THE inaugural Gunning Arts Festival is done and dusted, but not really – you can still see it online.

That’s got to be the biggest payoff for arts lovers in this new era, as technology races to keep up with our need for social communication— and the events are recorded for posterity.

The festival committee, headed up by Michelle Storey as chair, was quick to assess the situation and work out how to go online to offer what she called “an impressive testament to the resilience of regional communities.”

“CityNews was alerted early by artist Margarita Georgiadis who with husband Max Cullen, was busy setting up The Picture House Art Prize, still open for viewing and for voting here. The winning artist will be announced on May 16.

I watched the whole thing, from the welcome to country by Aboriginal elder Joel Bulger to the book readings.

To be sure there were some experiences that could not be easily replicated online, like the Gunning & District Historical Society’s walk-through the historical Pye Cottage Museum. Here only the eyes were engaged, but any visit to a heritage site is something more three-dimensional.

The same might be said for the festival’s “wearable art” exhibition.

Dianna Nixon’s tantalising introduction to local playwright Millicent Armstrong suggested the urgent need for some real-life workshopping of Armstrong’s plays and the homemade video on the subject could have been longer.

By contrast, the readings from author Pam Kensit of excerpts from her most recent book “Dust to Mud” and Gregory Baines of excerpts from his China-set novella “The Nail House” ran longer and, with a single-focus camera, proved simple and effective.

Lively concerts by George Washingmachine and Mad Kelpie Playdate were as entertaining as they would have been  live, but young jazz singer Ruby Jackson seemed in need of some canny cinematography to capture her moody style.

A high point, something easily achieved online when as in this case you have good talent, was a talk by Joshua,  a year 8 student from Goulburn about the importance of the arts for young people in regional Australia. Plainly a trained actor, he jumped into the hot issues for young artist, not least the cessation of voice and drama classes at Goulburn Con.

Still, author Greg Baines summed up the general feeling when he said in his intro, “even if we go off-line next year I hope there will still be an online component”.

No doubt the virtual festival worked, but let’s hope it is not always necessary.

To access the festival at gunningartsfestival.com

Anne Murray, of Cloud Conversations, will be speak with Baines on Zoom tomorrow, April 23 from 6pm-6.30pm, visit here.