tag:theconversation.com,2011:/us/topics/npea-19891/articlesNPEA – The Conversation2016-10-19T00:53:42Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/673032016-10-19T00:53:42Z2016-10-19T00:53:42ZArts training is an essential part of an innovative nation<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/142274/original/image-20161019-20336-3ok6c5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">More than 50 arts training programs across the nation, including circus, may no longer be supported by the federal government. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Julian Smith/AAP</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>The past two years have not been happy ones for the arts sector in Australia. It all began in early 2014 with federal Ministers Brandis and Turnbull telling artists at the Sydney Biennale that they were ungrateful and selfish to protest about the role of Transfield in Nauru. </p>
<p>It then emerged that the Federal Minister for the Arts, George Brandis, believed he could do everything better in arts funding than the existing structures. He began his campaign by taking away a large portion of literature funding from the Australia Council in December 2014. </p>
<p>He then “trumped” this move by taking a third of the Council’s ongoing arts funding in May 2015 to set up his own ministerial fund for the arts naming it the National Program for Excellence in the Arts. Brandis’s concept of “excellence” though was tainted by a limited and élitist perspective of what constitutes the arts and by demonstrating overt favouritism and protectionism towards large arts organisations.</p>
<p>The arts sector protested and a Senate Inquiry was instituted. More than 3000 submissions were received by the Inquiry. The Coalition Government did not participate in the process and appeared to be ignoring the furore in the arts sector. However, with a new Prime Minister in place in late 2015, it was not long before a new Minster for the Arts emerged, Mitch Fifield. </p>
<p>In November 2015, Fifield announced he would give back a portion of the money taken from the Australia Council. However, he kept the rest and changed the name from Program of Excellence to Catalyst. Then there was an election in May 2016 and Minister Fifield’s Catalyst Fund played an interesting electoral role in allocating arts funding to some unusual recipients. </p>
<p>Further, with its reduced funding, the Australia Council cancelled project funding rounds for small groups and individuals in 2015 and then cut funding to over 60 arts organisations across the country in May 2016. There have been <a href="https://dailyreview.com.au/fifield-set-restore-raided-arts-funds-australia-council/50036/">recent rumours</a> that more of the Ministerial funds might be returned to the Australia Council but as yet there is no evidence of this.</p>
<p>But sadly this is not the only action that will harm and continue to damage the arts sector. The Federal Government is now considering cutting funding to students who wish to undertake creative arts training. Education Minister Simon Birmingham has said he believes <a href="http://www.senatorbirmingham.com.au/Media-Centre/Media-Releases/ID/3238/New-VET-Student-Loans-course-list-focussed-on-employment-outcomes">training in the creative arts is a ‘lifestyle’ choice</a> and cannot lead to a satisfactory career or any economic outcome. He says,</p>
<blockquote>
<p>VET Student Loans will only support legitimate students to undertake worthwhile and value-for-money courses at quality training providers.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>As the government’s priorities are related to demonstrating economic outcomes, they say that their preference is for technology programs and agricultural science courses related to the STEM educational model.</p>
<p>In this context creative arts training is perceived as irrelevant and Minister Birmingham intends to cut loan support for students to undertake this form of education and training. If this occurs, more than 50 arts training programs across the country will no longer be supported. These include programs in ceramics, photography, dance, acting, animation, all forms of design, circus, music, film, fashion and journalism.</p>
<p>To describe creative arts training as a “lifestyle” choice in my view demonstrates a lack of knowledge of what is involved and what is produced. There seems to be no understanding or recognition that artists/arts workers are trained professionals who are highly skilled, knowledgeable and adept. They are also highly employable in many industry sectors – not just the arts.</p>
<p>Australia talks constantly about supporting innovation and wanting to be seen as a “smart” country. Training people in the creative arts is a sure way of doing this. Confining education only to technology and the sciences does not create a nation that is necessarily clever or innovative.</p>
<p>Arts training provides the capacity to problem solve, think outside the square, be divergent and come up with new and untried solutions. These are skills that are essential for innovation and change. The arts are a basic foundation of the culture of this country. </p>
<p>Australia is presented internationally by its artists, by its films, by its literature - it is the soul of the country. If the arts training sectors are not funded by this Federal Government, there is a clear message that the government does not think that the arts matter in Australia and, ipso facto, Australian arts and culture does not matter to the world.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/67303/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<h4 class="border">Disclosure</h4><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Jo Caust has previously received funding from the Australia Council and the Australian Research Council. She is a member of the Arts Industry Council (SA) and NAVA.
