Vivid Sydney — 2026 Festival

Our 2026 Vivid Minds (formerly Vivid Ideas) program hosted not one but two of the most recent Academy Award-winning film directors (Sean Baker and Chloé Zhao), a Pulitzer Prize-winning author (Jerry Saltz), New York Times-bestselling author (Roxane Gay) and Grammy nominee (Zane Lowe), reaffirming the festival’s commitment to creative excellence. 

Minds also continued to diversify its program offering, complementing more traditional keynote talks and conversations with immersive and experimental means of conveying ideas, such as the technology-led polyvocal lecture A Sexual History of the Internet, and Wonderverse, which uses light, music and performance to teach children about the vastness of the universe.

In a festival-first, French aerial performers and musicians took over the Sydney Opera House forecourt for a long weekend of free outdoor performance of Cristal Palace – from the dizzying heights of a giant chandelier centrepiece. And the footprint expanded beyond dark, with the commission of several major installation artworks. There, Now, Here by New York-based artists Wade and Leta invited moments of spontaneity, curiosity and an unexpected return to childhood behaviour within the fabric of the city. Manawan, by Bard man and artist Darrell Sibosado, drew on the form of tropical gum trees (woollybutts), translating cultural knowledge and lived experience into a gorgeous sculptural work that grounds the site in deeper histories and glows day and night. Positioned adjacent to Circular Quay, the works activated the corridor between the light rail and train lines along Alfred Street, building on the energy of the Light Walk while extending Vivid far beyond nightfall.

The Midweek Minds series brought together leading minds from creative industries to deep-dive into the changing creative landscape, while events with the renowned Debbie Millman and Mindy Seu were hugely popular. 

Curator, Vivid Minds: Mitchell Oakley Smith