Things to do in Sydney this week

If you’ve been longing for an excuse to splurge on that first designer handbag, Hawkeye Vintage is holding one of its unmissable pop up sales in Sydney so you can indulge in luxury without breaking the bank. From May 17-18 in Woolloomooloo, the beloved vintage designer reseller is making dreams come true with up to 60 per cent off a treasure trove of vintage Chanel, Louis Vuitton, Fendi, Dior, Celine and YSL pieces.  What’s on offer? A range of rare and hard-to-find clothes, handbags, jewellery and silk scarves dated from the ‘80s, ‘90s and early Y2K will be available, all of which come with 100 per cent authenticity guarantee.  The online retailer has slowly become one of Australia’s leading resellers, and following the success of its pop-ups in Perth and Melbourne, there's no doubt this sale will be epic. Doors are open from 10am-7pm (we suggest getting there early) so you can come down and meet the team and find some gems.  Entry is $10 and you can register to attend here.

The Museum of Contemporary Art knows how to party. This month, Circular Quay’s temple of future-forward art is entering a parallel timeline with one massive night of futuristic performances, sensory art activations, DJ sets and more. As part of The Biennale of Sydney, groundbreaking digital artist (and Time Out Future Shaper) Serwah Attafuah has curated an immersive night of art and entertainment for the latest edition of Artbar on Friday, May 17, in response to the theme of 'Tomorrow – 20 minutes into the future’.  Attafuah’s cyber dreamscape is taking over every level of the MCA’s galleries, and you can experience the museum after-dark anytime between 7pm and 11pm. There’s an epic line-up of local and international artists on music duties, including genre-bending death metal from Dispossessed, experimental pop that channels techno-utopianism from DeepFaith, new wave pop-plasticity from multi-instrumentalist crwlr, hardcore punk from Persecutor, and Global Sounds will also be spinning forgotten gems of funk, disco and soul all night. You can also encounter a photography project that weaves art, politics and environmental concerns by Pieter Hugo; immerse yourself in a video game and sculpture work by Kal Dhir; watch an interactive performance from Bristol-based musician and game designer Llainwire; witness a '90s revival art installation and performance by ‘Cyber Dada Manifesto’; and interact with people from around the world as the virtual and real world collide at ‘Artbar M

Are you ready to chase artistic escapades around the city? The Biennale of Sydney is back for its 24th edition from March 9 to June 10, 2024. Whether you’re a dedicated arts fanatic or a casual culture buff, you’ll find something to inspire and provoke you along this epic art trail. The largest contemporary art event of its kind in Australia, the Biennale is taking over six different locations with awe-inspiring installations and intriguing exhibitions. Titled Ten Thousand Suns, this year the festival explores a multiplicity of global cultures, taking on a transgressive spirit as it leans into the origins of Carnivale. As always, the Biennale is free for everyone to visit for a total of 16 weeks.   Of all the locations, White Bay Power Station is absolutely the main character of the Biennale’s 50th year anniversary (and 24th iteration – it takes place every second year). This is the first time the revitalised industrial site will officially open its doors to the public in more than 100 years – and what they’ve accomplished is pretty spectacular. Years of accumulated pigeon poop has been cleared out of the enormous factory spaces, making way for art installations that tower multiple storeys high, and more works hidden in various nooks and crannies. Pop-up bars and brand new bathrooms also set the stage for a packed program of live performances and music curated by Phoenix Central Park. Think of White Bay as a replacement for the role that Cockatoo Island has played in Sydney’s

Ray is a farmer. Ray is dying. Ray is falling in love. Ray has had a tough year. Ray mourns his wife. Ray meets his wife. Ray doesn’t want to live in a nursing home. Ray’s kids don’t understand him. Ray doesn’t understand why the world won’t let him live his life. Ray, played with impressive physicality and nuance by veteran actor Colin Friels, is the central figure of Into the Shimmering World – a new work commissioned by Sydney Theatre Company that makes the intimate epic, seesawing back and forth in time but remaining locked in space. The main arena of conflict is the family farm that Ray and his wife, nurse Floss (fellow veteran Kerry Armstrong) have run their entire adult lives. It’s a hard existence, but a rewarding one, contending with droughts, floods, fluctuating markets, and unruly neighbours (one dubbed “The Crook” remains an unseen presence, but a constant source of grievance).  Written by 2020 Patrick White Playwrights Fellow Angus Cerini and directed by STC’s Director of New Work and Artistic Development Paige Rattray, Into the Shimmering World is a study of Australian masculinity – as were the previous works in Cerini’s Australian gothic trilogy, The Bleeding Tree and Wonnangatta. In many ways this play is a study of stoicism, its strengths and its limitations. The laconic Ray meets every challenge with a resigned determination that borders on fatalism, an attitude that has served him well for decades. But the sons his work put through university don’t want to