</span></em></p>The past two years have not been happy ones for the arts sector in Australia. It all began in early 2014 with federal Ministers Brandis and Turnbull telling artists at the Sydney Biennale that they were…Jo Caust, Associate Professor and Principal Fellow (Hon), The University of MelbourneLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/669792016-10-13T03:59:25Z2016-10-13T03:59:25ZThe new Australia Council Board has a chance to be better than the last<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/141560/original/image-20161013-16246-1ge3jo7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">A changing of the guard...will it make a difference?</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Shutterstock</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>The organisation Senator George Brandis described as having an “iron wall” around it, is refreshing its sentinels. This week’s announcement of <a href="http://www.australiacouncil.gov.au/news/media-centre/media-releases/australia-council-board-appointments/">four new appointments</a> to the Australia Council Board represents a change of focus from last year when, you may recall, the agency had other things on its mind.</p>
<p>I once confided to a friend that I could tell the level of political pressure the Council was under by how closely the brow of Rupert Myer, its long-suffering Chair, matched the colour of his shirts. These days, I’m glad to say, it’s returned to its normal shade. </p>
<p>What happened with <a href="https://theconversation.com/out-with-the-npea-in-with-catalyst-expert-response-51026">Catalyst</a>, <em>nee</em> the <a href="https://theconversation.com/au/topics/national-programme-for-excellence-in-the-arts-17421">National Programme for Excellence in the Arts</a>, was neither rational nor right, but a misjudgement by an ill-informed Minister who did a deal of damage and made no lasting positive contribution to his portfolio.</p>
<p>With Senator Brandis now displaying as Attorney-General the same pachydermic egotism and semantic chicanery as he did with the arts, the cultural sector can be confirmed in its view that he is a Bad Egg.</p>
<p>What next for the Council? The new appointments come at a time when it confronts a flinty task of redefinition. While the changes that began with the <a href="http://creativeaustralia.arts.gov.au/assets/australia-council-review-report-survey-outcomes-20130419.pdf">2012 James and Trainor Review</a> and led to the abolition of its art form boards, have been rung through, the events of last year shook the perception and the self-perception of the sector. In brief: there’s not a lot of trust out there.</p>
<p>The Council plays piggy-in-the-middle between three sets of unforgiving forces. On the one hand, it represents the arts to the government. On the other, it represents the arts to the public. And on a third, perpetually smarting hand, it represents the government to the arts.</p>
<p>Making sense of these varied stakeholder needs is like a cultural version of the chicken/fox/sack-of-corn conundrum. It is the job of the Council to riddle the challenge. What happened last year must be inwardly digested and turned into lasting cognitive capital. The Council must grow a policy memory and the Board must be its best expression. Put simply, what happened under Senator Brandis must never happen again.</p>
<p>The Board is a round dozen of culture types from all over the country. Like most arts boards these days there is an abundance of “suits”. With the departure of Robin Archer as Deputy Chair, it leaves just one senior practising artist. Is that enough? No. You wouldn’t run a hospital board without working doctors on it, or a school board without full-time teachers.</p>
<p>No one would argue that such artists have superior insight into the cultural policy process, but presumably they shouldn’t be left out of it. It would be a good recruiting move, too, for a Council that has to regain the sector’s confidence.</p>
<p>With the old art form boards gone, the Council’s moral and intellectual leadership now lies with its Board. In the 1980s, with <a href="http://www.jamesmccaughey.com/bio/james/">James McCaughey</a> as chair of the Theatre Board, <a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/gary-foley-8251">Gary Foley</a> as chair of the Aboriginal Arts Board and <a href="http://musicinaustralia.org.au/index.php?title=Letts,_Richard">Dick Letts</a> as chair of the Music Board, there was formidable policy activism at that level.</p>
<p>Today this is seen as a problem. It was seen that way then too – by the government. The art form boards were often autonomous in their opinions and actions, and if they could be erratic, they were also pugnacious. They were difficult for governments to intimidate. If the arm’s length independence of the Council had a hard edge to it, it was to be found in the attitude of these art form boards.</p>
<p>Responsibility for maintaining the arm’s length relationship is now the Board’s, and that means more than Friday night drinks with Liberal staffers and birthday cards to Senator Mitch Fifield (who is 50 next year, the same age as the Council).</p>
<p>It means a genuine vision for the sector – thoughtful, inclusive and operationally valid. It means addressing the locked-in funding problem around the <a href="http://www.australiacouncil.gov.au/symphony/extension/richtext_redactor/getfile/?name=c2da6fb09dc09b1bff708a93fa8e0a82.pdf">Major Performing Arts Framework</a> that Senator Brandis neither understood nor cared to. It is this Framework that ensured cuts from two successive federal budgets fell <a href="https://theconversation.com/carnage-in-the-arts-experts-respond-to-the-australia-council-cuts-59368">solely on smaller arts organisations</a>. It is this Framework the James and Trainor Review was supposed to open up.</p>
<p>Instead, after the election of a Liberal government in 2014, the opposite happened. The resentment and distrust this bred will continue to have a deleterious effect on relations in the sector until an effort is made to understand the problem on its own terms and not through witless buzz words, be they today’s “innovation” or yesterday’s “excellence”.</p>
<p>The Council has no Harry Potter spell to double its cash in the bank. Nor can it walk away from long-standing commitments to major institutions and programs. What it can do is display meaningful understanding of the systemic issues affecting cultural subsidy, and respond with a polite “—– off” if the government comes touting its own “priorities” and treating the agency like a doormat.</p>
