The Switch - Tuning in and turning online

Time  25 May, 11:30am AEST

As a triennial festival of contemporary arts and performance from across the Asia Pacific, each Asia TOPA is the culmination of three years of creative collaborations between makers, producers, presenters and the communities in which we live and work.

Between festivals, Asia TOPA hosts a series of creative LABs – seeding and developing new works, inviting international artists from the Asia Pacific region to explore potential collaborations with artists from Australia.

In March 2020, as the festival ended and the pandemic’s disruption hit, lead producer of Asia TOPA, Arts Centre Melbourne began exploring how online collaborations could keep artists in work and creatively connected.

Asia TOPA’s founding Creative Director, Stephen Armstrong hosts an exploration of their online revisioning for seeding new creative works with LAB artists and digital dramaturg, Dan Koerner from Sandpit. From practical tools to broad organisational strategy, hear how fascinating Asia TOPA projects evolved, mutated or were born out of a strange new world.

Asia TOPA Virtual LABs have been supported by Asia TOPA, Arts Centre Melbourne, Sidney Myer Fund, Playking Foundation and the Commonwealth Government.