Quebec’s Machine de Cirque will play this year’s Hawke’s Bay Arts Festival. Photo / Stéphane Bourgeois
Blending acrobatics, live music and comedy, Machine de Cirque follows a group repeatedly distracted by their own imagination, competitive streaks and talent for getting into perilous situations.
After more than 700 performances around the world, and known for pushing the boundaries of circus while creating performances filled with humanity, absurdity, and connection, the Hastings show will be Machine de Cirque’s Australasian premiere.
Hawke’s Bay Arts Festival director Jade Baker said she wanted to launch this year’s festival with two potentially unforgettable experiences.
“To have an artist of Macy Gray’s calibre coming to Hawke’s Bay Arts Festival is incredibly exciting, and Machine de Cirque is one of the most inventive and internationally celebrated contemporary circus companies performing in the world right now.
“One is a genuine music icon, the other is funny, thrilling and unlike anything we’ve brought to the festival before.
“Together, they give a real sense of the scale and ambition behind this year’s programme – with a whole raft of large and smaller-scale events still to be announced.”
Baker said the festival’s full programme would be released at the end of July.
It would feature a diverse mix of music, theatre, dance, visual arts, circus, comedy, literature and whānau events across the region from October 8 to 18.
Tickets for Macy Gray and Machine de Cirque go on sale Thursday, June 4 at 9am at the festival’s website or via Ticketek.