Arts & Culture

Queenstown Lakes District Council (QLDC) and the Three Lakes Cultural Trust (TLCT) are playing creative matchmaker this November — pairing local creativity with unexpected spaces and places across the district.

Josie Shapiro is the bestselling author of Everything is Beautiful and Everything Hurts, which won the inaugural Allen & Unwin Fiction Prize and was named one of the best books of 2023 by The Spinoff and The New Zealand Listener.

Vaudeville is a genre of live theatre dating back hundreds of years, which can feature a range of acts from music and comedy to pantomime, dancing and multifarious skills.

Expect the unexpected… That’s what Kiwi sailor and songwriter Andrew Fagan is telling fans about his upcoming tour, Passage of Time – Solo Songs and Stories from Swirly World.

The Queenstown Writers Festival starts at the end of this month, presenting a diverse programme filled with award-winning writers, big personalities and a slew of talented southerners. Highlighting some great literary talent, the festival is for anyone who loves books, words and insightful conversation.

The last film screening in Arrowtown Creative Arts Society’s (ACAS) Winter Film Series will be Dale Frank, Nobody’s Sweetie. On Friday, 24 October, following the film, there’ll be a Q&A with director Jenny Hicks.

Santiago Bonhomme has been selected as one of the winners of Christchurch City Libraries National Poetry Day Competition, taking home a prize in the adult category for his poem The World War Has Not Yet Reached the South Island.

Pulling together a production in a week sounds pretty challenging, but it’s what 45 young people with the help of Stage Antics will do these school holidays. On Friday and Saturday, they will bring the show Sister Act JR. to the stage, performing at the Memorial Centre.

At the World’s Edge Festival (AWE) will celebrate their fifth festival this year, in October. They’ll be delivering an extensive programme of chamber music across Queenstown, Bannockburn, Wānaka and Cromwell.

Snow Machine festival is underway, bringing 7000 people to town for skiing, music and events. One big party. DJ Hot Dub Time Machine returns to Queenstown and is sure to be one of the highlights, playing hits across the decades - check out Jess Allen's interview with the man himself, Tom Lowndes.

Remarkable Theatre’s latest production is Kiwi playwright Roger Hall’s Take a Chance on Me. The funny, warm and relatable comedy will take over Arrowtown Athenaeum Hall next week and follows a lively group of characters as they navigate the ups and downs of love, loneliness and starting over later in life.

Award-winning documentary filmmaker Annie Goldson will be in town on Friday for a screening and Q&A of Red Mole: A Romance. The film explores the origins, performances, personalities and fate of the Kiwi group Red Mole, who burst onto the scene in the early 1970s.

Gibbston’s brand-new music festival The Valley has unveiled a stellar line-up for January 2026.

Award-winning comedian Tom Sainsbury is coming to town – twice! This Friday he’ll be tackling Kinross with his show, Can’t Dim This Shine, before performing Lessons Not Learnt in October in Arrowtown.

While much of Queenstown’s history focuses on stories of the men of the time, author Lauren Roche is focusing one of the most influential women of the time – Julia Eichardt.

Arrowtown Creative Arts Society (ACAS) and Queenstown Writers Festival are bringing New Zealand’s Poet Laureate Chris Tse to town. He’ll be performing this Friday alongside local poets, and will also host a Masterclass on Saturday.

The Central Otago Whine Tour will return this Friday and Saturday, bringing talented female comedians to Rhyme X Reason and Sherwood.

Dunedin pianist and composer Abhinath Berry will perform at Arrowtown’s Aspiring Lifestyle Village this Sunday. Midway through a scholarship in London, it’s a show not to be missed.

Te Atamira’s latest exhibition, Elemental, takes a look at the foundational forces – earth, water, fire and air – that shape our natural world and the creative process.

Following a six-month search across Aotearoa New Zealand and overseas, Queenstown's cultural centre Te Atamira has a new director.