“I hate themes but I like journeys, especially the random ones,” Ruth Mackenzie tells Limelight as she sits down to discuss the 2024 Adelaide Festival, her first as Artistic Director. She is in high spirits, having just unveiled her inaugural program to the media.

Like her newly appointed counterparts at Adelaide’s sister-festivals in Edinburgh and Avignon, Mackenzie is keen to examine the purpose of a festival in today’s world, and to foster greater community engagement.

At the media briefing she posed the question, “How do we help artists to help our communities, to understand the present and build the future?”

Mackenzie didn’t claim to have the answers, promising instead to “draw on the history and strengths of the festival, inviting back old friends and audience favourites while also thinking about ways in which to build new allies and directions moving forward.”

Ruth Mackenzie. Photo © Claudio Raschella

When it comes to “old friends”, next year’s program boasts an embarrassment of riches across a range of artistic disciplines, and Mackenzie cannot wait to welcome them back.

Canadian director...