Remembering Warana Festival

As Brisbane residents know, springtime in the River City can be utterly glorious. September brings Brisbane Festival, Riverfire and a host of community activities. One of Brisbane’s very first spring festivals was Warana Festival – a celebration that grew alongside its host city – from a country town to a vibrant destination.

State Library holds a variety of items from the many Warana festivals, including some spectacular images from the popular street parade, along with festival programs from 1962 through to the 1990s, giving a unique insight into how the festival – and the city’s cultural landscape – changed over the years.

The idea of a large-scale community festival for Brisbane came about after the successful Centenary of Celebrations in 1959. A competition was held to name the festival and “Warana”, suggested by fruit cannery process worker Stewart Foxlee, was chosen as the winner from 15,000 entries.

We are told in the inaugural official program – held in State Library’s collections – that Warana is “the Aboriginal word for blue skies” (although this claim was never verified).

The first Warana Festival ran from September 29 to October 6, 1962, with its centrepiece a two-hour parade through city streets. The parade featured decorated floats, marching girls, entertainers and bands (ironically, this first parade, according to a history of the festival held in State Library collections, was “rained on”).

The first Warana Festival events were held across Brisbane, Ipswich, the Sunshine Coast, Lowood, Gatton, Laidley, Stanthorpe and Warwick and included a horticultural Spring Festival, open-air art display, writers’ convention, city illuminations, art exhibition, concerts, film screenings, water ski shows, and sporting events.

Throughout the 1960s and into the ’70s, the program grew larger, with traditional events more reflective of a conservative state now sharing the  bill with those beginning to push cultural boundaries.

Alongside The Sunday Mail Fence Painting Competition, Miss Warana Quest and dog obedience trials (culminating in a Hoop of Fire finale) were major cultural events, such as the launch of the Queensland Theatre Company.

In a sign of things to come, 1976 saw for the first time F-111 jets soar over Brisbane city in an “after-burning torching, spectacular night display”.

By 1982, Warana had become, according to its official history, “the largest festival of its kind in Australia”.

It ran in conjunction with the 1982 Commonwealth Games under the banner of “Festival ’82”, welcoming  700 participants from more than 50 Commonwealth countries, alongside “2500 skilled Queensland and interstate entertainers”. Following Expo ’88 Warana began to evolve into a festival that matched the ambitions of a maturing city.

In 1996, Warana became a biennial arts festival with the moniker Brisbane Festival, and Warana Writers Week became Brisbane Writers Festival.

In 1998, Brisbane City Council’s RiverFestival began as an annual 10-day September event, and in 2009 was combined with the existing Brisbane Festival, becoming the international art festival we know today under the Brisbane Festival name.

If you have any significant material relating to Warana Festival and would like to donate it to State Library of Queensland, please contact qldmemory@slq.qld.gov.au.

Here’s to many more blue skies  in September!