International Youth Arts Festival

International Youth Arts Festival
Genre	Festival
Dates	July (exact dates vary each year)
Location(s)	Kingston upon Thames
Country	England
Founded	2009
Website
	www.iyafestival.org.uk

Last updated April 09, 2019

International Youth Arts Festival (IYAF) is an annual youth arts festival held in the Royal Borough of Kingston upon Thames every July. The festival was founded in 2009 by Robin Hutchinson MBE and more than 25,000 young people have delivered the festival as participants and volunteers since its inception.

The Royal Borough of Kingston upon Thames is a borough in southwest London, England. The main town is Kingston upon Thames and it includes Surbiton, Chessington, Malden Rushett, New Malden and Tolworth. It is the oldest of the four Royal Boroughs in England. The others are Kensington and Chelsea and Greenwich also in London, and Windsor and Maidenhead. The local authority is Kingston upon Thames London Borough Council.

Open access

International Youth Arts Festival is an open-access mixed arts festival: it does not book performers and anyone may participate, with any type of performance. The official programme categorises shows into sections for theatre, comedy, children and family shows, music and circus.

Theatre or theater is a collaborative form of fine art that uses live performers, typically actors or actresses, to present the experience of a real or imagined event before a live audience in a specific place, often a stage. The performers may communicate this experience to the audience through combinations of gesture, speech, song, music, and dance. Elements of art, such as painted scenery and stagecraft such as lighting are used to enhance the physicality, presence and immediacy of the experience. The specific place of the performance is also named by the word "theatre" as derived from the Ancient Greek θέατρον, itself from θεάομαι.

In a modern sense, comedy refers to any discourse or work generally intended to be humorous or amusing by inducing laughter, especially in theatre, television, film, stand-up comedy, or any other medium of entertainment. The origins of the term are found in Ancient Greece. In the Athenian democracy, the public opinion of voters was influenced by the political satire performed by the comic poets at the theaters. The theatrical genre of Greek comedy can be described as a dramatic performance which pits two groups or societies against each other in an amusing agon or conflict. Northrop Frye depicted these two opposing sides as a "Society of Youth" and a "Society of the Old." A revised view characterizes the essential agon of comedy as a struggle between a relatively powerless youth and the societal conventions that pose obstacles to his hopes. In this struggle, the youth is understood to be constrained by his lack of social authority, and is left with little choice but to take recourse in ruses which engender very dramatic irony which provokes laughter.

Music is an art form and cultural activity whose medium is sound organized in time. General definitions of music include common elements such as pitch, rhythm, dynamics, and the sonic qualities of timbre and texture. Different styles or types of music may emphasize, de-emphasize or omit some of these elements. Music is performed with a vast range of instruments and vocal techniques ranging from singing to rapping; there are solely instrumental pieces, solely vocal pieces and pieces that combine singing and instruments. The word derives from Greek μουσική . See glossary of musical terminology.

Venues

Since the first International Youth Arts Festival, venues across the Royal Borough of Kingston upon Thames have been supporting artists by transforming their venues into performance spaces. The festival includes over 200 events staged in venues including Rose Theatre, Arthur Cotterell Theatre, Kingston Library, Fairfield Recreation Ground, Eagle Brewery Wharf and The Library club.

The Rose Theatre, Kingston is a theatre on Kingston High Street in the Royal Borough of Kingston upon Thames. The theatre seats 899 around a wide, thrust stage.

People

Artistic Directors

2016 - Andy Currums^[2]

2015 - Trevor Blackman^[3]

2009 - 2014 Aniela Zaba

Patrons

Festival patrons include Angellica Bell, Michael Underwood,^[4] Tom Holland,^[2] Tom Chambers, Chike Okonowo^{[ citation needed ]}, Sheridan Smith and Matt Lucas.^[5]

Chairman and founding trustee

Robin Hutchinson MBE

Related Research Articles

Kingston upon Thames, frequently known as Kingston, is an area of southwest London, England, 10 miles (16.1 km) southwest of Charing Cross. It is the administrative centre of the Royal Borough of Kingston upon Thames, and identified as a major metropolitan centre in the London Plan.

Richmond is a suburban town in south-west London, 8.2 miles (13.2 km) west-southwest of Charing Cross. It is on a meander of the River Thames, with a large number of parks and open spaces, including Richmond Park, and many protected conservation areas, which include much of Richmond Hill. A specific Act of Parliament protects the scenic view of the River Thames from Richmond.

Fareham is a market town at the north-west tip of Portsmouth Harbour, between the cities of Portsmouth and Southampton in south east Hampshire, England. It gives its name to the Borough of Fareham. It was historically an important manufacturer of bricks, used to build the Royal Albert Hall, and grower of strawberries and other seasonal fruits. Current employers include Fareham Shopping Centre, small-scale manufacturers, HMS Collingwood and the Defence Science and Technology Laboratory.

The Edinburgh Festival Fringe is the world's largest arts festival, which in 2018 spanned 25 days and featured more than 55,000 performances of 3,548 different shows in 317 venues. Established in 1947 as an alternative to the Edinburgh International Festival, it takes place annually in Edinburgh, Scotland, in the month of August.

The Glee Club is a chain of independent live stand-up comedy and live music venues in the UK. The first Glee Club was opened by Mark Tughan in Birmingham's Chinese Quarter in 1994, the first dedicated comedy club to open in the United Kingdom outside London.

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References

↑ "INTERNATIONAL YOUTH ARTS FESTIVAL KINGSTON – Enabling young people to realise their potential through the arts". www.iyafestival.org.uk. Retrieved 2016-11-16.
1 2 "Kingston's IYAF names new director as charity gets celebrity patrons". Epsom Guardian. Retrieved 2016-10-19.
↑ "New International Youth Arts Festival director announced". Surrey Comet. Retrieved 2016-10-19.
↑ Leisure, Time &. "Time & Leisure Local Lifestyle Magazine". www.timeandleisure.co.uk. Retrieved 2016-10-19.
↑ "Kingston begins countdown to country's biggest youth arts festival - South West Londoner". South West Londoner. 2013-06-11. Retrieved 2016-10-19.

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[1] "INTERNATIONAL YOUTH ARTS FESTIVAL KINGSTON – Enabling young people to realise their potential through the arts". www.iyafestival.org.uk. Retrieved 2016-11-16.

[:0-2] 1 2 "Kingston's IYAF names new director as charity gets celebrity patrons". Epsom Guardian. Retrieved 2016-10-19.

[3] "New International Youth Arts Festival director announced". Surrey Comet. Retrieved 2016-10-19.

[4] Leisure, Time &. "Time & Leisure Local Lifestyle Magazine". www.timeandleisure.co.uk. Retrieved 2016-10-19.

[5] "Kingston begins countdown to country's biggest youth arts festival - South West Londoner". South West Londoner. 2013-06-11. Retrieved 2016-10-19.