Midsumma Festival

Midsumma Festival is an annual celebration of queer culture. Held during January and February in Melbourne, Australia, the festival began as a one week celebration of gay pride in 1989. The festival has expanded over the years to what is now a three week event that now attracts 120,000 individuals to its opening Carnival alone, with many participating in, and attending, Midsumma events across the entire festival.

Midsumma Festival is considered a major event by Tourism Victoria and the City of Melbourne, with both government agencies providing funds to aspects of the festival delivery. The festival has in the past been identified globally as one of the top five gay and lesbian arts and cultural celebrations, along with New York, San Francisco, Vancouver and Sydney.

Previous events have included what at the time was Australia’s only gay short play competition, Pink Shorts, a collaborative project engaging theatre veterans and drama newcomers to bring new short works to the Melbourne stage (see more later). Summa Cabaret which featured Hugh Jackman, Geraldine Turner, and the ensembles Combo Fiasco and The Great Big Opera Company.

The festival, has since 2008 opened with Carnival on the middle Sunday of January. Carnival is a day-long celebration in the City of Melbourne providing access to both Queer and Mainstream communities to picnic with family and friends, view entertainment that forms part of the coming 3 week festival, as well as engage with community and commercial organisation by browsing the stallholders. The festivities continue into the night with T Dance – an outdoor dance party – featuring some of Melbourne’s and Australia’s most popular DJs.

Midsumma’s visual arts program features a range of exhibitions in and around Melbourne from emerging & established local, national and international gay artists. Yarra Arts and Queer City play home to many of the exhibitions.

The festival’s performing arts program includes a range of musicals, theatre, cabaret, film, spoken word, music events and dance parties. These performing arts events are largely produced by the community.