Richmond Arts and Ideas Festival is back in 2025
Today the sun is at its highest point, and we celebrate the longest day of the year. We have reached the Summer Solstice, an event that traditionally signals the middle of summer. Last year, the occasion was marked by a Richmond Arts and Ideas Festival event, organised by Orleans House Gallery. Orange Tree Youth Theatre led us on an immersive procession, featuring wild performances reflecting on the climate emergency.
The event was an energising, hopeful and sometimes confronting look at the climate emergency, expressed directly through the words and ideas of young people. As we were led from the gallery grasslands to the river, themes such as Noah’s Ark and Dr Seuss’ Lorax made us reflect on our futures and our relationship with nature. Hopefulness was found through the planting of seed sculptures, created by artist Andrew Merritt at key points during the march.
Super Solstice Procession 2023 featuring the Lorax
Looking to the future, today we celebrate the Summer Solstice with an exciting announcement. The Richmond Arts and Ideas Festival was so successful in its pilot year that we are delighted to announce that the festival will be back next year. Get ready for June 2025 for another programme of music, dance, exhibitions, theatre, writing and much more.
Much like the solstice celebration event last year, the festival theme for 2025 is Cultural Reforesting, a programme initiated by the Richmond Arts Service. It is a series of artist-led, multi-disciplinary projects set in the context of the ecological crises. Each artist project responds to the question – how can we renew our relationship with nature? The programme recently received an honorary mention at the European Union Prize for Citizen Science.
Cultural Reforesting is expanding into Richmond Arts and Ideas Festival 2025. Events across the borough will explore our relationship with nature and reflect on the ecological crisis. One of these events will be a group exhibition at Orleans House Gallery featuring stories by the Cultural Reforesting artists.
Super Solstice Procession
Watch a forest of culture grow across Richmond (and beyond) and participate in a network of ideas and discussions, like mycelium transferring nutrients and information between trees.
Throughout the festival we’ll be asking ‘What next?’. What next for the second half of this decade, what next for us, what next for nature. We’ll leave you to reflect on this this as we prepare for Arts and Ideas Festival.
We’ll be back in 2025, until then we’ll be sharing festival updates and reflecting on past events. Sign up to our newsletter and follow us on Instagram and X to keep updated.