The Met Gala might be behind us, but the biggest annual event of Sydney’s fashion calendar is just around the corner. Australian Fashion Week (AFW) will be taking over Carriageworks this month – transforming the cavernous post-industrial space into a central hub of talks, workshops and runways featuring everyone from emerging student designers to Australia’s fashion royalty from May 13–17.  And though it might seem like an exclusive concept, don’t let the epic outfits intimidate you, there are plenty of ways you can get involved with Sydney’s biggest celebration of style. The spectacular showcase of design was once an industry-only event, but now they've opened the doors – it is no longer only restricted to the fashion world’s elite few. Though not every runway offers tickets to the paying public, many do – with the varied program also featuring panel discussions, consumer activations and other special events and parties. (Hot tip: There is no cover fee required to hang out at the festival hub, suss out the brand activations, grab a refreshment at the pop-up bars and settle in for some people watching.) AFW 2024 will feature boundary-pushing runway shows alongside presentations from new and well-established names alike. Though Carriageworks will serve as the hub, additional AFW-related events will be popping up across the city, and runways will be streamed virtually at australianfashionweek.com. On opening night, after a Hair Masterclass presented by Shark Beauty, a Sustainab

Sydney’s more adamant theatergoers have been waiting with bated breath to see Australian acting legend Hugo Weaving tread the boards with the great Irish actor Olwen Fouéré (Terminus). A first-time co-production between Sydney Theatre Company and Dublin’s renowned Gate Theatre, you could say that the Australian premiere of the late Austrian playwright Thomas Bernhard’s dark comedy, The President, has a lot riding on it. However, considering that Bernhard’s plays are rarely staged, in part due to the known fact that they’re considered a notoriously hard sell, it calls into question: what is the motivation for mounting a new adaptation of The President in 2024? We find ourselves in an unnamed European country at an unspecified but tumultuous time – although the play’s initial production date of 1975, a period of political unrest and bloodshed, offers some context. Following a failed assassination attempt on the titular President (Weaving) that instead slew a faithful Colonel, The First Lady (Fouéré) prepares for a night out. She harangues her maid, Mrs Frölich (Julie Forsyth) over the selection of eveningwear and frets over the state of the country – emboldened anarchists are striking at the establishment – but especially the death of her beloved dog, struck down by a heart attack triggered by the assassin’s gunfire.  ...although The President improves in the back half, it never quite recovers from a punishing first act. Bernhard’s work certainly contains themes that draw paral

Musicals are often a product of their time. So, it is somewhat expected that the show will reflect the sentiment, the tragedy, the conflict and the beliefs of that time. What is rare, however, is when a revival of a musical manages to find that stark relevance again, as if history is repeating itself. Off the back of the celebrated Broadway revival starring Ben Platt, this new staging of Parade arrives in Sydney following a sold-out Melbourne premiere in July 2023.  First staged in 1998, Parade is based on the true story of the 1913–1915 trial, imprisonment, and lynching of Leo Frank (Aaron Robuck – The Great Gatsby: An Immersive Theatrical Experience). A Jewish man from Brooklyn, Frank was a fish out of water amongst the residents of Atlanta, Georgia, where he worked as the superintendent of a pencil factory. When he was accused of the tragic assault and murder of a 13-year-old girl named Mary Phagan (Adeline Hunter – Urinetown), the townsfolk’s prejudices and the sensationalist media coverage of the trial stirred up a storm of antisemitic tension. Witness tampering and scapegoating by the local police force led to Frank being landed with a guilty verdict, a ruling which most modern researchers strongly disagree with. Most significantly, the historic trial spurred the formation of the Anti-Defamation League, whilst concurrently initiating the revival of the Klu Klux Klan. Despite some difficulties...this show succeeds in reminding the audience that prejudice, hate, and the

