Luminato - Toronto Festival of Arts and Creativity, is a publicly attended, multi-disciplinary arts festival held annually for 10 days each June in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Launched in 2007, Luminato features local, national, and international artists from a variety of genres; including, classical and contemporary music, dance, theatre, film, literature, visual arts, fashion, food and design. Events take place in multiple indoor and outdoor locations throughout Toronto’s downtown core.[1]
Luminato 2011 runs from June 10–19, 2011.
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Luminato was founded by Tony Gagliano (Executive Chairman and CEO of St. Joseph Communications) and the late David Pecaut CM Senior Partner at The Boston Consulting Group) in 2007.[2]
Janice Price was selected to be Luminato’s first CEO and remains in this position today. Born in Toronto, Price most recently served as the President and CEO of the Kimmel Center for the Performing Arts in Philadelphia, and was both the Interim Executive Director and Vice President of Marketing and Communications at the Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts in New York.
Chris Lorway, Artistic Director, heads up the artistic team. Lorway has more than 12 years experience working in the international arts community. Prior to Luminato he was a Senior Consultant for AEA Consulting in New York where he worked on a number of projects including long-term strategy development for the Edinburgh Festival, The Royal Shakespeare Company and Jacob's Pillow.[3]
The team also works with a Festival Advisory Committee consisting of local arts leaders. This ensures Luminato achieves balanced programming for Toronto audiences as well as introducing Canadian artists to international arts organizations and opportunities.[3]
As of 2009, this committee consists of the following individuals.
FESTIVAL ADVISORY COMMITTEE MEMBERS
William J.S. Boyle – CEO, Harbourfront Centre
Charles Cutts – President & CEO, The Corporation of Massey Hall and Roy Thomson Hall
Atom Egoyan – Director & Filmmaker, Ego Film Arts
Kevin Garland – Executive Director, National Ballet of Canada
Piers Handling – Director & CEO, Toronto International Film Festival Group
Karen Kain – Artistic Director, National Ballet of Canada
Bruce Kuwabara – Partner, Kuwabara Payne McKenna Blumberg Architects
Bruce Mau – CEO, Bruce Mau Design Inc.
Alexander Neef – General Director, Canadian Opera Company
Peter Oundjian – Music Director, Toronto Symphony Orchestra
Albert Schultz – General Director, Young Centre for the Performing Arts
Matthew Teitelbaum – Director, Art Gallery of Ontario
Andrew Shaw – President & CEO, Toronto Symphony Orchestra
The fourth edition of Luminato ran from June 11–20, 2010. Nine new works were commissioned or co-commissioned by Luminato for the 2010 festival, including the North American premiere of Rufus Wainwright’s Prima Donna and the world premiere of Volcano Theatre’s The Africa Trilogy. Luminato 2010 presented five world premieres, four North American premieres, and one Canadian premiere, as well as the North American debut of Syria’s acclaimed dance company, Enana Dance Theatre. Luminato 2010 took place in 36 venues across the city, featuring artists representing 30 countries, including: Australia, Syria, Germany, USA, Kenya, South Africa, UK, New Zealand, Iran, Japan, and Spain; as well as Canadian artists from 8 provinces.
Luminato First Night featured concerts by Jully Black, Sass Jordan, and Melanie Fiona, and performances by Tony Allen and Bela Fleck at Queen’s Park on the Festival’s opening weekend. Throughout Luminato, the Wish Come True Festival’s Rainbow King popped up in unexpected places, encouraging Festival-goers to enjoy the closing weekend celebrations in Queen’s Park, including FriendsWithYou’s Wish Come True Festival, National Bank Financial’s World Divas and Global Blues concerts, a World Music Celebration, and the President’s Choice® 1000 Tastes of Toronto™ food event.
Three curatorial threads were explored throughout Luminato 2010: the relationship between east and west, artist rights, and a celebration of the diva.
The fifth anniversary edition of Luminato 2011 will take place from June 10–19. Programming announcements will be made in early 2011.
The third annual Luminato was June 5–14, 2009. Themes of the festival included the celebration of the guitar, the commemoration of Edgar Allan Poe, and the exploration of society's relationship with technology. The festival was opened by Randy Bachman at Yonge-Dundas Square as part of the Luminato First Night event. The 10-day event included performances by Goran Bregovic, a Brazilian Guitar Marathon and a tribute to Neil Young featuring the Cowboy Junkies; Holly Cole; Danny Michel; Steven Page; Carole Pope; Bill Frisell Trio; Issa (formerly Jane Siberry); Colin Linden; Stevie Jackson (Belle & Sebastian); Harry Manx; Jason Collett; Sarah Slean and musical director Kevin Breit.
Luminato 2009 featured the North American Premiere of Robert Lepage’s nine-hour epic Lipsynch, which weaves together the stories of nine interconnected lives over the span of 70 years.
