As the energy builds, this weekend will be a hugely important time to visit Liverpool and not only because the city is the focal point for fans for the Champions League battle in Madrid. Instead this inspiring and progressive city Liverpool will be staging a series of remarkable events as the hugely popular River Festival Liverpool takes over the World Heritage Waterfront, and a series of culturally significant events and installations will take shape as part of the RISE programme for 2019, paying homage to extraordinary women from Liverpool and around the world.
River Festival Liverpool will return to the city with an awe-inspiring splash from 1-2nd June, celebrating the port of Liverpool as an arrival and departure point for exemplary culture, music, food and wine from across the world. Historical ships, global music, inspiring food and award-winning wine will be aplenty and there are chances to experience several breath-taking, agenda-changing artworks and installations including the following:
‘Whale Song,’ a visually stunning water, sound and light show which will take place in Canning Dock each evening from now until Sunday 2nd June between 9.45-11pm, the image of a humpback whale will emerge 15 metres out of the Rover Mersey and plunge back in a six-minute show with an emotive soundscape of beautiful whale noise. The globally-acclaimed designers behind the artwork, LCI productions, said the projection is to highlight our closeness and affinity to the earth, and is a warning that we pose a threat to the planet.
At the Pier Head visitors will see several huge, floating Urchins in place at Mann Island, created by internationally acclaimed artist Jin Choi of Choi and Shine design studio, who have previously presented this work at the Commonwealth Games in Australia. Inspired by the light, delicate structure of sea urchin shells that reveal one of the most spectacular patterns found in nature and all hand-crocheted with industrial marine fibre by women across the World, the focus is to raise awareness of our fragile oceans.
During this time the UK’s largest cathedral, Liverpool’s Anglican Cathedral, in the centre of the city will play host to Gaia, an incredible commission created by British artist Luke Jerram,. This stunning 23ft replica of the Earth features accurate and detailed NASA imagery and will hang in the Cathedral Well until 23rd June. The artwork will rotate 360 times faster than our real planet, completing a full rotation once every four minutes. The artwork continues the ‘Changing Tides’ creative programme, which last year saw the Museum of the Moon installed in the Cathedral attracting 60,000 visitors to the venue in just two weeks.
As part of the visionary Rise Liverpool programme features a series of brand new artistic commissions by leading female artists, thinkers and leaders, in-demand artist Jola Kudela as ‘Yolart’ has created a unique commission ‘Reclaiming Babel.’ The piece features women that the artist has met and worked with from the many communities that have made Liverpool their home, highlighting the positive impact that shared experience and interaction can have in creating social cohesion and contributing to the culture and diversity of the city. The artwork is pasted onto the sides of a series of shipping containers, stacked in an approximate triangular shape.
Yolart creates large-scale reinterpretations of classic paintings and traditional imagery and presents them as part of the urban landscape. By using members of local communities as the stars of the work, the pieces carry huge emotional weight and are able to tackle challenging stories and themes and bring them to life.
In a response to the RISE festival, ten female Liverpool writers will take up residence and write as it unfolds throughout 2019. Their poems, songs, stories and plays-in-miniature will pop up throughout the festival year, in film, print, online and in performance. For example Yemeni Scouse poet and performer Amina Atiq (BBC6 Music Festival) has created a sound composition with composer John Bligh in response to Yolart’s Reclaiming Babel. Writers include Lizzie Nunnery (Winner of Best New Play at UK Theatre awards 2017), acclaimed poets Helen Tookey (Best British Poetry 2014, Salt) and Jennifer Lee Tsai (Ten: Poets of the New Generation, Bloodaxe 2017), playwright Lindsay Rodden (The Story Giant), short story writer Stephanie Jane Gray (Writing on the Wall) and acclaimed novelist and playwright Deborah Morgan (Disappearing Home).
This weekend the award-winning Bordeaux Wine Festival also returns to the city bringing world-class wine and delicious food to the Pier Head and sharing the secrets of the success from Bordeaux vineyards, from Friday 31 May until Sunday 2 June. Tickets can be purchased now from www.bwfliverpool.com.
For full details of the programme, including locations of events and times, visit www.theriverfestival.co.uk or follow @riverfestlpool on Twitter, or River Festival Liverpool on Twitter and Instagram.
River Festival Liverpool is supported by Arts Council England and Liverpool City Council as part of its National Portfolio Organisation status.
For more information about Gaia, visit www.my-earth.org, #ear or to find out more about RISE Liverpool go to www.riseliverpool.co.uk, follow @Rise_Liverpool on Twitter and Instagram. using #RISEwithUS.
RISE has been curated by Liverpool City Council and funded by Arts Council England. Other partners include University of Liverpool, The Women’s Organisation, Blackburne House, Northern Power Women, Merseyside Women of the Year, The Girls Network and the Mayoral Club.