Popular Ontario music & art festival adds live art event to schedule
The wildly popular Convergence Music & Art Festival in Oshawa has added a live art experience to the September lineup, with artists painting plastic Muskoka Chairs during the event.
Oshawa Tourism and the City of Oshawa is calling on local artists to submit proposals to live-paint the Muskoka chairs with acrylic paint during the festival.
The theme for the artwork is Creating Community Connections and the completed chairs will be displayed at up to three city events during 2025.
Convergence, which takes over the downtown streets Sept. 19-20, has always been about thinking big while staying authentic to its roots and culture and that philosophy has helped the event rack up awards and become one of Ontario’s most popular music and arts events in just two years.
The festival had its inaugural event on September 23, 2023 and was an instant hit with residents, as well as visitors who came from across the GTA and beyond to enjoy music (The Strumbellas closed out the show on the main stage), art, pro wrestling and all the pop culture you could squeeze in a few city blocks.
And all for free.
Convergence brought TALK! – a four-time nominee last year and winner of Breakthrough Artist of the Year – in 2024 and this year’s event will be headlined by Valley, a Toronto-based indie/pop band known for their energetic performances, chart-topping hits and their ‘Val Pals’ fan club.
The band – nominated three times at the JUNOS – will be joined on the main stage by singer-songwriter Aysanabee (a JUNO winner himself) whose powerful storytelling and soulful sound have captivated audiences across the country.
The festival has always been about more than big name music acts, however, offering a variety of interactive experiences – last year featured ARTBLOCK, an art exhibition that transformed the former Oshawa Bus Terminal into an interactive art display and the 2025 event boasts DIMENSION X, an exhibit where shipping containers are turned into portals to surreal and extraordinary worlds created by visionary artists. There will also be music stages devoted to up-and-coming artists, live professional wrestling, a Punk Rock Market and Nerd Alley, a space for gaming, comics, cosplay, and collectibles. These attractions create an inclusive, high-energy environment and a feel-good vibe that is the real character of the event.
With nearly 24,000 attendees last year – up 85 per cent from year one – the festival generated a single-day $1.16 million boost in local business revenue, with a 391 per cent increase in downtown foot traffic, benefitting retail, hospitality, and service sectors.
A third of all visitors travelled at least 40 km to get there, making it a destination festival for cultural tourism, while two-thirds of the performers hailed from Durham, highlighting local talent and “reinforcing Oshawa’s reputation as a cultural hub.”
The deadline for submissions for the Muskoka Chair event is noon on May 30 and a selection committee from the city’s Cultural Leadership Council, Public Art Task Force and city staff will evaluate the submissions.
For information on how to apply, application requirements, selection criteria, eligibility, and more visit oshawa.ca/ArtistCalls.
By Glenn Hendry, insauga
