With numerous very successful, high profile shows and events in Australia to its name, AGB Events is to expand, bringing its unique vision and talents to festivals, museums, cultural/heritage celebrations and other iconic events and locations around the world.
AGB Events was founded in 2006 by Anthony Bastic, who has spent decades in the entertainment and events industry, including as creative director for the Sydney 2000 Olympic and Paralympic Games Live Sites and the recent Invictus Games Sydney 2018. Bastic is best known as curator of Destination NSW’s annual Vivid Light Sydney.
“We specialise in imagining, producing and delivering cutting edge creative and cultural event concepts. AGB Events has a long track record of developing unique content that engages audiences in superb spectacles,” said Bastic, “and we plan to bring our extensive expertise and skills to organisations worldwide.”
“Our strength is in storytelling in a way that resonates, excites and deepens understanding,” he continued, “whether that’s for governments, arts festivals, heritage sites and events or corporations – capturing imaginations in innovative ways with light and sound, creating digital stories for content from the present day to content that may be centuries old. We can do that on the largest scale imaginable – as we did recently for Parrtjima – or for the most intimate of gatherings.”
“For us,” he added, “technology is an extremely powerful enabler of beautiful and immersive experiences – but it’s the experience, not the technology, that is always centre stage. Our overriding objective is always that everyone who sees what we create remembers it forever. We love what we do, and we think it shows.”
Working, as always, in partnership with its network of trusted audiovisual suppliers, AGB Events has created and produced the Vivid Sydney Lightwalk for the past 10 years, helping to grow it into the world’s largest light festival.
AGB Events was instrumental in devising Parrtjima: A Festival in Light, a celebration of Australia’s First Nations, now in its 4th year. The company continues to play a key role as creators and producers of the event, bringing the unique Indigenous art festival to life.
The company were also producers and creative consultants for the 2018 and 2019 Australian Prime Minister’s Veterans Employment Awards, creating a memorable awards ceremony which paid tribute to the servicemen and women who have served Australia.
AGB Events creates concepts that contain a strong narrative and use the latest advancements in technology to tell these stories. By bringing projection technologies to interiors AGB Events has begun building a new repertoire of story-telling projects for major cultural institutions.
‘Treasures Illuminated’, at the Australian Museum in Sydney, saw AGB Events take the museum’s 200 treasures out of their glass cabinets and bring their stories to life in a dynamic and animated digital show.
Another example of this discipline area began in the National Library of Australia. AGB is preparing for an international tour of their digital sound and light show entitled Beauty Rich and Rare. This innovative exhibition illuminates Australia’s unique flora and fauna collected by Sir Joseph Banks and the scientists and illustrators who travelled on the HMB Endeavour 250 years ago. Beauty Rich and Rare was commissioned by the National Library of Australia, granting the team of animators at AGB Events full access to the Library’s collection to reimagine the artefacts, creating this engaging show.
AGB’s numerous credits also include The Lights of Boston, the Lights of Christmas in Sydney and Brisbane, Oz Fest in Delhi and Canberra’s centenary celebrations.
The AGB Events management team now includes international event logistics professional Todd Severson, who is the company’s chief operating officer. He has an outstanding track record of 10 Olympic Games, G8 and G20 meetings, the Commonwealth Games and even an edition of the Sundance Film Festival. Severson also served for a four-year period as Director of Games Services with the Rio 2016 Organising Committee for the Olympic and Paralympic Games.
AGB Events is also expanding their creative consultancy discipline. “We are working with a series of international clients to help them embed unique creative solutions in their cultural placemaking plans. Spanning major international events, cultural institutions, and urban precincts, this discipline area of AGB is fast becoming a major expansion area of our creative agency.”