A nocturnal landscape of sound, light and gathering.
WinterLive returns to the Convent from 20 June with an acclaimed line-up of global and local artists working at the vanguard of experimental practice.
Across June and July, Abbotsford Convent will transform through immersive sound, performance, film and installation, inviting audiences into deep listening, collective encounter and discovery across the precinct’s atmospheric buildings and grounds.
Designed to be experienced after dark, WinterLive is communal, layered and deeply human, says Abbotsford Convent CEO, Justine Hyde.
“WinterLive is a vital platform for artists working at the edges of contemporary practice, creatives whose work speaks powerfully to the social, cultural and political realities of our time,” said Ms Hyde.
“The program is an invitation to reflect, to listen deeply, and to encounter new ideas, perspectives and ways of experiencing the world.”
A major highlight of this year’s program, Colombian composer and experimental musician Lucrecia Dalt will perform following the release of her acclaimed 2025 album A Danger to Ourselves, bringing her singular world of surreal electronics and emotionally charged storytelling to a rare Melbourne performance.
Joining Dalt are First Nations artists and collaborators J.WLSN and Liam Keenan, whose textured sound worlds draw from ambient minimalism and post-rock experimentation.
At the program’s centre is Laundry Sessions, a multi-performance journey through sound art, installation, film and live performance staged throughout the Convent’s Magdalen Laundry.
Audiences are invited to move through a series of immersive works and performances featuring internationally renowned Japanese sound pioneer Akio Suzuki and multidisciplinary artist Hiromi Miyakita, whose deeply meditative, site-responsive practice transforms listening into a heightened encounter.
Suzuki’s residency project Oto Date will unfold across the Convent precinct through sound walks, drawing visitors into moments of shared stillness and mindfulness.
First Nations artist Amby Downs presents immersive de/anti-colonial sound works exploring Indigenous political justice, while Japanese-Australian composer Ai Yamamoto shares intricate electronic compositions constructed from manipulated domestic sounds and ambient textures.
Artists Maria Moles and Chloë Sobek further expand the possibilities of improvisation, electronic composition and experimental sound performance.
International collective Blame the Shadows presents The Sky After Rain, a three-channel installation exploring displacement and queerness through poetry, choreography and recorded testimony from members of the Iranian diaspora, while projection artist Yandell Walton shares Ecological Adaptation, a responsive digital installation imagining speculative ecosystems through motion, sound and immersive projection.
This year, WinterLive also extends into intimate and communal experiences, with Nigerian-Dutch artist Kasinda Fasse bringing Agaracha Orchestra with Birth of the Black Baroque, a genre-defying work fusing Nigerian and Dutch rhythmic traditions through an ensemble of leading Melbourne musicians.
The program culminates in Wildflower, a vocal gathering featuring performances by Queenie, WILSN and Nkechi (Owelu Dreamhouse), who together span soul, jazz, R&B and contemporary experimental music.
Additional highlights include a sound bath on the eve of Winter Solstice led by Los Angeles-based artist and composer Odeya Nini, whose internationally recognised practice explores the transformative and healing possibilities of the human voice.
Across sound, performance, installation and moving image, WinterLive reimagines the Convent as a place for experimentation, gathering and collective experience. An invitation to slow down, listen deeply and move through the precinct in new ways, winter nights at the Convent are shaped by art, sound and shared encounter.
WinterLive runs 20 June–18 July 2026 at Abbotsford Convent.