You Are Here is an annual curated festival of the best of Canberra’s diverse independent and experimental arts and culture. From Thursday 13 to Sunday 23 March, the festival will inhabit Canberra’s inner city spaces.

The creative producers of the You Are Here festival have been gleefully sweating it out in their Gorman Arts Centre office, putting the final touches to the 2014 program. In keeping with previous years, the festival has an eclectic program designed to showcase the energy and talent of Canberra’s artistic and creative communities. You can expect an entirely free program of events, with old favourites returning, and electrifying new projects taking the stage.

“We’re excited to keep challenging our audiences, as well as bringing them the events that delight and entertain”, says festival co‐producer Vanessa Wright.

For the fourth year running, You Are Here will again be transforming a vacant shopfront into the festival hub space. After the success of Fletcher Jones in 2013, the team is excited to welcome audiences to the festival’s new hub for 2014, The Money Bin, previously the ANZ Bank in Petrie Plaza.

You Are Here will be crossing the threshold of your favourite venues and public spaces, re­‐purposing them for an array of challenging, strange and experimental theatre, visual arts, dance, music and all that lies in between.

As always, the events and projects that feature in the program reflect the dynamism of Canberra’s arts scene – from the DIY to the refined, the easy to the cerebral, the classic to the contemporary, art that sits on the edge of genre and classification. Entry to all events is free, all ages, alcohol and drug free (except where events occur inside licensed venues).

Events you won’t want to miss

Free Music for Rich Kids

Free Music for Rich Kids is a music festival for everyone, despite the name. Featuring four stages across the city, including: Ainslie Place, Gorman Arts Centre, everyone’s late night favourite the Phoenix (pending whether it’s ready post-fire), and The Money Bin (the festival hub).

At each stage you can find your favourite genre of music, there will be 18 bands in four hours, including Canberra favourites such as: Sex Noises, Spartak, Julia and the Deep Sea Sirens, Waterford, Burrows, Cracked Actor, Faux Faux Ami, Schoolgirl Report, Orlando Furious, Yard Duty, Territory, Spindrift Saga, Suede Merit and more!

It’s all happening from 8pm – 12am Friday 14 March.

The Night Fort

Commencing with round one of in case of sound, featuring performances from the best of Canberra’s experimental electronic musicians and slowly segueing into a durational sleep experiment, You Are Here presents an overnight event in partnership with the Canberra Museum and Gallery.

Inhabiting the foyer of CMAG, constructed from blankets, sheets and the varied contrivances of peaceful slumber, The Night Fort is your very own midnight kingdom. Tuck yourself into your sleeping bag for an evening of mysterious storytelling, blissful projection, subtle screenings and ambient performance that will lull you into a state that exists somewhere between reality and fiction.

From 9pm Saturday 15 until 7am Sunday 16 March at the Canberra Museum and Gallery.

Neon Night Rider

Canberra’s very first iridescent community bike ride, from bridge to bridge this glowing cavalcade will light up the lake, with a stream of riders bedecked in their own glimmering lights.

The ride invites participation from everyone who can ride and will feature enticing performances and installations at four checkpoints along the route. Rolling straight into a night of dancing in the dark at our Friday night special edition of No Lights No Lycra, it’s set to get your pulses racing!

From 7pm – 9pm Friday 21 March at Lake Burley Griffin.

Blurred Lines (#RobinThickeLovesIndependentLiterature)

Join the inaugural edition of Blurred Lines, You Are Here’s first independent publishing fair. For the last day of the 2014 festival, they will be packing up The Money Bin and moving everything and everyone to Gorman Arts Centre.

There will be zines aplenty with the Canberra Zine Emporium bringing in zinesters from all over the country, small press publishers will be touting their wares and local independent record labels will be wooing you with their tunes. As well as a fair to browse and words to buy, there will be theatre, circus, workshops and panels running all day as well as food and coffee to keep you going.

From 11am – 4pm Sunday 23 March at the Gorman Arts Centre.

No Lights No Lycra

No Lights No Lycra is a global community dedicated to dancing in the dark and we warmly invite you and your groove thang to don your finest tracky dacks and dance like no one’s watching. All the joy of shaking your cake off without the sticky floors or scary mirrors. There is no light, no lycra, no steps to learn, no teachers, NO JUDGMENT. Just get loose and get dancin’! Grapevine? Air guitar? Grapevine guitar? Anything goes.

Want a little preview? NLNL happens every single Tuesday from 7:45 in Corroborree Park, Ainslie. You should be dancin’. Yeah.

Enjoy the special Festival Friday session from 9.30pm – 11pm Friday 21 March at The Money Bin.

Lady Lolz

There are more men than women on the stage at most stand up comedy nights. This is a problem. There’s also never enough comedy tomfoolery at serious arts festivals. So You Are Here is stamping down hard on the other end of the seesaw and putting on stage for your most excellent comic relief, four very hilarious, very funny people who just happen to be ladies.

Stand up, storytelling and all that comes in between. With added lolz.

From 8pm – 9pm Saturday 22 March at Smith’s Alternative.

the essentials

What: You Are Here
When: Thursday 13 to Sunday 23 March
Where: Various venues across the city
How much: Free
Web: youareherecanberra.com.au
Facebook: www.facebook.com/YouAreHereCanberra
Twitter: @youarehere_fest