Author Neil Gaiman presented the Canadian premiere of his latest novel, The Graveyard Book at the Jane Mallett Theatre. The event was moderated by Mark Askwith (Producer at CTV’s SPACE).
Luminato 2009 also included RedBall Project by artist Kurt Perschke. The 15-foot inflatable ball was placed in a new location each day of the festival.
The second annual Luminato was June 6–15, 2008. The event featured 1,400 local artists and hosted 40 international arts managers and producers who were seeking new works to present abroad. According to a festival wrap-up report, Luminato attendance at ticketed events rose 11% from the first year’s attendance numbers.[4]
There were a number of free public events in the 2008 festival, including Luminato’s opening week celebrations at the Yonge-Dundas Square with the TELUS Light On Your Feet dance series. Luminato featured street artists using Toronto's public space as their open canvas in Streetscape Program. Another free event was Mille Femme, a tribute to 1,000 artistic, creative and inspiring women from Toronto and their protégés.[5]
The festival also featured four world premiere events, and seven Canadian premiere events celebrating diversity and art. Programming highlights from the 2008 Luminato Festival included:
Black Watch, The National Theatre of Scotland’s theatrical piece by playwright Gregory Burke, based on interviews Burke conducted with former soldiers serving in Iraq. The Herald (UK), gave it a five-star review and wrote “Black Watch is an astonishing artistic whirlwind. The world must see this play. Immediately.”[6]
The Festival also featured director Tim Supple’s international version of Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream presented by a company of 23 Indian and Sri Lankan dancers, street acrobats, martial arts experts, musicians, actors and performers. The play was performed in seven languages; English, Tamil, Malayalam, Sinhalese, Hindi, Bengali, Marathi, and Sanskrit. The Daily Mail (UK) described it as “Ravishing and enchanting. Supple’s all-Indian production is a Dream as you’ve never seen it.”[7]
Luminato presented Mikel Rouse’s epic opera trilogy for the first time in repertory. The multi-media musical trilogy includes The End of Cinematics, a live video collage. In high contrast are Rouse’s solo show Failing Kansas, a multi-media opera directly inspired by Truman Capote’s In Cold Blood, and his talk show opera, Dennis Cleveland, a fusion of pop, rock and rhythmic structures.
The inaugural Luminato festival took place from June 1–10, 2007. The event featured over 1,300 local and 214 international artists participating in events taking place at over 30 venues across the downtown Toronto core.[8] The festival had over 1,035,000 attendees present, both local Torontonians and tourists.
Luminato’s program featured 10 world premiere events, including six commissioned or co-commissioned works: Book of Longing, VIDA!, Norman, Not the Messiah, Pulse Front, and Auroras/Testimony.
Some highlights of Luminato’s inaugural festival included: Book of Longing, a music theatre piece using Leonard Cohen’s poetry set to music by Philip Glass. Luminato hosted the inaugural performance of the international tour, which then continued to other festivals and venues around the world.
Not the Messiah (He’s a Very Naughty Boy), the comedic oratorio commissioned by Luminato, and written by Eric Idle & collaborator John Du Prez. Based on Life of Brian, the hour-long oratorio premiered at the Toronto festival before beginning an international tour.
Pulse Front: Relational Architecture 12 was a light installation produced by Mexican-Canadian artist Rafael Lozano-Hemmer and was situated at Toronto’s harbourfront. The installation was dependent on audience participation, with 20 onsite handlebars linked to computers that transmitted the heart beats of those who touched them to one of 20 searchlights streaming above Harbourfront Centre, Toronto.
The Luminato festival is centred on “celebrating the creative spirit” and defines three “pillars” to anchor the festival programming: collaboration, accessibility and diversity.[9]
According to the Toronto Star, Luminato has been successful in meeting its stated core values thus far:
● Collaboration: Luminato works with existing arts groups; instead, Toronto’s cultural organizations were recruited as partners. (Including, the National Ballet, the Young Centre for the Performing Arts, Soulpepper Academy, Harbourfront Centre, Tapestry, Theatre Direct, and the Art Gallery of Ontario.
● Accessibility: Approximately 80% of the events are free.
● Diversity: There is wide-range of programming, stretching from different cultural and artistic backgrounds.[10]
Luminato receives funding from sponsors, private donors, ticket sales, and various government agencies. In 2005, the Ontario Government committed $1 million in funding, which moved the project forward for the first festival. In 2008, the Ontario Government announced a series of strategic investments in the province’s cultural industry. As part of that initiative, Luminato received $15 million, which was internally restricted by the Board of Directors towards commissioning future projects and securing first-performance rights from Canadian and international artists.[11]
In 2007, L’Oréal was announced as Luminato’s “exclusive presenting partner.” This partnership has since been presented under the banner “Luminato /L’Oréal: Partners in Creativity.”[12]