What We Offer
We’re here to help you develop your professional practice in every way that we can.
Registering to participate in Melbourne Fringe gives you access to a very special range of opportunities like our mentoring programs and our awards. Even if you aren’t doing a Melbourne Fringe show this year, you can still utilise the resources and information on this site to help you in your artistic endeavours.
General advice, information and support
Melbourne Fringe employs a number of specialised and experienced staff who are available to assist you with your registration and show planning.
If you’d like to ask one of us a question, just take a look at the staff list.
Resources
On our Artist Resources page you’ll find all sorts of useful documents and links. Publications like our Marketing Handbook and Publicity Handbook are extremely useful and other resources such as the venues database and sample venue contract can save you heaps of time and money (not having a proper venue contract in place when something goes wrong can be a really costly mistake!). You’ll also find information about advertising in the Fringe Guide, and all you need to know about shouting out to our amazing, switched-on audience. These are just a couple of examples. Check out the Partners page for the full low down.
Forums, Salons, Talks
Our Fringe Forums covering topics like production, venues, project management, marketing, publicity, sponsorship and everything in between. Most of our forums are open to all independent artists but there are a few that are restricted to currently registered artists – check the Forums and Talks page for more information.
Outside Eye
Registered Melbourne Fringe Festival artists have the opportunity to apply for our mentoring program Outside Eye. Take a look to see why other artists (and mentors) have found it so rewarding and inspiring.
Awards
Winning a Melbourne Fringe Festival Award is about so much more than the glory! Many of our awards include professional development opportunities that will help you in the next stage of your practice or in remounting your Melbourne Fringe Festival show. Check out the Awards page for more info.
More benefits
Artists who register a show in the Melbourne Fringe Festival also have access to:
One-on-one meetings with Melbourne Fringe staff (by appointment only).
Festival Publicist – Katrina Hall handles publicity for all Festival shows. She'll help you develop and distribute a media release for your show, and is available for advice and support. She also helps us present our Marketing and Publicity Forum, bringing in journalists from major publications and radio to advise you on the best way to get your show in the media.
Melbourne Fringe conducts a comprehensive marketing and communications campaign each year that drives audiences to our Festival Guide and to our website. All shows and events in the Festival benefit from a level of promotion and publicity that it is very hard for individual independent artists to generate on their own.
Melbourne Fringe shows enjoy discounted advertising from our media partners including Inpress, Beat and RRR and we also offer discounted advertising in our guide.
And much much more!
The Melbourne Fringe Festival logo
Each year, a special Melbourne Fringe Festival logo identifies your show as part of the Festival, and you're required to use it as part of your Festival Contract. This ensures your audiences recognise you as part of the critical mass of the independent arts that is the Melbourne Fringe Festival, and that they know how to buy tickets and get to your show. Once registered, you'll get this year's logo through your Artist Login after Registration.
Using the Melbourne Fringe Festival logo is like the logo of your government or philanthropic funding body: it doesn't detract from the independence of your production. Importantly, nor does it create any responsibility whatsoever for your creative, financial or legal risks on the part of Melbourne Fringe. Our artists should be particularly mindful of this when flyering or postering without a permit - you will risk local government fines! Be sure to come along to our Forums on marketing and publicity to maximise your show's exposure and minimise your own exposure to unwelcome risks.
