THE lens officially shut last Sunday on the biggest Ballarat International Foto Biennale ever.<\/p>\n
BIFB general manager Kate O\u2019Hehir said despite it being the most challenging festival to deliver yet, it was an \u201cenormous success,\u201d opening in September to regional Victorian visitors, and then to metro audiences at the end of October.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis year has been incredibly hard for our very small, hardworking team, but since opening up to Melbourne visitors, the festival has just been so well received,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
\u201cIn the last two weeks, we had more than 10,000 visitors. In terms of visitation, it\u2019s been our most successful yet.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s been really rewarding to be able to give people an experience to enjoy during these really hard times.\u201d<\/p>\n
Eighty-nine exhibitions in 75 venues, indoors and outside, were part of BIFB this time around.<\/p>\n
The major Linda McCartney: Retrospective<\/em>, and Number One | Gudinski <\/em>shows proved most popular in spaces at the Art Gallery of Ballarat and Ballaarat Mechanics\u2019 Institute respectively, as did the \u201cmoving\u201d Raining Embers<\/em> in the Mining Exchange.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019d really like to acknowledge all of the venues that provide the exhibition spaces for us, not only the open program but our core curated indoor program,\u201d Ms O\u2019Hehir said.<\/p>\n \u201cThe Art Gallery of Ballarat staff have been phenomenally supportive, the City of Ballarat\u2019s been incredibly generous, and we acknowledge that this year has been difficult for everybody involved, but they have rallied around us and shown us incredible support.\u201d<\/p>\n It was the first time BIFB had also offered three-day passes, allowing visitors to take a \u201cdeep dive\u201d not only into the festival, but into Ballarat more broadly.<\/p>\n