Vivid Sydney Illuminates the Harbour City

Vivid Sydney Illuminates the Harbour City

SYDNEY, May 28, 2011/PRNewswire/ --

Sydney has been transformed tonight into a colourful canvas of light with
the launch of the third annual Vivid Sydney festival - the largest
celebration of light, music and ideas in the Southern Hemisphere, from the 27
May - 13 June 2011. Over 40 light installations were illuminated to mark the
start of the festival including the amazing "Lighting the Sails" on the
iconic Sydney Opera House created by French design team SUPERBIEN.

To view the multimedia content associated with this release, please
click: http://www.multivu.com/players/English/50345-Vivid-Sydney-2011/

(Photo: http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20110528/MM10562 )

Thousands lined the edge of Sydney Harbour to watch the first showing of
"Lighting the Sails"; explore a playground of interactive and low-energy
light art displays by a global field of artists from countries including
Germany, Singapore, New Zealand, The Netherlands, France, Thailand and
Australia; and witness FireDance, the largest fire performance ever seen in
Australia.

To celebrate the opening night of Vivid Sydney, SUPERBIEN produced a
special 15-minute lighting performance to music, giving onlookers a taste of
the 3D mapping designs being projected onto the sails over the 18 nights of
the festival.

SUPERBIEN let their imagination go wild with a swirling psychedelic
journey of organic forms and colourful digital sea monsters, taking over
Australia's favourite building. The artwork also includes a specially
commissioned soundscape.

The music program at Vivid Sydney, Vivid LIVE at the Sydney Opera House
curated by Stephen Pavlovic, opened with UK's Spiritualized, performing their
modern masterpiece Ladies and Gentlemen we are Floating in Space with
orchestra, gospel choir and band, ahead of a line-up including local and
international music acts such as The Cure, who will perform their first three
albums in their entirety at two very special shows exclusive to Vivid.

Other music acts performing at Sydney Opera House include 2manyDJs
(Belgium), Bat for Lashes (UK), Sonny Rollins (U.S.), Yo Gabba Gabba (U.S.)
and Odd Future (U.S.), creating an eclectic mix of established and emerging
artists.

Executive Producer of Vivid Sydney, Ignatius Jones, known world-wide for
his ambitious major event productions, said "Vivid Sydney is a special type
of festival, unique to the popular harbour city."

"In a world where the vast majority of festivals are held at the height
of summer, Sydney's mild winter nights make our city the perfect setting to
play with light.

"And what a stage we have for an outdoor festival with Sydney Opera
House, Circular Quay and The Rocks the stage for best and brightest local and
international creative minds to showcase their talent through light, music
and ideas.

"Vivid Sydney brings us one of the world's most iconic buildings, the
Sydney Opera House - singing and dancing in a way few great monuments ever
could, or ever would," he said.

Around 400,000 Sydneysiders and visitors are expected to attend the
festival, which also includes free public events on the business of
creativity at Vivid Creative Sydney, and a program of creative industry
business events aimed at fostering collaboration and new ideas with some of
the best global creative thinkers converging on Sydney during Vivid.

Vivid Sydney is a major celebration of the creative industries and
positions Sydney as the creative hub of the Asia-Pacific region. The festival
is one of five signature events on the NSW Events Calendar.

The full Vivid Sydney program is available at http://vividsydney.com

NOTES FOR EDITORS:

Ignatius Jones is one of the world's leading Major Event Directors,
Creative Strategists and Event Script-Writers. Ignatius Jones' 2010 credits
include Artistic Director of the Opening Ceremony of World Expo 2010 Shanghai
China, the largest major event in peacetime history, as well as Artistic
Director of the Ceremonies of Vancouver 2010 Olympic Winter Games. The
Vancouver Opening Ceremony was awarded three Emmy Awards for best direction,
best lighting and best music.

In 2006 Ignatius was Artistic Director of the Ceremonies of the 2006
Asian Games in Doha, Qatar. An Olympic event, the Asian Games are the largest
sporting event after the Summer Olympics, and the Ceremonies were watched by
an estimated 3 billion people, across Asia and the world. In 2000, Ignatius
directed the beginning of the Opening Ceremony of the Sydney Olympics, the
spectacular Man from Snowy River charge of 121 horses into the stadium and
the performance of the Australian Anthem by the Sydney Symphony Orchestra.

SUPERBIEN Unique and compelling, each of their creations is an immersive
experience tailored to the site and the mission - seamlessly integrating
every possible technique into new forms of multimedia expression.

Their work is featured everywhere, from Kanye West's blog to Dior's
latest launch, work so compelling that it's transmitted virally at speeds
approaching the light from which it's made. Having refined the art of
projecting beautiful 3D images onto complex surfaces, they will bring their
skills to bear on the ultimate artistic and technical challenge; the
sophisticated organic geometries the Sydney Opera House. For Vivid Sydney
2011, SUPERBIEN have titled their "Lighting the Sails" artwork "La Macula."

Source: Events NSW

Tamara Sperling of Events NSW, +61(0)2-8114-2400 or 0416-028-682, tamara.sperling@eventsnsw.com.au; Erin Huckle of Avviso PR, +61(0)2-9368-7277 or 0432-977-529, erinh@avviso.com.au

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