OzAsia Festival, Australia’s leading contemporary arts festival engaging with Asia, has launched its longest program yet – spanning four weekends this Spring. From Friday October 17 – Sunday November 9, OzAsia Festival will expand across the city, with events at Adelaide Town Hall, Her Majesty’s Theatre, Odeon Theatre, Adelaide Botanic Gardens, and more. Tickets on sale now.
Audiences can expect transformative performances, delicious food and engaging conversations from this year’s program which includes six world premieres, four Australian premieres and eight Adelaide premieres.
Showcasing the best of Asian and Asian Australian art and culture and featuring more than 200 local, national and international artists from 14 countries, OzAsia Festival is curated by Festival Director Joon-Yee Kwok: “This year OzAsia Festival spans four weeks, giving our audiences more chances to celebrate culture, creativity, community and connection at intimate shows and spectacular events. From theatres and galleries to the riverbank, parks, and city streets, we’re looking forward to bringing people together with some fantastic Asian and Asian Australian artists.”
At Adelaide Town Hall, GRAMMY award-winning pianist Hiromi will join forces with multi-GRAMMY-nominated string quartet PUBLIQuartet to present a breathtaking blend of jazz and classical composition in The Piano Quintet for one night only on Tuesday 28 October, as part of her anticipated national tour.
Celebrating his 80th birthday, pioneering artist William Yang will reflect on his extraordinary life in Milestone at Adelaide Town Hall on Friday 31 October, exploring themes of family, sexuality, and culture with his signature humour and candour. Weaving together documentary photographs with personal stories, Milestone is a joyous tribute to an Australian icon set against an exquisite score composed and performed by Elena Kats-Chernin with Ensemble Lumen.
Adelaide Festival Centre CEO Kate Gould: “This year, OzAsia Festival offers audiences new and diverse ways to experience the festival, by expanding into even more venues and public spaces across the city. I look forward to welcoming audiences, old and new, to Adelaide’s cherished OzAsia Festival this Spring.”
At Her Majesty’s Theatre, The Special Comedy Comedy Special: Greatest Debate will be a hilarious night featuring Michael Hing, AJ Lamarque, Alex Lee, Lawrence Leung, Sashi Perera and Kushi Venkatesh debating “the new Australian dream is never moving out.” A night of real estate, rice cookers and repressed emotions, moderated by ABC Radio Adelaide’s Jason Chong.
At The Odeon Theatre Monica Lim and Mindy Meng Wang reimagine the connection between life and death in immersive, multi-artform performance, Opera for the Dead 祭歌, a contemporary Chinese cyber-opera for those who find beauty in darkness and humour in the macabre. Also at the Odeon, Australian Dance Theatre continue to break new ground in their 60th anniversary year, with Two Blood – an OzAsia Festival commission created by visionary artists S. Shakthidharan, Daniel Riley and Jasmin Sheppard.
At Festival Plaza, Singapore’s The Human T.H.E) Dance Company return to OzAsia Festival with Searching Blue, an outdoor performance tracing shifting relationships between people, places and passers-by, guided by Malaysian sound artist Kent Lee’s live music.
At Vitalstatistix, Ryuichi Fujimura’s trilogy of solo contemporary dance works will be performed together for the first time. A witty and moving depiction of a life in dance, the HERE NOW Trilogy (comprised of solo works How Did I Get Here?, How I Practice My Religion, and Fall! Falter!! Dance!!!), charts the passing of time and Ryuichi’s shifting capabilities during his 25-year journey as a contemporary dancer.
At The Lab at ILA, Elsewhere in India: Return to Technopia is an immersive nightclub experience featuring electro-classical Indian music and surreal visuals, by transmedia artists Murthovic and Thiruda. Exploring cultural heritage, digital technology, and speculative futures, Elsewhere in India will feature collaborations with some of Adelaide’s most exciting South Asian artists.
At Nexus Arts Venue, Spanish-Iranian duo Mohammad Miraghazadeh and Michel Gasco breathe new life into the ancient music of a vast cultural region that spans the borders of Iran and Afghanistan in Badieh: Music from Greater Khorasan; live cello, electronics and sounds of the Bornean forest meet storytelling and hip hop in seafaring epic The Offering (A Plastic Ocean Oratorio) by Omar Musa and Mariel Roberts Musa, exploring family, ecological collapse, and Southeast Asian colonial history.
