Something to Do Every Day in Sydney This Week
From after-hours art, to weird and wonderful brews, to clearing out your wardrobe to help folks in need.
Something to Do Every Day in Sydney This Week
In partnership with
From after-hours art, to weird and wonderful brews, to clearing out your wardrobe to help folks in need.
Another week, another chance to fill it with as much fun as possible. Thankfully, Sydney is a place that knows how to deliver. Art shows on a Monday, live music on a Thursday, festivals on a weekend — that's just life in this busy city of ours. No day is ever the same, and no span of seven days either. Of course, we wouldn't have it any other way.
Too much to do, too little time? If that's how you're feeling, don't worry, we've got you covered. To help you get the most out of every moment across this particular week, we've teamed up with Australian Red Cross and Uber to cast our eyes over the best events happening around town from Monday to Sunday. The result is a jam-packed agenda that not only takes care of your free time but makes sure you're having a mighty fine time while you're at it, too.
If you need a ride to or from your destination, Uber can obviously assist — but the ride-sharing service and Australian Red Cross also have your Sunday sorted. That's when they're holding their annual Uber x Red Cross clothing drive, and will even send a driver to your house to pick up your unwanted threads. As well as helping clear out your wardrobe and helping those in need, it's the perfect way to cap off your busy week. Spend Monday to Saturday at markets, bars and galleries, then chill at home, donate to a good cause without leaving the house, and make a date with your couch.
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The World Press Photo Foundation is a global platform connecting professionals and audiences through raw visual journalism and storytelling. The organisation was founded in 1955 when a group of Dutch photographers organised a contest to expose their work to an international audience. Since then the contest has grown into the world’s most prestigious photography competition and global travelling exhibition.
The 61st edition of the World Press Photo Exhibition is on display at the State Library of NSW until Sunday, June 24, showing the winners chosen by an independent jury that reviewed more than 73,000 photographs by 4548 photographers from 125 countries. The one that took top honours for 2018 is Ronaldo Schemidt’s frightening image of José Víctor Salazar Balza who was set alight at a protest in Caracas, Venezuela when the gas tank of a motorbike exploded. Other finalists also feature across categories such as contemporary issues, environment, general news, long-term projects, nature, people, sports and spot news.
Image: ‘Venezuela Crisis’ by Ronaldo Schemidt (cropped).
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With the spectacle of the Harbour Bridge and the Opera House, it can be easy to forget that Vivid’s delights extend further than the CBD. But there’s plenty to see and do up north, too. As part of the festival’s tenth anniversary, the Chatswood precinct will present Lightscape, a free outdoor installation that combines art and light exhibitions with fashion and food — the latter of which is the Light Market.
From 5.30pm until Saturday, June 16, the central square will host 20 food stalls that have been built from recycled materials and arranged to resemble a makeshift town. Built by event producer Victoria Harbutt and Sydney-based scaffold sculpture artist Alejandro Rolandi, with the help of Randwick’s Bluebottle art studio, the scaffold structure of opposing lines and shapes is topped off with a dynamic light design. The stalls will feature some Sydney food favourites, including Mary’s burgers, cakes from Black Star Pastry, Agape Organic’s hearty dishes and scoops of gelato from Enmore’s Cow and the Moon.
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Each hump day throughout the duration of Vivid, the Art Gallery of New South Wales will keep its doors open late for a free evening of music, discussion and art. The first Vivid Art After Hours takes place tonight and will see The Indigo Project run a few discussions and a 20-minute mass meditation, as well as Goldheist and her band performing alongside an Auslan interpreter.
Each performance will be preceded by a talk, while the gallery itself will remain open until 10pm. It’s also a good opportunity to catch The Archibald Prize and the last weeks of the Biennale and The Lady and the Unicorn.
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It’s been two decades since Cat Power (Chan Marshall) caught a plane from the US to Melbourne, where she spent 11 days in a recording studio with sound engineer Matt Voigt, guitarist Mick Turner and drummer Jim White of trio Dirty Three. The result was Moon Pix, the full-length album that became Marshall’s breakthrough.
To mark the record’s 20th anniversary, as part of Vivid Live, Cat Power is performing the entire album live in the Sydney Opera House Concert Hall tonight. She’ll be joined by Turner, White and a string section. It’s Marshall’s only Australian show — and the first time she has performed the album in full with its original collaborators.
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For its inaugural Festival of 1000 Candles, Neutral Bay’s Firefly is lighting the place up with warm, moody lighting, with — you guessed it — a whopping one thousand candles. From tonight and tomorrow, beginning at 5pm each night, guests are invited to lounge in the bar’s dark timber and leather banquettes while tucking into the weekend’s specialty menu.
Think flaming hot buttered rum cocktails and spiced wine paired with a flambé meringue dessert. To heighten the cosy candlelit theme, they’ve even hired a magician to surprise diners with tableside tricks and add some wintry wonderment to the evening. While walk-ins are welcome, bookings are highly recommended to ensure a table on the night.
Image: Kai Leishman
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The Great Australasian Beer SpecTAPular, better known as GABS, returns to the Sydney Showground for the fourth year running on Saturday, June 2. After humble beginnings in Melbourne eight years ago, it has now expanded to cover three cities and two countries and is rightfully considered by most as the best craft beer and cider festival in the Asia Pacific region.
Creators Steve Jeffares and Guy Greenstone (The Local Taphouse, Stomping Ground Brewing Co.) have again wrangled up the best breweries from the region and are offering up over 500 brews in all, including 170 festival beers and ciders. These exclusive and often wacky specialty brews are created just for the event — and they’ll be accompanied by the fest’s first Holey Moley pop-up course, the much-loved 18-metre-high beer Ferris wheel, plus the usual wandering performances and local food stalls.
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For the third year in a row, Australian Red Cross has partnered with Uber for its annual Uber x Red Cross clothing drive — and you’d best take the drive part literally. The ride-sharing service will actually drive to your house, pick up your unwanted clothes and deliver them to the nearest Red Cross. Even better — it’s not only super easy to take part, but it’s free as well.
If you’re a resident of Sydney’s CBD and surrounding suburbs, just make sure you’re ready between 12pm and 4pm on Sunday, June 3. Once you’ve bagged up all of your old bits and pieces (items you’d happily give your best friend, but no toys, books, furniture or electrical objects), it’s all incredibly simple. Open the Uber app during that four-hour window, find the Red Cross Clothing Drive card, tap ‘request’ and confirm your pickup location. An Uber driver will then stop outside your house, meaning that you just need to take your preloved goods out to their car. Voila, you’ve cleared out your closet and you’ve helped folks in need, all with the tap of a button.
Top image: Kai Leishman.
