Vault Festival postponed until 2022

Vault Festival has been postponed until 2022, which will mark the event’s 10th anniversary.

According to the organisers, the event takes 10 months to plan and create, and that this – together with the “financial and safety risks” brought about by the pandemic – means it needs to postpone its next full live festival until 2022.

When theatres were forced to close earlier this year, the 2020 festival was cut short, resulting in 97 companies and artists missing out on their chance to perform.

Announcing the decision to postpone the next festival to 2022, organisers said in a statement that this decision was “in the best interests of its artists, staff, and collaborators”.

The statement added: “The team do not want to ask the artists to begin expending time, money and energy in creating new shows when the risks remain so unpredictable in an already precarious industry.”

All of Vault Festival’s income comes from ticket sales, food and drink, and fundraising.

“As such, the festival doesn’t have the margins to be able to ride out a less-than-great festival, to implement social distancing effectively, and to protect their artists from exposure to increased financial and safety risks,” the statement said.

Founders Mat Burtcher and Andy George will use this time to “restructure and reorganise the festival to better serve everyone involved”.

They said: “The prospect of not doing a festival in 2021 is daunting but our mission is now more important than ever. Our commitment is to continue working to provide an accessible platform that best serves our artists, audiences, and staff throughout 2021. We want to make our community, industry, and world more accessible, more inclusive, and more sustainable.

“We’re grateful to the wonderful artists, audiences, our team and the collaborators who’ve made the festival what it is so far – thank you for your continuing support. We’ll be back, better, soon.”

They said they would be using the time to “re-engage with the festival’s purpose and interrogate its place in the industry”. The festival normally takes place in venues around Waterloo in London.

They will also be looking to generate live and digital opportunities for artists, staff and audiences in 2021.