White Night Melbourne 2018: City lights up for all-night festival

The Royal Exhibition Building is set to look stunning in Carlton Gardens. Photo: Luis Ascui

Melburnians were promised this year's White Night would take projections to another level, and the 12-hour festival is living up to its promise.

Crowds that are expected to reach half-a-million by tomorrow morning are walking the city streets as the buildings that line them are transformed by light and colour.

At 7pm on the dot, the "Verandah Virtuosos" along Swanston Street anounced the start of the all-night party in a big way from the top of the Town Hall with their grand voices and costumes complementing the hall's stately architecture.

A Welcome to Country was also held at Queen Victoria Gardens with elders Carolyn Briggs and Diane Kerr leading a smoking ceremony to celebrate White Night as an ongoing commitment to “the spirit of generosity which remains an important part of Melbourne culture”.

Federation Square

The impending disaster of key attraction, Liquid Sky at Federation Square, didn't keep keen sightseers away. The silver aerial sculpture was torn away by winds earlier in the week and on Saturday night again strong winds wreaked havoc with dozens of streamers blowing away and fashion-forward thinking spectators using them as headbands.

Despite the weather, it is Melbourne after all, photos and videos do not do the art work justice - it shimmers and sparkles with glints of rainbow and the strips of mylar plastic that continue to shed are, The Age has learnt, biodegradable and will break down in six to 12 months.

The Bells at Federation Square. Photo: Scott McNaughton

Also at Federation Square, are The Bells, a mix of alternative theatre, acrobatics and whole lot of bell ringing. The 15-minute spectacle involves five actors exhausting themselves by performing aerial feats while singing, acting and tolling bells, not to be missed.

The Royal Exhibition Building's 3D projections were a first for the festival. Photo: Luis Ascui

Carlton Gardens

Carlton Gardens' 3D projections have the startling effect of making it appear the Royal Exhibition Building has collapsed before putting itself back together again, over and over.

Dragons, serpents and kaleidoscopic colours swirl across the edifice before it becomes a living, breathing entity - the sound of tonnes of stone crunching as its balconies protrude and retracte with each breath, back and forth. It is out of this world.

A dragon in Carlton Gardens. Photo: Luis Ascui

Collins Street; Londsale Street

On Collins Street, several stages are set up on balconies and the steps of the Regent Theatre, where Priscilla Queen of the Desert is showing, sporting drag kings and queens ready to strut all night long as if to celebrate the recently gained Yes vote.

“We’ve moved up from being in the gutters - this time we’re on the balconies,” said Queens on Collins co-host Art Simone.

Further along, on Lonsdale Street is what is described as an augmented reality piece projected over Golden Square Car Park. You can use the EyeJack app on your phone to bring it to life.

City Square

A silent disco inside one of Melbourne’s brand new high capacity trains is as strange and good as it sounds.

The queue is long and you’ll need to journey to the edge of White Night on Birrarung Marr, but this is one installation not to be missed.

Complete with a DJ, disco lights, backup dancers and some pretty savvy marketing material from the state government about how these trains have more space! More hand straps!

State Library

The state library reading room got submerged again this year!

Last year we went under water at Port Phillip Bay. This year we discovered the Secret Life of Books - an ingenious site specific work which celebrates the magic of reading.

We delved inside books about the jungle, the sea and outer space, entire worlds unfolding around us. It was like the dome was a human mind - and this is what it was filled with when they picked up a book and started reading.

The Yarra River

Pleasingly, there is more to see on the banks of the Yarra this year. The fish-like Le Bal des Luminéoles bob and sway in the air as if it were water; opposite, at Birrarung Marr, the eagle creator deity Bunjil darts brightly down the riverside; and a next-generation train becomes a fantastical futuristic silent disco.

Descending the path down to Alexandra Gardens behind Felipe Reynold’s astronaut stuck in the earth it really does seem as if the inflatable sculpture was giving us the finger. (It was in fact an index finger pointed at the stars.)

Further along, a half-submerged planet appears to have ejected itself from the nearby solar system - at war with itself, spewing heavy metal feedback noise and churning through frenetic black and white imagery, this was not a happy planet.

What If...?

The festival is showcasing the best of Melbourne with the city's hidden laneways, a fashion parade, independent music acts, a whole army of food trucks and the Arts Centre spire shooting lasers like a beacon all highlighted - even our changing public transport system gets a guernsey.

But importantly this year the program has also gone beyond pretty spectacle with the proposition What If…?.

Many installations respond directly to the theme, and questions beginning with "What if" announce themselves periodically around the footprint of the festival, inviting passers-by to open up their imaginations.

In his second year at the helm for Melbourne’s sixth White Night, artistic director David Atkins is offering a diverse mix of interactive and performative attractions and visual arts, including the requisite projections.

"What if we all treated each other with kindness, respect and equality? What if there was no prejudice, bigotry and discrimination?" said Mr Atkins, speaking at the official launch of the event.

White Night provides opportunities for “creators of almost every form of art”, he said, " and the city and parklands become the canvas on which all this is presented. It’s a way for us to reimagine the city in which we live."

The state government and Visit Victoria have been notoriously tight-lipped on the cost of White Night, other than to say the annual festival is currently funded through an $80 million, four-year major events package to 2019.

Carlton Gardens is a must-see this year.

However, with White Night having expanded to Ballarat in 2017 and to Bendigo and Geelong later this year, support for the event would appear to be stronger than ever.

“The major events fund that White Night is funded from is committed for the long term,” said Visit Victoria chief executive Peter Bingeman.

“We will do a review every year, as after every major event; we do a big review to see how we can either improve it or do things differently.”

Cities hosting White Night are understood to foot part of the bill for their festival.

Hannah Francis is Arts Editor at The Age.

Ebony Bowden is a reporter for The Age and The Sydney Morning Herald. She was previously a breaking news reporter for The New Daily and an intern with Al Jazeera in Kuala Lumpur.