Swimming pools are much more than holes in the ground - they are often beautifully designed, as a new exhibition at the NGV shows. They also document Australia’s history of racism and sexism, and gradual relaxation of social mores.
From Cate Blanchett to David Williamson, some of Australia’s most well known theatre artists have performed at La Mama, which celebrates its 50th birthday this year.
Australia’s videogame industry has called for an end to the government’s silence around funding. And with local games competing on the world stage, it’s time for the cultural medium to be recognised alongside TV and film.
The Logies are fantastically daggy, but they let us compare audience and industry definitions of achievement. Looking back, it’s clear the public celebrates new, diverse and varied television.
Small organisations are creating Australia’s most exciting art. Yet a recent report shows that even the most popular art-forms are bleeding revenue, while government funding dwindles.
Richard Neville was a man of his times: a smart-alec student in the 60s; a drug-smoking hippie on trial in the 70s; to a family man, writer and public speaker in the 80s and 90s.
The literary magazine Meanjin was founded to ensure the nation did not ‘drop its mental life’ during World War Two. Given the decision to starve it of funding, will future Miles Franklin winners be generated by blogs?
The idea that the Australian accent may be the product of drunkenness in early European settlers is wildly speculative. And yet it has gained international attention in the past week. Why?
Blood + Thunder offers an entertaining insight into the development of the “Australian Sound” – but why do the producers fail to acknowledge the influence on the blues on that sound?
In Australia, from its beginnings, humour and irony have been small weapons in the armoury of the oppressed, the outcast, or those simply fed up with cultural uniformity.
It’s been seven years since Kevin Rudd delivered his apology to Indigenous Australians. On Australia’s stages dramatists continue to explore the ramifications of that apology and colonial history.
Opera Australia has once again posted a major operating loss and is weathering criticism for its very safe repertoire. Both these points merit consideration in the federal government’s National Opera Review.
The NSW town of Nyngan has announced it will build a Big Bogan as a tourist attraction. The question is, what kind of bogan does the town council have in mind?
Anyone who has seen a play can tell you whether it “works” or not – but very few people can tell you exactly why. We all need a better grasp of this. Why? So that playwriting can better represent contemporary Australia.
Goths, punks and hipsters roam the streets, wilfully asserting their counter-cultures. But in an age of cultural appropriation, is this resistance just another way of fitting in? In 2015 can anyone truly…
Paul Dalgarno, The Conversation; Catriona Menzies-Pike, The Conversation, and Alix Bromley, The Conversation
Hey luvvies! We’ve made it! 2014 is in the bank – and here’s what we did, what you read, how we all came through it. Think of the following as a music festival: loads of highlights, one after the other…
Australia today is very different to the place I grew up in: our culture has changed and is changing, but public discussion is still framed by old tropes. We need a new shorthand to capture the reality…
Few who watched Ian Thorpe’s “coming out” interview with British interviewer Michael Parkinson on Sunday night could haved failed to be moved by his story. The anxiety and turmoil he felt in telling the…