Smith’s — storyteller, rebel, poet, and heart of The Dingoes. Man Out of Time: The Broderick Smith Songbook gathers his closest collaborators and admirers to reinterpret his catalogue with reverence and raw energy. Across two stirring sets, musicians revisit songs that shaped generations — “Boy […]
Experience a full day of dance, connection and creativity at the Regional Dance Summit, as part of the Castlemaine State Festival! Bringing Victoria’s regional dance community together to move, learn and celebrate, the Summit welcomes dancers of all ages and stages of their journey. From a young dancer dreaming big, to an adult ready to […]
Castlemaine Press is a community access printmaking studio with a membership of over 70 artists including both renowned and emerging printmakers, working across all mediums. Set within the stimulating surrounds of Lot 19, this two hour event will showcase the diverse range of printmaking techniques – woodblock, linocut, collagraph, etching, monotypes and more. Meet and […]
Internationally acclaimed vocal quartet Windborne bring their extraordinary harmonies and social conscience to Castlemaine. Hailed by The Guardian as “the most exciting vocal group in a generation,” Windborne’s singing is rooted in folk traditions from around the world — layered, resonant and alive with purpose. Their repertoire moves seamlessly from Appalachian ballads to songs of […]
DEEP HEART is a collaboration in poetry and song exploring love in all its strange, enduring forms. Poet Ross Donlon joins with Rebecca Morton and Ken White to trace the fault lines between tenderness and truth, drawing from a lifetime of writing about connection, loss and renewal. This performance feels like being invited into a […]
The Boy & The Ball is a tender, wordless theatre experience created by Stephen Noonan. Designed for preschoolers aged 3-4 years, the performance unfolds through movement and sound rather than dialogue - inviting young audiences to interpret the story through feeling and imagination. The show follows a boy and his beloved ball through moments of […]
Iranian-born, Adelaide-based artist Maryam Rahmani brings her hauntingly beautiful fusion of Persian classical music, contemporary composition and improvisation to Castlemaine. A master of the Santur (Iranian lute), Rahmani’s playing is deeply expressive — weaving traditional motifs with spontaneous exploration. Her performances are both virtuosic and vulnerable, marked by moments of meditative stillness. Through her music, […]
Awake Together: Poems of Life brings six acclaimed performers – five poets and one musician – into one of Castlemaine’s most unexpected settings: Thompson Family Funerals. It’s an intimate evening shaped by candour, tenderness and the belief that poetry lands differently when the room itself carries memory. Each artist brings a strong connection to the […]
Iranian-Australian duo ZÖJ — composer and kamancheh player Gelareh Pour and drummer Brian O’Dwyer — present a breathtaking live score to Grass, the 1925 silent film chronicling the nomadic Bakhtiari tribe’s epic migration through the mountains of Iran. Through ZÖJ’s haunting instrumentation, the film’s black-and-white imagery is reborn with new intensity. Pour’s kamancheh weaves melodies […]
Created by Teamo Henderson and Deirdre Gibb, Life’s 2 Short – Our Mums Are Dead is darkly funny, heartbreakingly honest theatre that transforms grief into something strangely life-affirming. Through quick-witted dialogue, music, and irreverent humour, the performance explores the strange social choreography of aging and mortality — how we grieve, how we laugh when we […]
MIX IT UP all musics – no limits, produced by Punctum, invites musicians, composers, and sonic explorers to a day-long studio/workshop in improvisation, experimentation, and sound making with the inimitable multi-instrumentalists of Aryo Seno Ensemble — Aryo Hall, Zoë Barry, Justin Marshall & Kirri Büchler. It’s hands-on, upbeat, and welcomes musicians of all stages and […]
PechaKucha is a global storytelling platform that connects people - their ideas and inspirations, creative thoughts and processes. Created in Japan in 2003 by renowned architects, Astrid Klein and Mark Dytham, PechaKucha has a slide show format of 20 images, shown for 20 secs each - it’s non-stop and you've got 400 seconds to tell […]
The Melbourne Georgian Choir performs ancient polyphonic songs from the Caucasus Mountains — one of the world’s oldest continuous vocal traditions - celebrating of human connection, harmony and the enduring vitality of folk song. The choir’s repertoire spans work songs, ritual chants and joyous feasting tunes, sung in harmonies that are raw, earthy and utterly […]
For Astor Piazzolla tango was always for the ear rather than the feet. Composer, bandoneón master and inventor of nuevo tango, he revolutionised the form, transforming traditional tangos for the dance floor into concert works with jazz and classical music elements. In this special concert TangoMundo is joined by the Thompson's Foundry Band tuba quartet […]
The Castlemaine Fringe Festival closes its wearable art exhibition with a dazzling runway show like no other. It’s A Kind of Magic transforms the stage into a catwalk of creativity and chaos - a full-blown celebration of imagination, design and performance featuring works by more than 30 local creatives. Artists, designers and performers of all […]
Two beloved acts of the contemporary folk scene share the stage for an unforgettable evening of harmony, storytelling and spirit. Grace Petrie, the British singer-songwriter known for her wit, warmth and protest songs, will be joined by the Australian sister duo The Maes — celebrated for their luminous harmonies and emotionally rich songwriting. Grace first […]
Presented by the Bendigo Chamber Choir, Lux Aeterna — Eternal Light is a choral meditation on hope, loss and transcendence. Performed entirely by candlelight, the program moves through key choral works from the 20th Century — all deeply embedded in sacred music traditions — exploring how voices can illuminate darkness. The concert’s centerpiece, Lux Aeterna […]
Set in the heart of the Castlemaine Botanical Gardens, beside the historic Mill complex, the Garden Party is one of the Festival’s most beloved traditions. For our 1976–2026 golden anniversary, we invite you to spend a full day immersed in music, dance, performance, food and community — an open-air celebration shaped by the creativity of […]
Skip to content