ACT CHIEF Minister, Andrew Barr opened the seventh Design Canberra Festival this morning (November 9) in front of the new, large-scale suspended installation by Canberra artist Hannah Quinlivan outside the David Jones entrance to Monaro Mall.

A socially-distanced crowd of art and design lovers gathered for the official launch of the annual three-week festival, intended to celebrate Canberra as a global city of design and a living design laboratory.

This year’s event will feature more than 200 events, exhibitions, talks, tours, activations, collaborations, and artists’ studios.

According to the festival’s artistic director, Rachael Coghlan, the event had attracted a record 114,770 people in 2019, showcasing the city’s thriving design community. It is the focal event of the calendar for Craft ACT, which Coghlan also directs.

As the crowd watched on, four unusual BMWs could be seen parked in the precinct, showing the results of the Design Canberra-Rolfe Classic car-wrap competition in which four local designers were selected to have their art wrapped around brand-new BMWs.

But the highlight of the opening was the unveiling of Quinlivan’s newly commissioned site-specific installation, “Desiderium”, an 3D spatial drawing-sculpture that has allowed her to explore the social atmosphere after periods of crisis, including Australia’s recent red summer, the subsequent COVID-19-induced health and economic crisis, and the fissures that have risen in communities.

DESIGN Canberra, all around Canberra, November 9-29. Details here.