Next Wave Festival 2016 was the organisation's most inclusive and accessible yet for artists and audiences with disability, and in recognition Next Wave was awarded a VicHealth Award for Building Health Through Arts. Artistic Director Emily Sexton asked artists to respond to the idea of the 'New Grand Narrative' for the 2014 festival taking place 1–11 May. Specifically the festival was offering the following ideas to be explored, "How do we come to care about things we’re not interested in? The information we encounter is increasingly curated. And we have increased ability to filter that which doesn't add to our worldview. There are less pages of the newspaper to turn, more apps to buy and I don't have to follow you if you’re not relevant. What are the grand narratives of our time? How do we come to understand them and whose voices create their meaning?" 38 commissioned works by 239 artists from across Australia, the Philippines, Korea, Lebanon, Canada and the UK made up the 2014 event. "Blak Wave" was the keynote initiative of the 2014 Festival, presenting major commissions, public conversations and a publication that explored the future of Indigenous art.  2014 Victorian Green Room Awards nominations included:  The Next Wave Festival unfolded from 19 to 27 May 2012. Its theme was 'The space between us wants to sing' and was Emily Sexton's first festival as Artistic Director. The theme was explored by artists in a variety of ways including No Show's interactive theatre piece, Shotgun Wedding and The Greater Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere by artists Abdul Abdullah, Nathan Beard and Casey Ayres. This part-installation part-performance piece took place in the National Gallery of Victoria and drew upon their Asian-Australian heritages to offer an over-the-top embrace of cultural and ethnic stereotypes and kitsch reflections of multicultural experiences to Next Wave Festival 2012. Several works were nominated for various categories of the Green Room Awards including:  "The Stream / The Boat / The Shore / The Bridge" was subsequently awarded Outstanding Production – Creative Agency For Audiences. "Can art be challenging and meaningful in a risk-averse, overly cautious society obsessed with security, OH&S policies and micro-management of behaviour?" The 2010 Next Wave Festival's theme, 'No Risk Too Great', was a challenge to the artists to be ambitious and see what art can achieve while asking the question: is our society and our art too safe? Next Wave opened up new spaces for artists to explore this question. Building on the momentum of previous Festivals, the 2010 Festival brought together around 53 projects and over 300 artists from Victoria, Australia and across Asia.