Placing community at a festival’s heart while reaching for the stars

Brisbane Festival’s Louise Bezzina wants to redefine what a festival can and should be.

Louise Bezzina brims over with enthusiasm as she speaks about the upcoming Brisbane Festival, her third as Artistic Director and her most ambitious to date. ‘Every year you want to grow, highlighting what you think is important and defining the sort of festival you want to create, and we have done that this year,’ she said.

Bezzina feels lucky that her previous two festivals were able to go ahead in the midst of lockdowns across the country.

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Suzannah Conway is an experienced arts administrator, having been CEO of Opera Queensland, the Brisbane Riverfestival and the Centenary of Federation celebrations for Queensland. She is a freelance arts writer and has been writing reviews and articles for over 20 years, regularly reviewing classical music, opera and musical theatre in particular for The Australian and Limelight magazine as well as other journals. Most recently she was Arts Hub's Brisbane-based Arts Feature Writer.