Record Breaking July for Festive Road

At Festive Road, we had our busiest and most successful July since records began!

Locally, as part of the MK Festival Fringe, we invited people to step into our extraordinary, weird & wonderful world. Our Exhibition, at Westbury Arts Centre, gave visitors the chance to see who/what Festive Road is and does; getting the rare opportunity to get up close and personal with some of the amazing Festive Road creations – both old and new – showing the fusion of art and engineering that make Festive Road so distinctive. Also as part of the Fringe, one of Festive Road’s resident artists, Clive Doherty, exhibited his unique interactive mechanical sculptures at the CentreMK. These kinetic sculptures, inspired by the automatons of the eighteen and nineteenth century, were a major attraction during the Fringe.

At a national level, Festive Road was invited by the Southbank Centre in London to take part in activities linked to its ‘Power of Power Festival’. Programmed around Richard Wagner’s iconic Ring Cycle, Festive Road took inspiration from the dragon Fafner and showcased its own giant dragon, Gwynhaf.  Additionally, they ran drop-in workshops, with over 75 children creating dragon heads. A number of the children, plus their fabulous creations, then took part in a grand parade with Gwynhaf.

Not to be outdone, other creatures also had outings during the month – Harminder, the elephant, packed her trunk to join ‘Readipop’, in collaboration with Annual Daydream Harvest; and the Festive Road dinosaur family, including their naughty new baby Rex, took part in Telford’s ‘Carnival of Giants’, which was attended by an estimated 12 thousand people.

Festive Road was also delighted to be chosen by ISAN, The Independent Street Arts Network, to host one of its ‘On the Road’ events which are being held around the UK over the summer. The aim of these events is to discuss topics and issues affecting the sector; giving the opportunity to share information and ideas.

Additionally, before the schools broke up for the summer, the Festive Road Education Team was busy running carnival workshops and helping to organise some spectacular local parades – including schools in Northamptonshire and Essex.

Comments are closed.