Tam's picks for the Performance Program

You’re in luck! Asia TOPA’s Senior Curator Tam Nguyen -- who also worked on the first two triennials -- shares her picks from the Performance program, zooming in on technology, free events, First Nations voices, and big icon energy.

Read on for once-in-a-lifetime experiences, epic one-night-only shows plus genre-bending theatre bursting with Blak humour.

What are your must see picks from the Performance stream and why are these so special?

The global sensation that is KAGAMI is an unmissable, once in a lifetime experience exclusive to Melbourne. It feels like a miracle to have this hauntingly beautiful, intimate audience with the late Ryuichi Sakamoto. You can move around during the performance and view it from anywhere you want including being right next to him and seeing his hands move over the piano – magical. There is one song, never released, which Sakamoto wrote for his friend Bernardo Bertolucci’s funeral. (They worked together on the film ‘The Last Emperor’ which Sakomoto won the Academy Award for Best Score).

Milestone is an epic, incredibly moving, landmark new work by national treasure William Yang who recently turned 81. Don’t miss William with the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra for one night only as we open the festival with a true icon.

Made over 5 years, Gapu Ŋupan is by extraordinary Yolgnu artists from North East Arnhem Land with Paiwan and Amis artists from Taiwan rekindling ancient ancestral connections. Stunning, powerful, joyous.

I'm new to Asia TOPA, what should be on my list?

We’ve got so many free events to whet your festival appetite. Unleash your inner Bollywood fantasies with super fun, high-energy Bhangra dancing, tasty Indian treats, wrestling, live music, and films in a 3-day extravaganza Bread, Circuses and Home by Delhi-based artist duo Thukral and Tagra.

Festival friends will be slinging Indonesian breakfast food via an underground network of WhatsApp aunties with a full gamelan orchestra. Bliss. And I can’t tell you who till December 10 when the Nightlife program drops but a too-famous-to-be-free-but-it-is concert. All this and more, free in Fed Square.

I'm up for something different - Surprise me.

Go on a wild ride that pushes form, genre and reality in A Nightime Travesty from the brilliant minds of Kamarra Bell-Wykes and Carly Sheppard. “Patriarchy, colonial genocide and stolen generations, white supremacy and white guilt … You name it, it eviscerates it” (The Age).

I never miss anything by Melanie Lane. In Pulau, she deep dives into Yayoi Kusama’s iconic body of work and obsession with the obliteration of the body and responds with a new work in NGV’s Great Hall. Mythic figures embody acts of resistance, pleasure and protection beneath Kusama’s seminal installation Dots Obsession 1996/2024. This special after-hours gallery experience is only on for 2 nights.

Take me through your picks that happen across the city:

Indonesia’s godmother of performance art Melati Suryodarmo’s performance lectures at Dancehouse including parts from her most iconic work Exergie – butter dance. Last seen in Australia 19 years ago!

Goldfish at Arts House - smart, funny, essential theatre for young people and their adults.

Lasers, an altar of synths, and carnatic music - Oblation is a powerful experience in a beautiful power station.


Want more? Explore the Performance program 👀

Image: Tam pictured with Creative Producer Nisha Madhan at Asia TOPA’s Performance program launch Photo: Michael Pham (2024)