A CELEBRATION of visual arts by the River Thames is promised to visitors to this year’s Henley Festival.

The annual black-tie event returns to Wokingham borough this summer, bringing with it five days of entertainment.

Headliners include Nicole Scherzinger, Gladys Knight, Dave Stewart’s Eurythmics Songbook,

House Gospel Choir, the Ministry Of Sound Ibiza Anthems With Ellie Sax, Nigel Kennedy and Sam Ryder.

Also appearing will be Trevor Nelson, comedians Mark Watson, Angela Barnes, Dara O Briain, Sara Pascoe, Marcel Lucont, and Flo and Joan.

And while many eyes will be on the big-name performers on the famous floating stage, there is much more to the event than music.

A large attraction to the Henley Festival will be its visual arts programme, and this year it includes one of the country’s best-selling figurative painters Mark Demsteader.

Also appearing will be the Doug Moran National Portrait Prize and Archibald People’s Choice Award-winning artist Esther Erlich, and sculptor Holly Bendall, who creates bronzes including a Greenpeace-supported permanent public installation in Porthleven.

The festival’s charitable initiative RISE will feature works from the upcoming artistic generation, while The Ruby Gallery will host an exhibition, including pieces from Haut de Gamme, an international platform for the original artwork, prints, and installations by Alexander Hall – who aged just 22 was commissioned by Peter Jones to create all of the artwork for his international offices and has since gone on to become one of the world’s most recognised multimedia artists.

Also exhibiting will be visionary polymath, Tayo Irvine Hendrix, who blends fine art, music and spirituality to create multi-faceted works of spiritual exploration.

There will be curated collections from The Barker Gallery, Tommy Gurr’s I Spy Contemporary, and West End gallery Panter & Hall is back to the riverside to exhibit a selection of their leading contemporary artists including Mark Demsteader, Simon Laurie, Esther Erlich and Edward Seago.

Also appearing will be Amber Galleries and artist-led gallery, Punchbowl Gallery. They will exhibit contemporary paintings, prints and sculptures.

And in The Festival Gallery artist, surfer and traveller Nina Brooke will showcase her paintings that capture unique aerial perspectives of the world’s most picturesque seas, beaches and shorelines.

In The Drang Gallery there will be modern masters and new emerging talent.

The Audi High RISE Gallery features three visual artists – Cheltenham-based Jackson’s Emerging Artist Award winner and landscape painter Conrad P Clarke, winner of the 2019 Phyllis Roberts Prize and 2022 Young Artist Award Robert Ware, and Amie Elizabeth Wolo, who won the 2023 Woman in Art Prize’s Susan Angoy Award – will be exhibiting, each representing a spectrum of creative inspiration, artistic approaches, backgrounds, ages and abilities.

Collectively, the trio will design a car wrap that features on Audi’s latest fully electric SUV, the Audi Q8 e-tron.

Audi is inviting each artist to create a piece for a silent auction where the artists will retain 100% of the proceeds raised.

In the run -p to the festival, these artworks will be showcased at men’s outfitters, Richard James, on London’s Savile Row.

Audi’s support of new talent also extends to the Festival’s remarkable riverside Sculpture Garden, where RISE sculptor Beatrice Galletley – an award-winning, London-based ceramic artist inspired by the juxtaposition of geometric and organic forms – will have her astonishing pieces on display.

Festival goers will be able to enjoy further work from leading sculptors including Marlow’s Fi Hunter and her larger-than-life sculpted heads that explore the fragility and strength of the human condition. RIBA registered architect Mike Clancy brings his figurative, abstract and conceptual artworks that bridge the gap between art and architecture, citing influences such as Picasso and Richard Serra.

There’s more: further installations are on display courtesy of sculptor Christopher Townsend, who is inspired by the agricultural environment of his Oxfordshire studio; Simon Probyn who creates bespoke industrial sculpture for the landscape; Cornwall artist Holly Bendall whose passion for public art can be seen in her bronze masterpiece Waiting for Fish, which was supported by Greenpeace and unveiled by Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall in Porthleven; Fred Gordon’s award-winning bronzes created with the historical lost wax method; elegant yet playful figurative human and animal sculptures by Helen Gordon; contemporary fine art gallery Hanoi Art House will be showcasing the life-sized creations of Len Gifford; Australian-born, Henley-based sculptor Beth Rusby presents her clever and witty sculptures created out of cardboard and paper; Clare Bigger captures the spontaneity and fluidity of movement in her stainless steel-forms; and whether abstracted or realistic, Nicola Godden’s sculptures take inspiration from the beauty of human figure.

And on the Riverside Lawn, Atelier Sisu will be display their larger-than-life bubble artwork Evanescent, iridescent in daylight and illuminated in nighttime accompanied by an ethereal soundscape.

The festival runs from Wednesday, July 10, to Sunday, July 14. For more details, or to book tickets, log on to: henley-festival.co.uk

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