2003 – Year of Amazing Youth Arts
Lights, camera, action! What screams out energy? What pumps out passion? The Youth Arts Festival 2003.
From the 16 to 23 of August, young people from throughout New Zealand, aged between 13 and 25, exhibited their range of wonderful talents in the capital. The Michael Fowler Centre, Capital E, Civic Square and many more sites in Wellington have been buzzing with the excitement and enthusiasm of thousands of young Kiwis.
The Big Sing, the Clemenger Film Festival, a workshop on Latin American dance and the tango are just a few of the spectacular events which have taken place in the past week.
And what have the students thought? "It's all great for the future," quotes one Tawa college student, "The Youth Arts Festival gave New Zealand's future generation an opportunity to show the country just what youth are capable of."
On Saturday August 23 the Festival's solo rock event took place at the Parthenon. This event expressed to me the diversity of the arts. Throughout the week I had been to workshops such as "The Music Video Factory", "Music and Creativity in Learning and Self Esteem", and "An Introduction to the Tango" and performances such as a percussion concert, kapa haka competitions and jazz concerts.
Rock music is something that I take a huge interest in, and before this week, I had never really thought of this genre of music as being an 'art' as such. Yet the people that I met and being a part of the Youth arts experience really drove home the reality that art is a passion, a hobby that can be loved by all.
All of these events blew me away. The energy, confidence and enthusiasm of all who took part was astounding and gave me a great sense of pride in the fact that we are all unique. However the lesson I learnt, was that although we are such a diverse cultural population, we are all Kiwis together. Young and old, black and white, nothing can stop New Zealanders from being an amazing group of people.
Students throughout Aotearoa have enjoyed the opportunity to take part in such an event, and thanks go to all who organised it. The Time-Based Art Exhibition at the Michael Fowler Centre gave me a new opinion of visual art. It allowed me to appreciate the talents of some of our special young people, and let me see just what kind of message can be told through the art.
The Hutt International Boys School (HIBS) percussion concert on Wednesday was definitely a new experience and I was so pleased to see how amazing and how creative a young bunch of boys can be.
The Youth Arts Festival 2003 was a brilliant week. If you couldn't make it this year, then you have to attempt to come in 2006! I can say now that you would not regret going to any of the events of the festival one bit. I had never done the tango. I would never have even thought of trying to do the tango, but the Youth Arts Festival is the kind of event that takes a hold of you and makes you do crazy things!
There is really one simple message that I got out of the whole week and that is to have fun. Being young, you've all got talents so get out there and give everything in life a go. At the end of the day, you have nothing to lose! Thank you Youth Arts Festival 2003!
Brendan King - year 12
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