Festival putting Bay on the Kiwi arts map

Tauranga Arts Festival director Jo Bond left, associate director Claire Mabey and sponsor liaison Nikki Hansen are looking forward to having a luminarium on the waterfront. Photo/George Novak

Millions of dollars and some welcome spring vibrancy will be injected into the city centre when the Tauranga Arts Festival 2015 begins next month.

Associate festival director Claire Mabey said nearly 11,000 people attended ticketed events during the last 10-day festival in 2013 with $2.6 million spent in the community - excluding ticket sales.

The festival, which runs alternate years to the New Zealand Garden and Art Festival in Tauranga, will celebrate its ninth event showcasing music, literary and performing arts from New Zealand and around the world.

Over a month out from the festival more than 1000 school children are already booked to go to the luminarium - an inflatable maze of colour and light which is travelling to the Tauranga waterfront for the festival.

It just really engages the CBD and brings people into the city.

Pip Loader, Tauranga City Council

Chief executive of economic development agency Priority One Andrew Coker said events like the Arts Festival were key to attracting the right people to the Bay. "It brings that vibrancy that we really want to attract skilled and talented people and the businesses that want them," he said.

Those who attended shows were likely to visit restaurants and bars, injecting life in to the CBD.

The festival also profiled Tauranga nationally, and to an extent internationally, to people who would perhaps consider working or setting up business in the Bay, he said.

Tauranga City Council strategic events manager Pip Loader said the festival was one of the city's five major events.

Over the past year, council had been completing economic impact assessments on each of the five events - including the AIMS Games, National Jazz Festival, Port of Tauranga Half and New Zealand Garden and Art Festival - the last of which will be the Tauranga Arts Festival.

Mrs Loader said the assessment, due for release in December, would measure the event's impact on regional GDP, visitor nights and event seasonality. It would also consider how the event showcased Tauranga and grew community pride.

Staging a festival brought a real "crowd of buzz and atmosphere to our city," Mrs Loader said.

In a region renowned for its beaches and natural landscape the festival offered the opportunity to bring the community together through the arts.

"It just really engages the CBD and brings people into the city."

The festival programme, which includes a free ANZ Community Day expected to attract more than 4000 people to the city centre, succeeded in making the arts accessible to everyone, Mrs Loader said.

Tourism Bay of Plenty general manager Rhys Arrowsmith expected the festival to appeal to Tourism BOP's core market of 30 to 55-year-old couples or groups of friends.

"It is a great opportunity for visitors to take advantage of luxury packages at the official event hotel - Trinity Wharf, rent an apartment or bach with friends or use it as a good excuse to visit with local friends and family."

The festival, which will bring international artists to Tauranga, added to a growing arts and culture reputation in Tauranga, he said.

"The festival team work throughout New Zealand and overseas to curate and manage a world-class festival that puts the city on the cultural map."

Tauranga Arts Festival 2015

* Between 600 and 1000 are expected to come to the CBD each night to attend performances at Baycourt and Pacific Crystal Palace on The Strand.

* More than 180 performers and technical staff will stay in the CBD for an average of three nights each.

* Tauranga will host performers and writers from Wales, Czech Republic, Ireland, England, Germany, Australia and throughout New Zealand.