This is it, we have found the yassification of Shakespeare. Fuelled by a playlist of certified pop hits, this jukebox romp billed as “the greatest love story ever remixed” poses a simple but provocative question: What if, instead of joining Romeo in eternal slumber, Juliet decided to live? A contagiously joyous musical spectacular, & Juliet has finally landed at Sydney’s Lyric Theatre after being met with critical acclaim on Broadway and the West End, not to mention the rapturously received Australian debut in Melbourne.  Filled with sing-a-long-able chart-topping bangers made famous by the likes of Britney Spears, The Backstreet Boys, Katy Perry and more from the songbook of Grammy-winning Swedish songwriter/producer Max Martin, the Aussie cast is overflowing with talent in this feel-good, flashy production. & Juliet is Shakespeare remixed for the girls, the gays and the theys... [but does it] really cut it as the feminist reclamation that we are promised? Will you be entertained? Absolutely. Does & Juliet set a new standard for jukebox musicals? Yes. Will you see one of the most diverse and charismatic casts of triple-threats ever assembled on an Australian stage? Heck yeah. Does the story deliver on the feminist retribution we are promised? Not quite. “What if Juliet didn’t kill herself?” Anne Hathaway (played by the enthralling Amy Lehpamer) posits to her husband, William Shakespeare (the ever-charming Rob Mills). “She’s only ever had one boyfriend, and frankly, the endi

In paintings dating back to the 18th century, the Nayika (the heroine) can be seen with her Sakhi (her confidante). In ancient Tamil poetry, songs and dance forms such as Bharatanatyam, the cherished Sakhi – the friend, accomplice, and at times, the witness – is a catalyst for the heroine to wrestle with and ultimately to accept her truth. It is thus fitting that in Nithya Nagarajan and Liv Satchell’s Nayika: A Dancing Girl, we meet our heroine (Vaishnavi Suryaprakash – Counting and Cracking) as she is reconnecting with her childhood best friend. Beginning with a meeting over over-priced entrees in Sydney, the story explores bursts of the forgotten joy and sorrow the pair shared in Chennai, India, over four formative years as our heroine learned about love, met a boy, began a relationship and ultimately escaped its perils with her own scars. Satchell and Nagarajan’s script is moving, humorous and sensitive in its exploration of heartbreak and trauma. With dramaturgy support from Nick Enright Prize winner S Shakthidaran (the creator of critically acclaimed works Counting and Cracking and The Jungle and the Sea), Satchell and Nagarajan’s script is moving, humorous and sensitive in its exploration of heartbreak and trauma. As the only actor on stage, Suryaprakash is a captivating performer – she utilises accents effectively to indicate shifts in time and place, and is infinitely expressive as a smitten 13-year-old, finding the giddy exasperation of love with ease.  On the violin

Calling all amateur Egyptologists, history buffs and lovers of gold and glamour: you can explore a blockbuster exhibition packed with priceless Ancient Egyptian artefacts. Exclusive to the country's oldest museum – the Australian Museum in Sydney – Ramses & the Gold of the Pharaohs is an interactive museum experience more than 3,000 years in the making, and featuring 181 priceless artefacts. The popular exhibition has sold over a record-breaking 330,000 tickets in the first three months alone, becoming the biggest hit in the history of the Australian Museum. Ramses is still in town until May 19, 2024, and the Australian Museum has recently extended its visiting hours, giving you more chances to explore the exhibition after dark. In February, it is now open from 9am–9pm on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday (last entry at 8pm). The museum also continues to be open from 9am–5pm from Thursday to Sunday (last entry at 4pm).  View this post on Instagram A post shared by Time Out Sydney (@timeoutsydney) Ramses is the largest cultural exhibition to visit Australia in more than a decade, and in a huge coup, the Museum even managed to ship over the actual coffin of Ramses the Great for it. You can also excavate further with the museum's Gateway to Egypt public program, an exclusive season of lectures, conversations, and experiences designed to give visitors of all ages a richer understanding of Ancient Egypt, whether an Egyptophile or justEgypto-curious. RECOMMENDED: Thre