London 2012: Biggest ever festival the Cultural Olympiad opens today

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Today, a tidal wave of cultural events will break out across the UK, centred on London, as part of London 2012 Cultural Olympiad.

And it will be the largest cultural celebration in the history of the modern Olympic and Paralympic Movements.

Such events include the waters of Windermere that will burn in the Lake District, Jeremy Deller’s bouncy castle Stonehenge (pictured above) will pop up in the National Botanic Garden of Wales and a peace message from Yoko Ono in 24 languages will be played on all the giant screens installed for the Olympics.

Since 2008, the Cultural Olympiad has featured programmes and projects inspired by London 2012, funded by our principal funders and sponsors.

Here are a few Cultural Olympiad facts:

- More than 16 million people across the UK have taken part in or attended performances.
- Over 169,000 people have attended more than 8,300 workshops.
- More than 3.7 million people took part in nearly 3,700 Open Weekend events.
- Some 2,500 cultural projects have been awarded the London 2012 Inspire mark.

And to add to this, the culmination of the Cultural Olympiad is the London 2012 Festival, providing a unique opportunity of over 10 million chances to see free world-class events throughout the UK.

From today until September 9, 2012, this once-in-a-lifetime Festival will feature more than 25,000 artists from all 204 competing Olympic nations. Everyone will be able to join in the celebration with over 10 million free tickets and opportunities to take part in 12,000 events and performances at 900 venues in villages, towns and cities all over the UK, including 137 world premieres and 85 UK premieres.

The Festival consists of commissions and invited events in all art forms, dedicated to showcasing the best of British and world culture through exceptional creative partnerships.

Tony Hall, chair of the cultural wing of the Olympics festival said that it is going to be “the biggest ever festival that we could possibly imagine” and with 12,000 performances and events, including 137 world premieres, and more than 25,000 artists appearing in 900 venues in 204 centres, its definitely not hard to see why!

For the London 2012 Festival brochure or more info visit festival.london2012.com.

Lizzie Flint, Sportsister
The Women’s Sports Magazine

Image credit: London 2012

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