There’s a new festival in Adelaide made for people who don’t settle for mediocracy. And for families who are reigniting fun.

While much of Australia bunkers in for the chill months, South Australia’s festival calendar extends with the arrival of its newest major winter event, Illuminate Adelaide.

In its second year only, the festival is a beacon for an expanding art expression into the realm of artificial intelligence, where Adelaide (Kaurna Land) beams with activity. Visitors and locals emerge to experience a month-long program of free and ticketed events by over 400 local, national and international artists and studios.

As one of the first in the world, the festival showcases a city-wide program (and satellite regional events) of art, light, sound and imagination using codes and artificial intelligence to create light projection art; daring you to ignite your sense of wonder.

For the viewer, these installations marbled around the city challenge perceptions of traditional art, and for a month, weaving through the city’s illuminated with haughty and effervescent light feels somewhat like walking through an influenced dream.

The concept is borne from the dynamic duo of co-founding directors Rachael Azzopardi and Lee Cumberlidge, who have amassed a collecting experience in festival experience of over 50 years.

To create artificial intelligence art, artists write algorithms to learn a specific aesthetic by analysing thousands of images to generate new images and light.

A must-see is the Light Cycles, an Australian-first production from celebrated Montreal studio Moment Factory, which transforms greenery of the Adelaide Botanic Garden into an after-dark immersive experience.

Each year, the festival also hosts a Luminary Artists In Residence for the major exhibition and this year welcomed Istanbiul-based Ouchhh Studio for its revered Wisdom of AI spectacle.

Perfect for families, the Base Camp in Victoria Square stages the Electric Playground, a wonderland of interactive experiences including a Neon Village, ice-skating rink and local food vendors.

Electronic musicians feature heavily in the program, including the Gorillaz, KLASSIK underground and the Unsound Adelaide program of cutting-edge experimental sound and accompanying light displays.

This shift to accepting non person-made artworks allows one to get lost in an otherworldly experience and proves that human creativity is what art is all about – technology is an aid, not a replacement.

Read more about Illuminate Adelaide here.