Explore the Art of BLEACH Festival
From October 1 – 11, BLEACH Festival will transform the HOTA Precinct into a colorful, interactive and creative sensory explosion for your eyes, ears and heart. Alongside a packed program of live music, contemporary dance, storytelling and mind-altering art, BLEACH presents some fascinating and fabulous public art installations to engage your senses, spark curiosity and invoke delight.
Become part of the art with these inspiring installations at BLEACH Festival. The majority are completely free and on display for the entire festival so be sure to get amongst it – literally!
Start your day with a new perspective - Kaleidoscope Skies
Begin your BLEACH journey high above the Gold Coast with Kaleidoscope Skies by Claudio Kirac & Better Days Projects.
Taking over Level 5 of HOTA Gallery, this immersive installation transforms panoramic views through shifting light and colour, morphing in symphony with the sky. As the world outside changes throughout the day, so does the experience, inviting you to slow down and see from an entirely new perspective. The work casts the viewer as observer, participant, and subject, exploring the idea that perception is relational - shaped by where we stand.
When: Daily from 10am - Level 5 of HOTA Gallery
Cost: Free
Get hands-on and join the art - Hyper Temples
At BLEACH, you're not always expected to stand back and look.
Hyper Temples by Melissa Gilbert is an ever-evolving artwork shaped by the people who enter and activate it. Construct, dismantle and reimagine oversized soft sculptural forms as you create temporary structures together. Adults are encouraged to play and kids can enjoy the novelty of touching, moving and transforming an artwork in a gallery setting.
When: Daily from 10am - HOTA Gallery Foyer
Cost: Free
VOICES
Keep exploring at the HOTA Lake Precinct, where VOICES turns audience participation into an immersive experience of light and sound.
Spin one of 50 translucent tubes and hear a voice emerge. As more people join in, layers of light and sound build until the Sydney Philharmonia Choirs can be heard in full.
The more people who participate, the more the artwork comes alive.
When: Daily from 10am - HOTA Lake Precinct
Cost: Free
Slow down and listen differently - 100 Keyboards
What happens when 100 toy keyboards play the same note at once?
Created by pioneering Japanese sound artist ASUNA, 100 Keyboards transforms subtle differences in tuning into a shimmering, constantly evolving landscape of harmonies, pulses and textures.
Simply turn your head and the music changes around you, with every listening position revealing something different. Immersive, hypnotic and endlessly evolving, this is an invitation to slow down, listen deeply and lose yourself in a living landscape of sound.
Take part in a unique sonic experience created by sound artist, Asuna, when 100 toy keyboards play a single sustained note all at the same time. Immersive, hypnotic, and endlessly evolving, this is an invitation to slow down, listen deeply, and lose yourself in a living landscape of sound. Every listening position reveals new harmonies, pulses, and textures as the sounds combine in different ways. Each listener experiences a unique sonic perspective, discovering details that exist only from where they are seated.
When: 4pm daily from October 3 - 5 - Gallery 3
Cost: From $25
Witness something unforgettable – Thaw
Part installation, part durational performance, THAW unfolds on a three-tonne block of melting ice suspended high above the ground.
A solitary figure confined to the ice struggles for balance as their perch gradually disappears. From leading Australian physical theatre company Legs On The Wall, THAW is a spectacular feat of engineering and aerial artistry, and a powerful metaphor for our changing climate.
Experience this extraordinary work in two very different settings: a sunrise spectacle on the sands of Surfers Paradise Beach, then suspended above Evandale Lake at HOTA.
When: Thu 1 Oct, 5:00am - Surfers Paradise Beach and Sat 3 Oct, 11:30am - HOTA Lake Precinct
Cost: Free
Step inside another world - সুন্দরী Shundori
Be enveloped in the vivid and sometimes surreal large-scale, conceptual video works. Accompanied by a layered soundscape of field recordings, women’s songs, spoken word and a textural score, সুন্দরী SHUNDORI is a multi-projection, multi-channel, multi-lingual video installation that turns the space into an immersive portal of bold and intimate exploration of contemporary South Asian identity.
সুন্দরী SHUNDORI is a long-term collaborative work between artist Naina Sen and over 500 womxn across India and the Indian diaspora in Australia.
When : Daily from 10am – Studio 1
Cost: Free
Gather as the sun goes down – Beacon
As daylight fades, make your way to the HOTA Lake Precinct and watch BEACON transform.
Led by Everybody NOW!, this epic large-scale installation by global design leader Morag Myerscough was created in collaboration with hundreds of Gold Coasters. Vibrant colours, hand-painted patterns and poetic text call you in by day, while neon light transforms the artwork as dusk arrives.
When: Daily at HOTA Lake Precinct
Cost: Free
