MANILA – Fringe, the arts festival that spawned shows like Potted Potter and STOMP, is coming to the Philippines through the Fringe Manila Festival, set to launch on February 12, 2015.
Artists interested in the festival may now register until November 3.
The Fringe Festival model started in Edinburgh, where festival has grown to become the biggest in the world.
With Fringe Festivals are now in over 200 other cities all over the world, including London, New York, Philadelphia, Hong Kong, Taipei, and soon, Manila.
Fringe is an open access, artist driven, uncensored arts and community festival that showcases fresh, daring, and groundbreaking work. It brings together emerging and established artists in theater, literature, music, dance, visual art, film, cabaret, performance art, circus, and every other artistic genre in between.
Fringe Manila executive producer, Brett McCallum said “With Philippines’ rich heritage and evolving appreciation for local and international arts, Filipinos are now more than ready to embrace this global celebration of arts.”
A press release from Fringe Manila shared a study conducted by BOP Consulting during the 2012 Perth Fringe (Australia) inaugural program, saying that 98 percent of artists and audiences believe that Fringe is an important addition to the cultural life of a city.
“There is a growing renaissance of art by future movers and shakers in the industry that create work driven by their experience and social consciousness,” said festival director and co-founder Andrei Nikolai Pamintuan.
“The art that we see right now is bold, new, and unapologetic – a reflection of how far we’ve come in expressing our identity as Filipinos, and more importantly as art practitioners,” he added.
Emerging and established local artists are invited to share their work at Fringe Manila. Artists may register by visiting www.fringemanila.com and clicking the ‘Register my Event” tab.
Fringe Manila is also on the lookout for venues in the city of Manila, both conventional and unconventional, to showcase arts practice in all its forms. The aim is to help venues access new audiences, encourage audiences to explore their own neighborhoods and its communities, and help venues consider how they can support cultural practice throughout the year to the benefit of the venues themselves, the artists and the community at large.
In addition, the festival and Orange Segment Print and Design Studio are calling on artists and graphic designers to submit entries of poster designs that reinterpret the classic Filipino delicacy, Halo-halo, into an iconic design or image that will brand and identify the Fringe Manila 2015 festival. Special prizes and recognition awaits the contest winner.
For further details and inquiries, contact hello@fringemanila.com or call/text +639985543200. Follow Fringe Manila on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram @FringeMNL for updates.
Photo: A glimpse of Fringe Manila in a performance by SPIT (Silly People’s Improv Theater). Courtesy of Fringe Manila and Carlo Ambrosio T. Lina.
