The SXSW arts and tech festival is leaving Texas for a trip to East London
Next summer, there will be a week-long event in London called the “Olympics of the mind,” featuring new films, music, talks, and more.
Famous figures like Barack Obama, Johnny Cash, Matthew McConaughey, Elon Musk, and Mark Zuckerberg have spoken at the event before. Now, the popular Texan festival, known for looking at the future of culture and technology, is coming to London.
The European version of the South by Southwest (SXSW) festival is now open for applications from people who want to take part, either as speakers or audience members, before the event happens in London next summer.
Although it won’t be in the desert and there won’t be as many baseball caps, the famous Austin festival, known for music, film, and new ideas, is set to take over Shoreditch in East London.
Before the full schedule is announced next spring, Katy Arnander, the director of programming, shared that the main conference during the week will have 420 sessions. The event will take place at 29 venues, including galleries and nightclubs.
She said, “It’s already clear from the early interest that the streets of East London will be as lively as we expected.” The event, which is described as a “mind Olympics” with fashion and music involved, is being held in London instead of other European cities “because of its multicultural nature,” according to Arnander.
“It will also attract entrepreneurs and performers from beyond Europe because it’s much closer to the Middle East and North Africa,” she adds.
Fans of film, music, and technology, as well as creators and inventors, now have four days to vote on the event’s program. “The idea is to be democratic and let the audience have a say, though there will also be lots of planned content and performances.”
So far, the British organizers have received more than twice the expected number of submissions, with 2,700 entries and counting. Each submission will be reviewed by three curators to make sure everything gets a fair chance.
The festival started in Austin in 1987 and has grown into a major event that attracts hundreds of thousands of visitors to the city. It focuses on showcasing current trends and offering a glimpse of what innovators are thinking. However, it faced financial challenges during the pandemic after the 2020 event was canceled unexpectedly.
After a two-year break, Penske Media’s P-MRC Holdings invested in the festival. P-MRC is a partnership between Penske Media Corporation and MRC, which owns well-known media outlets like Billboard, Hollywood Reporter, Rolling Stone, Variety, and Vibe. The London event is owned by Panarise, a subsidiary of the Panarae investment firm.
In 2022, a mixed in-person and virtual version of the festival returned. But this year, the Austin festival faced backlash when 80 performers withdrew in protest over the festival’s partnership with the US military.
In June, South by Southwest ended its partnership with the US Army and the defense company RTX Corporation.
“After careful thought, we are changing our sponsorship approach,” the festival said in a statement on its website. “As a result, the US Army and companies involved in weapons manufacturing will not be sponsors of SXSW 2025.”
Published: 16th December 2024
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