Juice Festival begins with packed opening weekend

Families will be flocking to cultural venues, libraries, shopping centres and cinemas as part of the opening weekend of Juice Festival – NewcastleGateshead’s festival for families and under 25s, which starts on Saturday 24 October. The multi arts festival kicks off a packed October half term programme with events and performances across NewcastleGateshead. intu Eldon Square hosts this year’s Big Juice Launch (Sat 24 Oct) with young dancers, musicians and artists performing throughout the shopping centre. Expect lots of fun activities and a special appearance from the Newcastle University Science Buskers. Mini superheroes are invited to take part in a superhero training programme at Tyneside Cinema as part of the opening weekend of Juice Festival. Come dressed as your favourite superhero for Family Superhero Adventure: The Incredibles (Sat 24 Oct). Enjoy a screening of The Incredibles after a superhero-filled morning. Gateshead Central Library and Leisure Centre hosts the fifth outing of the hugely popular Anime Attacks (Sat 24 Oct). A celebration of all things Japanese, expect music, arts, crafts and fashion as well as manga puppet making, anime screenings, giant pixel art  and some very special guests. An after party will take place for older Anime fans at Caedmon Hall in Gateshead from 7pm-10pm. The first day of Juice Festival sees the opening of a two new exhibitions in Gateshead featuring work by young people. The Shipley Art Gallery presents new pieces of art created by students at Lord Lawson of Beamish Academy. Follow your very own art map around The Shipley Art Gallery and create your own mini pieces of art as part of the Family Arts Trail (Sat 24 Oct). BALTIC Centre for Contemporary Art hosts a multimedia exhibition of work by young people from Cedars Academy. Using memories and experiences to create visual stories, the exhibition runs until 1 November in the Art Mix Hub at BALTIC. A new year-long project exploring how our region’s young people react and understand the conurbation of NewcastleGateshead launches at The Core in Science Central on Sat 24 October. Delivered in partnership with Northumbria University, Mapping the City (Sat 24 – Fri 30 Oct) connects young people with artists and Northumbria University academics to identify the places, activities and culture they most value in NewcastleGateshead. Part of Juice Festival’s young people’s ‘Manifesto for the City’, The Core hosts a pilot exhibition of work created by students at Royal Grammar School and Walker Technology College with artists Ben Jones and Jessica Dolby. See maps of students’ local areas, the city centre gilded with gold leaf, ideas for new mapping apps for young people and stick charts of secret worlds only known to the young navigators who created them. Juice Festival’s opening weekend continues on Sunday 25 October with Sunday Assembly (Sun 25 Oct); a free afternoon of inspiring talks and discussions about what matters to young people. Taking place at The Core in Science Central, Team Juice – Juice Festival’s young leadership team – partner with Sunday Assembly Newcastle volunteers for a day of laughter, conversation, singing and most importantly, cake. Juice Festival – NewcastleGateshead’s festival for families and under 25s, takes place from Saturday 24 October to Sunday 1 November 2015. The multi-arts festival in cultural venues, libraries and public spaces in Newcastle and Gateshead features dance, performance, exhibitions, workshops as well inclusive events welcoming children, young people and families with additional needs. As well as the work created by children and young people, Juice Festival features work by regional, national and international artists. The theme for this year’s festival is Seen and Heard; presenting performances and events in unusual locations whilst reflecting the festival’s approach to showcasing the talents and creativity of local children and young people. Additional highlights of the nine day festival include C-12 Dance workshops and Flashmob (Tues 27 Oct) at Newcastle City Library. Take part in an exciting dance workshop with professional performance company C-12 Dance Theatre before putting the new skills to good use in a flashmob dance inside Newcastle City Library. The best part is people can make as much noise as they want! C-12 Dance Theatre will then be at Dance City on Wednesday 28 October to perform its story of love, flying overdue library books and a dancing librarian. Shhh! (Wed 28 Oct) is sure to be a highlight of this year’s festival. Expect lots of dancing, jumping, climbing and acrobatics in the story of how people came together to save their local library from being demolished. Sage Gateshead hosts a day of creative workshops and performances for budding musicians or people looking for a career in the music industry as part of We Are Here: Young People’s Music Day (Mon 26 Oct). Run by local artists, the day culminates in an emerging artist showcase featuring young musicians from across the North East. Juice Festival has partnered with ¡VAMOS! – NewcastleGateshead’s annual festival celebrating Spanish and Portugese speaking cultures – for a special Day of the Dead-themed event for families including live music, food, fun workshops and face painting. Day of the Dead: Family Celebration (Sat 31 Oct) takes place at the newly opened ¡VAMOS! Social on Market Street, Newcastle, celebrating Latin America’s most popular holiday. For more information about Juice Festival and to buy tickets, visit www.juicefestival.co.uk Follow Juice Festival on twitter @JuiceFestival or like the Facebook Page, www.facebook.com/JuiceFestival.NG