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15/7/2010

Milton Keynes International Festival

Different venues, Milton Keynes

Milton Keynes International Festival 2010 today announced programme highlights for the city’s inaugural international multi-arts festival. Taking place over 10 days from 16th to 25th July 2010, the biennial festival will bring together a line-up of international artists and performers in a diverse programme of UK premieres and spectacular new commissions.

Celebrating the city’s unique architecture and utopian vision of its 1960s’ founders, the festival will make use of the landmarks, parks, boulevards, disused buildings and unusual locations of central Milton Keynes in an ambitious programme of performances and family-friendly events, both ticketed and free, which include new circus, theatre, dance, music, visual arts and sound installations.

UK Premieres will include the critically acclaimed InStallation – a Swiss collective of aerial and high wire artists, dancers, musicians, horses and their expert handler who will showcase this breathtaking theatrical performance in a Big Top. Telling the story of a chance meeting of these extraordinary artists in a horse’s stable, a special universe unfolds both on the floor and in the air, with each scene heralding a new visual, artistic and musical world that comes together in a kaleidoscope of mesmerising artistry. Architects of Air will unveil their new luminarium Mirazozo, a large walk-in inflatable structure in which neon-like illuminated seams create visual illusions similar to those encountered in the geometric surface design of Islamic art and architecture. Producers of extraordinary live events Artichoke, in partnership with Sky Arts, will work their customary magic bringing a mysterious and fantastical new experience to the festival in another UK first.

With IF: Milton Keynes International Festival produced by The Stables, one of the UK’s leading live music venues currently celebrating its 40th anniversary, there is a strong music and sound theme underpinning the festival. World acclaimed percussionist Evelyn Glennie will perform with the New York based guitarist Fred Frith in the UK premiere of Late Night Lounge, an improvised concert in the City Church. The late night ‘lying down’ concert will feature a light display projected onto the Church dome, which the audience will view from a prone position on the floor of the church.

Sound artist and this year’s inaugural artist-in-residence, Janek Schaefer, will create Asleep at the Wheel, his new commission for the festival. Constructed in the old Sainsbury’s superstore, the immersive soundscape will feature several upended cars on a fake tarmac road running through the disused structure. Climbing into the cars, audiences will hear their radios mysteriously tuning in to the newly composed sound-work. Schaefer’s teenage years were spent in Milton Keynes and here he responds to the city and its connection to the car. A Belgian Spiegeltent will be at the heart of Festival Central in Campbell Park and home to a live music, comedy and cabaret programme, with highlights including Karbido’s electrifying audio visual spectacle The Table, Adrian Edmondson and his folk punk band The Bad Shepherds, festival favourites Bellowhead, and Perrier award winning comedian Rich Hall.

Monica Ferguson, Festival Director: ‘‘We’re very excited to announce the first elements of the ambitious programme for IF: Milton Keynes International Festival. We expect to attract in excess of 150,000 people across its ten days, presenting world class arts that engage people in new ways and encourage them to reframe their vision of Milton Keynes as a place of innovation and destination.’’

Creative Producer, Bill Gee: ‘‘I was particularly interested by the vision of the city’s founders when Milton Keynes was built as a new town in the 1960s, a combination of engineered design and spiritual ethos, orientating the geometrically laid-out city around the lay-line on which the sun rises and sets each year on Midsummer’s day, giving Milton Keynes an incredible energy and unique landscape. IF: Milton Keynes presents an ambitious, innovative and unique programme inspired by the city and its origins.’’

The festival will open with The World Famous and Terrafolk’s Full Circle, taking the audience on a journey through the seasons in a spectacular fusion of pyrotechnics, performance, music, lighting and projections and conclude with the World Picnic, a large-scale family picnic event in Campbell Park with free entertainment and performances. Full programme details will be announced in May. For more information and updates visit http://www.ifmiltonkeynes.org.

IF: Milton Keynes is produced by The Stables in association with Milton Keynes Gallery and funded by Arts Council England. It is supported by Milton Keynes Council, Milton Keynes Partnership and Milton Keynes Economy and Learning Partnership in recognition of the role it will play in the future growth of the city. Sky Arts is media partner to the festival and will be filming a short documentary which will be available to watch on Sky Arts 1 / 2 HD and online at http://www.skyarts.co.uk during July and August.

For further information / Use of pictures / Interviews
Idea Generation: +44(0)20 7749 6850
Emily Airton emily@ideageneration.co.uk
Tani Burns tani@ideageneration.co.uk

Opening 16 July 2010, 21.30
Campbell Park

Differents Venues, Milton Keynes

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