After a sold-out season at OzAsia Festival 2024, South Australian hip-hop artist Kultar Ahluwalia’s The Mixed-Race Tape is back at Nexus by popular demand. This autobiographical, multidisciplinary performance blends hip-hop with old recordings, family interviews, and spoken word to delve into Kultar’s Punjabi heritage and upbringing.
Another show at Nexus Arts turning family history into an immersive solo performance is Embarking on a Drift to the Unknown. In 1957, a woman crossed the sea and vanished into an arranged marriage. Decades later, her granddaughter retells the story in an audio-immersive work delivered to audiences via wireless headphones — merging soundscapes, fragmented memory, and archival media to explore migration, colonial legacies, and resistance.
In a poignant yet playful cabaret brimming with song and laughter, Rick Lau and Anna Lo celebrate their ancestral roots and honour the many lives and memories that make up Hong Kong in LauZone, with a euphony of dialects including Cantonese, Putonghua, Chiuchow and Shanghainese.
The Honourable Andrea Michaels MP, Minister for Arts: “OzAsia Festival is an exciting celebration of Australian and Asian culture right here in Adelaide and is not to be missed. This year, audiences have even more opportunities to experience this wonderful festival, as it extends for an extra weekend throughout the city.”
OzAsia Festival favourite, Lucky Dumpling Market, returns to Elder Park from October 17, serving up a delicious range of cuisine from the best local vendors accompanied by free live entertainment on the OzAsia Festival stage, kicking off with a free Opening Night Party featuring live music by multiple ARIA-nominated artist and songwriter Mo’Ju. Don’t miss Sunset Sounds on the OzAsia Festival stage – an exciting line-up of musical guests from across Australia, and internationally from Vietnam, Indonesia and Thailand.
Follow the spectacular 40 metre long Hong Kong Dragon lantern across the Riverbank Footbridge and see more than a dozen giant lanterns light up Tarntanya Wama/Pinky Flat for the beloved Moon Lantern Trail. A free, family friendly event featuring roving performances, giant puppets and delectable food from Thursday 23 to Sunday 26 October, this year, families can look forward to the new Moon Garden program with performances and workshops for all ages by local artists and communities, including lantern-making, origami, calligraphy, storytelling and more.
Celebrate Japanese pop culture at AnimeGO! on Sunday 26 October, with anime, manga, karaoke and more to explore at Dom Polski Centre, and on Saturday 1 November, indulge in authentic Korean street food, K-pop performances and traditional games at Hongdae in Adelaide, a must for K-culture fans and foodies alike, at 12 Eliza St, Adelaide.
On the final weekend, audiences can enjoy thought-provoking panels and inspiring conversations at OzAsia Festival’s Weekend of Words, Australia’s largest gathering of Asian and Asian Australian writers and thinkers. Curated by multi-award-winning writer and comedian Sami Shah, this year’s program of exciting free events for OzAsia Festival’s Weekend of Words will be announced in September, featuring international guests from Singapore, Indonesia and South Korea.
A vast array of visual arts will be on display throughout the festival, including solo exhibition UNITY by OzAsia Festival 2025 brochure cover image artist Victoria Garcia. Explore love and devotion in Asian art in Touching the Divine accompanied by Rakini Devi’s interactive performance The Female Pope at the Art Gallery of South Australia. At Adelaide Botanic Garden, take a journey across the land, water and skies of Singapore and the Malay Peninsula via 200-year old watercolours in exhibition Tails from the Coasts and accompanying multisensory, inclusive adventure Hu木an inspired by some of the works in the exhibition.
With plenty of free workshops, masterclasses, and talks also on offer, stay up to date on program details at www.ozasiafestival.com.au
Early bird ticket specials available until Sunday 27 July. Check ozasiafestival.com.au for details.
OzAsia Festival 2025 runs from October 17 to November 9.
Media kits with high resolution imagery, vision and show information here.