fortyfive Downstairs Theatre Announces Current and Upcoming Events & Shows

Gallery:
18 - 30 January
Midsumma

There are only a few days left to see our three Midsumma exhibitions:

Vivien St James' flamboyant costumes have been getting quite a reaction from visitors to the gallery. In her regrettable absence the gowns, jewels and photographs on display convey something of the glamourous performer that she was.

Adelina Emmi's paintings in The Sewing Circle depict screen sirens who who were known to have relationships and affairs with other women.

Anthony L'Huillier explores excess, strength and weakness in both the young and the aged through a series of beautiful yet confronting photograph.

All three exhibitions end at 4pm on Saturday 30 January.

Theatre: Pink Shorts
26 - 30 January
Midsumma

Midsumma's own series of queer-themed short plays has proved very successful thusfar. We still have tickets for the remaining nights but they're selling fast.

Nightly 7.30pm until Saturday 30 January
Tickets: $20/$15/$15 Group 8+

Theatre: Dispatch
2 - 7 February

This is the Melbourne premiere season of Barking Spider Visual Theatre's ethereal visual puppet theatre work, Dispatch, following its successful showing in the 2008 Ross Trust Readings Series.

Dispatch follows ‘Sorrel', a young girl who journeys alone in a leaky boat. She arrives at "the Middle place", a nowhere-land island populated by abandoned suitcases full of traces of the lives of their departed owners.

A treasure of a show!

Tuesday - Sunday 8pm
Tickets: $25/$20
Presented with assistance from City of Melbourne

Gallery: Gunns20
Lost and Saved: 21 Reasons to Protect Peaceful Protest
2 - 13 February

The sometimes hauntingly beautiful natural landscapes of Tasmania are shown to us in this fundraising photographic exhibition.

The exhibition coincides with the first day of the current Gunns20 trial, an ongoing trial against logging company Gunns. You can read more about the organisation and the trial at gunns20.org

Featuring photographs by: Senator Bob Brown; Olegas Truchanas; Peter Dombrovskis; Rob Blakers; and Wolfgang Glowacki.

Book Launch: Gagged: The Gunns20 and Other Law Suits
Greg Ogle
11 February, 5.30pm

The inside story of the defence of the Hindmarsh Island bridge defamation cases, an Animal Liberation battery hen case, and the infamous Gunns 20 law suit. A call for law reform to stop such incursions on civil liberties.

The book is being launched by Brian Walters, SC.

No Admission Charge.

Gallery: Giang Nguyen
My paintings are my voice
2 - 13 February

Deborah Salter Fine Art. brings us an exhibition of paintings by Vietnamese artist Giang Nguyen.

Nguyen's artworks contain ideas of identity, gender and sexuality, and the challenges she faces as a gay woman living in a society where homosexuality is a taboo.

More information on our website.

Music: Made in China
Presented by Operalab

An special musical event to welcome the Chinese Year of the Tiger.

This one-off concert features the Australian premiere of 'Visages peint dans les Opéra Békin III', a theatrical work composed specifically for Australian soprano Xenia Hanusiak.

Featuring: Xenia Hanusiak, Yi Zhang, Wang Zheng-Ting and Jim Atkins

Special Offer: Every booking placed before 8 February receives one free copy of Xenia Hanusiak's CD, A thousand doors, a thousand windows. ' ..this is a piece that has enjoyed exceptional public approbation' Clive O'Connell, The Age

Sunday 14 February, 5pm
Tickets: $23/$17

Theatre: Searchlight Festival
17 - 21 February

Searchlight Festival is back for its second year. This curated festival of of explosively diverse and eclectic performance is presented by Tashmadada and fortyfivedownstairs.

The festival kicks off with drinks, and a screening of Cathy Vogan's Live at MIFF ‘09 performance Mimosis, at 6.30pm on Wednesday 17 February. Our ticketed programme then begins at 8pm that night with Intimate Apparel, an 'anticaberet' by Vaudeville X creator Michael Dalley and TV sketch comedy star Paul McCarthy.

The following week includes performances by Benn Bennett, Wes Snelling, Chas Forrest, Antoni Jach, Ellie Nielson, Penny Baron, Ben Rogan, Sally Smith, Jeff Stein, Carolyn Connors, David Wells, Kate Hunter, Forty Forty Home, Mzzz Erin Tasmania, Cathy Vogan and Deborah Leiser-Moore.

Also included in the festival is a playwrights' soiree, a Director's Evening and an 'in-conversation' evening.

You can see the full programme on our website. The Searchlight blog also has a full listing and will be regularily updated with news, interviews, artists profiles and images prior to and throughout the festival.

Wednesday - Sunday, starting times various.
Tickets: $5 - $20
Book online through our website

For your diary:

16 - 27 February 2010
nature as history, photographs by imogen barragga hall

16 - 27 February 2010
Unsettling Portraits and Art Furniture by Alf Clark

24 - 27 February
The Memory Progressive, a new contemporary dance and multi-media work by Phantom Limbs

Bookings for all fortyfivedownstairs shows: www.fortyfivedownstairs.com tel 9662 9966

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