Junction Arts Festival: quick links
Now in its 15th year, Junction Arts Festival is very much a festival by and for Launceston – the Tasmanian city it calls home. Running from 12–21 September 2025, Junction maintains an intimate, grassroots feel while simultaneously programming works with an eye towards cultural visitors from ‘the mainland’ (as Tasmanians call the rest of the country) – hardly surprising given that its core funding comes from Events Tasmania.
‘We definitely have a really great community who really get behind the Festival. We have great buy-in from Tasmanians and Launcestonians … and there’s some really beautiful projects this year that I think really have that level of drawcard, both for mainland appeal but also for buy-in in the local community,’ says Elle MacLeman, Event Producer at Junction Arts Festival.
Junction’s intimacy is part of its appeal. Many venues are within easy walking distance of one another, including a cluster of venues in and around the Festival’s hub, Launceston’s Prince’s Square. Similarly, artists are easily accessible for audience members seeking to learn more about the works they’ve just experienced or are about to see.
‘I think that [intimacy is] really at the heart of why Junction is so successful, because it does have that element where the art is accessible and has a level of personability for a lot of the people that come see it as well,’ MacLeman tells ArtsHub.
Programming challenges vs programming highlights
Given rising costs, the supply chain squeeze and an exodus of workers from the arts industry during Covid, the Australian arts sector is currently facing numerous challenges simultaneously. As Melbourne Fringe Creative Director and CEO Simon Abrahams recently told News.com, ‘I really do believe there has never been a harder time to make art than right now’. Offered the opportunity to discuss such challenges with ArtsHub, MacLeman demurs, instead staying stubbornly on message.
‘We’ve been incredibly lucky to have funding through Events Tas for a number of years now, and very lucky to have that continued funding the next couple of years as well. I think, really, [what you’ve mentioned] is an issue that’s facing the industry, and definitely something that we need to be mindful as we look at programming for the next few years,’ she says tactfully.
Back to the 2025 program it is, then.
Junction’s 2025 program again features a strong contemporary music component, including a collaboration between Mutti Mutti singer and storyteller Uncle Kutcha Edwards and the rich, blues-tinged rock of Cash Savage & The Last Drinks as well as numerous Tasmanian bands and solo artists.
‘We’ve got a couple of free music nights and also some really great ticketed events. We’ve really focused in on creating little vignettes to each of the music nights so that there is quite a strong theme within each night, as well some really special nights, [such as] … Kutcha Edwards and Cash Savage, which will be a really beautiful collaboration,’ says MacLeman.
Circus and dance at Junction Arts Festival
The program also includes For Who the Bell Tolls by circus artist Bridie Hooper, performed beneath the bell tower of Launceston’s oldest church, St Johns, ‘just around dusk, kind of at that 6:15ish period as the light slowly starts to fade over the evening – and it’s really about connection and hope’; We Are All Stardust…, a collaboration between Launceston’s influential youth dance company Stompin and six-piece band MZAZA (led by French-Australian singer Pauline Maudy, the 2023 Australian Folk Artist of the Year); and Influencer at Earl Arts Centre, featuring five dance artists led by Kyle Shanks, the Artistic Director of Yellow Wheel, Melbourne’s pre-professional dance company.
‘Influencer is really a commentary on or an exploration of how we engage on social media and the impact that that has in our lives,’ MacLeman tells ArtsHub.
The Tasdance-presented DANCEWEEKENDER reflects Lutruwita/Tasmania’s strong community arts culture, while the Launceston Art Walk, returning to the program after debuting in 2024, connects festivalgoers with local visual artists. A walking tour, it allows festivalgoers to visit Launceston’s ‘various art spaces and [have] conversations with artists about how they work and what they undertake in their own individual spaces’. Another visual arts event, Junction Retrospective: 15 Year Gallery, celebrates Junction’s 15 year history to date.
‘The 15 Year Gallery will be a really beautiful project looking back at what the last 15 years has been and our transformation through those years as well,’ MacLeman concludes.
Junction Arts Festival runs from 12-21 September 2025. Visit the Festival website to learn more about the program.
