Your MPavilion 2019 program is here! Themes inspired by Glenn Murcutt AO
Drumroll, please… Bringing you the MPavilion 2019 program of free events! We’re so excited to launch the program for our forthcoming season, taking place in the Queen Victoria Gardens from 14 November 2019 to 22 March 2020. MPavilion 2019, designed by Australia’s only Pritzker Architecture Prize laureate Glenn Murcutt AO, will host over 400 free events, including talks, workshops, performances, kid-friendly experiences, and installations. This year the program is inspired by Glenn’s highly influential fifty-year practice, and will explore Australian design and identity, cultural collaboration, earth and climate, and knowledge sharing.
This season we’re doing things differently. Our opening weekend will be a huge celebration of Australian arts and design, and a sample of what’s in store for the rest of our five-month season of free events. The weekend will encompass the always spectacular fashion showcase presented by the RMIT Master of Fashion (Design) Graduate Showcase on Thursday 14 November; Melbourne Music Week events including the soothing Sound Bath with Mona Ruijs and Rory McPike on Friday 15 November and a discussion about Australian music and environmental sustainability on Tuesday 19 November; the launch of Assemble Papers issue #12 on Friday 15 November; MPavilion 2019 architect Glenn Murcutt AO will appear in conversation with Naomi Milgrom AO and Virginia Trioli on Saturday 16 November; and performances by acclaimed Yorta Yorta soprano and composer Deborah Cheetham AO along with the Dhungala Children’s Choir on Saturday 16 November.
The Social Studio. Photo by Liberation Images.
Highlight event series taking place at MPavilion across the 2019/20 season include Summer Sunsets every Friday evening, featuring DJ and live sets by local favourite weekend-starters. MPavilion’s annual Indigenous design forum BLAKitecture returns for five timely discussions throughout the season. The MPavilion Book Club will be curated and led each month by esteemed guests including Eugenia Lim of APHIDS and media outlet The Conversation. And Happy Melon Yoga and A—Space return for all your yoga and meditation needs!
Design by Alex McQuire. Photo by Kate Meakin.
November 2019—Australian Design: Identity & Cultural Collaboration
Each month of the MPavilion 2019 season will explore a different theme inspired by the work of architect Glenn Murcutt. Read up on highlights below, and view the full program over on our program page.
November at MPavilion explores and celebrates the many faces of Australia. On Monday 18 November, Melbourne nonprofit enterprise The Social Studio (which also designed this year’s MPavilion onsite staff uniform) hosts Pathways to Potential, a discussion about creating opportunities for young people from refugee backgrounds. On Thursday 21 November, Christopher Boots presents a special edition of its Design Thinkers series in which local designers discuss their practice; then on Tuesday 26 November, architecture studio Edition Office considers the NGV contemporary gallery design competition with the panel Forever Now: On Designing a Home for Contemporary Art.
On Saturday 30 November and Sunday 1 December, the Archibald Weekend presented by ANZ at MPavilion invites the entire community to explore their creative side through the lens of the legendary Archibald Prize. Guest speakers include Art Gallery of NSW director Michael Brand, artist Lindy Lee and 2019 Archibald Prize winner Tony Costa. The weekend will also include life-drawing workshops with the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra, zine-making workshops with Liminal magazine, and kids’ drawing workshops with artist Alice Oehr.
Small Giants Developments. Photo by Andrew Wuttke.
December 2019—Connection: Instruments of Harmonious Living
December is all about making connections at MPavilion, beginning on Tuesday 3 December with All Our Lonely Days, featuring two panels on loneliness and social inclusion presented by Real Life and The Social Weaver Group. On Wednesday 11 December, the School of Life presents A Night of Better Conversation: Connection, an open and relaxed discussion about meeting and making new friends in the modern age. Saturday 14 December is a whole day led and curated by young people who responded to MPavilion’s inaugural call to action for collaborators aged 15–25 years old. Join us as Athiqah Ummi Salma leads the interactive installation I’m Drawing You; the Urban Subversion panel and workshop explores guerrilla gardening and housing equality activism; and the Signal Curators present Set the Tone, a film night and discussion exploring South Sudanese Australian identity and community.
Photo courtesy of Climate Emergency Cinema.
January 2020—Unplugged: Energy Without Electricity
MPavilion explores the challenges of going off-grid in the month of January. People-powered by bicycles at MPavilion, Climate Emergency Cinema curated by the Little Projector Company happens over three nights on Tuesday 14, 21 and 28 January. Green magazine takes over MPavilion from Friday 31 January to Sunday 2 February, seeing a weekend of events presented by Australia’s leading publication on sustainable architecture and landscape design, celebrating off-grid living, design and permaculture. Our MKids series of events for the young and young at heart also heats up in January!
Paz Pisarski. Photo by Lily Watkin.
February 2020—Earth: A Place of Reconciliation, a Reconciliation of Place
In February, the MPavilion program considers the ground beneath our feet—how it is used and shared—with a number of exciting first-time collaborations. The internationally renowned Royal College of Art London presents a week of workshops from Tuesday 11 to Saturday 15 February, led by a group of RCA students researching shared housing and the modern family. The Asia-Pacific Triennial of Performing Arts—or AsiaTOPA—settles into MPavilion for an action-packed month-long residency from Monday 17 February to Sunday 15 March. Each day of the residency, talented and multidisciplinary guests from AsiaTOPA’s international roster of artists will give a lunchtime performance at MPavilion.
Photo by Tim da Rin for Right Angle Studio.
March 2020—Knowledge: Shared Learning, Shared Power
In March, MPavilion celebrates the teacher inside everyone with events filled with opportunities to learn and share. For International Women’s Day at MPavilion on Sunday 8 March, MPavilion hosts an entire day dedicated to trading knowledge and sharing ideas to create change, featuring Real Life, AsiaTOPA and Footscray makers studio Fab9. And the School of Life presents Storytelling as Therapy on Wednesday 11 March, a workshop on making sense of life through stories led by Dumbo Feather.
View the program now. We’ll see you in the gardens!
MPavilion 2019 opens in the Queen Victoria Gardens on 14 November 2019 – 22 March 2020. MPavilion is an initiative of the Naomi Milgrom Foundation in partnership with City of Melbourne, Victorian Government through Creative Victoria and Development Victoria, and ANZ.