Festival City Adelaide Appoints New Board

Festival City Adelaide (FCA) has announced the appointment of seven directors to its independent and skills based board. The festival industry body manages the consortium of major arts and cultural festivals in South Australia. Established in 2012, the organisation will celebrate its first decade in August this year.

The appointees include: David Coltman, Kath Mainland, Govert Mellink, Mat Kesting, Jim Plouffe, Susannah Sweeney, and Denise von Wald.

Govert Mellink has been elected as Chair of the Board, while Mat Kesting will fulfil the role of Deputy Chair. Govert takes up the baton from Ian Scobie AM, who successfully led the organisation in its formative years.

“Festival City Adelaide is a highly strategic and significant alliance of festivals, the only such platform in Australia.

Festivals in Adelaide deliver hefty social, wellbeing, and economic benefits to our capital city and state, and we aim to ensure that Adelaide is internationally recognised as Australia’s Festival Capital, particularly given the opportunities and challenges that lay ahead of the industry in light of the COVID-19 pandemic.

We look forward to continuing a proactive and productive relationship with government, industry, and partners as we steer the organisation into its next decade,” said Govert Mellink.

“Despite their differences, Adelaide’s festivals all share the same objective – to deliver the world’s best festival experiences, which create joy, celebrate artists, and foster a thriving industry. Festival City Adelaide supports the sector to have the right conditions to achieve its wide-ranging and diverse impacts.

Now more than ever collaboration is critical for industry recovery and business development. We are excited to bring our ideas and energy to the Board for the benefit of not only the consortium, but Adelaide – South Australia as well,” said Mat Kesting.

The FCA Board has also nominated Shaun de Bruyn and Deborah Kingsbury to serve on the organisation’s committees as external advisors. Justyna Jochym is the CEO of Festival City Adelaide.

Festival City Adelaide is the rebrand of Festivals Adelaide. Since its establishment in 2012, the organisation has existed to strategically position, develop, and advance the festival sector in the state’s Capital City.

The consortium is currently made up of 13 major arts festivals, including:

Adelaide Fringe, Adelaide Festival, WOMADelaide, SA History Festival, DreamBIG Children’s Festival, Adelaide Cabaret Festival, Adelaide Guitar Festival, Illuminate Adelaide, SALA – South Australian Living Artists Festival, OzAsia Festival, Feast Festival, Adelaide Film Festival, and Tarnanthi: Festival of Contemporary Aboriginal & Torres Strait Islander Art.

Download the media release and images here.