<p>Not on. There’s no point in having an expert body unless you allow it to exercise its expert judgement.</p>
<p>As the Board decide how to react to the news that must come eventually that Catalyst funding is being handed back to them (weary resignation or subdued glee?), it should ponder the examples of past Council heads like <a href="http://www.smh.com.au/comment/obituaries/arts-patron-who-fought-bureaucracy-20090303-8nca.html">Jean Battersby</a>, <a href="http://oa.anu.edu.au/obituary/coombs-herbert-cole-nugget-246">Nugget Coombs</a>, <a href="http://www.vectorleadership.com/pages/bio">Timothy Pascoe</a> and <a href="http://www.australianbiography.gov.au/subjects/horne/">Donald Horne</a>.</p>
<p>One, possibly two of these people, were conservatives, so it’s not a question of Labor bias. It’s about getting the government out of the Council’s face, so it can pick up where it left off in 2014 and deal with the difficult job that awaits.</p>
<p>Money’s tight, tempers are frayed, and the future is gloomy, but stiff cheddar: when were they not?</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/66979/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
The organisation Senator George Brandis described as having an “iron wall” around it, is refreshing its sentinels. This week’s announcement of four new appointments to the Australia Council Board represents…Julian Meyrick, Professor of Creative Arts, Flinders UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/511062015-11-23T01:53:31Z2015-11-23T01:53:31ZCatalyst or NPEA, we need to grow up: artists aren’t playthings for the government<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/102748/original/image-20151123-416-1quhghl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">In many quarters, the arts receiving any government support is still a contested space.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Julie</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>The latest change in the federal government’s arts funding approach, announced by new arts minister Mitch Fifield on November 18, raises more questions than it answers. Yes – as explored in an <a href="https://theconversation.com/out-with-the-npea-in-with-catalyst-expert-response-51026">expert response panel</a> published on The Conversation – the maligned National Program for Excellence in the Arts (NPEA) is now <a href="http://arts.gov.au/catalyst">Catalyst – Australian Arts and Cultural Fund</a>.</p>
<p>But what on Earth are we to make of it? </p>
<p>The <a href="http://arts.gov.au/sites/default/files/cultural-diversity/catalyst-guidelines.pdf">intent of Catalyst</a> is to reward “innovation” – as compared with “excellence” in the previous iteration. While “innovation” is a more populist strategy than “excellence”, arguably everything that happens in the arts is “innovative”. </p>
<p>Both funding programs are dependent on money reallocated from the Australia Council. </p>
<p>The <a href="http://www.australiacouncil.gov.au/">Australia Council for the Arts</a> – as the independent “<a href="https://theconversation.com/arms-length-forget-it-its-back-to-the-menzies-era-for-arts-funding-41743">arms length</a>” funding body for artists in Australia – is central to the story. Previous arts minister George Brandis had intended to fund the NPEA with A$104.7 million over four years, redirected from the Australia Council, and administered according to <a href="https://theconversation.com/getting-with-the-program-brandis-releases-his-draft-arts-funding-guidelines-44186">contentious guidelines</a> which – <a href="https://theconversation.com/writers-and-publishers-are-all-at-sea-under-brandis-and-the-npea-44842">among other concerns</a> – saw grants to individual artists disappear.</p>
<p>Catalyst, the replacement body, will distribute A$12 million annually, with A$8 million a year being reallocated to the Australia Council. </p>
<p>With a change in prime minister and the appointment of a new arts minister there has been an acknowledgement perhaps that the arts matter. Maybe the government was a little embarrassed by the furor it created within the arts sector by the previous changes. But, whether the needs and concerns of the arts sector have been fully understood is still not evident. </p>
<p>The arts sector (while the Australia Council itself remained publicly silent) fought hard to communicate its concerns about the Brandis changes to anyone who would listen. More than <a href="http://www.smh.com.au/entertainment/art-and-design/thousands-lodge-submissions-to-the-senate-inquiry-into-arts-cuts-20150721-gih4e7.html">2,200 submissions</a> were made to a senate inquiry into the funding changes – showing not just the level of discontent but the incredibly <a href="http://www.crikey.com.au/2015/08/03/senate-submission-reveals-full-impact-of-brandis-raid-on-ozco/">wide range of individuals and bodies</a> that comprise the sector. </p>
<p>The submissions underlined the fact that the Australian arts sector is not just the “high arts”: it is also about small and medium size organisations and individual artists who work in many different contexts doing every kind of arts practice. </p>
<p>People engaged in such high numbers with the inquiry process because, in many cases, their very survival and continuity as artists and arts organisations was at stake. The government has responded by returning some of the money to the Australia Council (A$32 million over four years, out of a total of A$104.7 million over four years) it previously took, seeing its response no doubt as a worthy compromise. </p>
<p>But what about the rest of the money that was taken and the concerns expressed by those working in the small to medium sector about their capacity to actually survive? Inventing another new category of funding does not address those concerns – it merely increases their workload while they try to fit their activities into a new box, so that they might get some of the money on offer.</p>
<p>There is an uneasy compact between government and the arts sector in Australia. While it is recognised that a healthy and sophisticated nation needs the arts, governments of all persuasions are uncomfortable about giving enough money to the sector to ensure that the arts thrive and prosper. </p>
<p>Other sectors receive <a href="http://www.tai.org.au/node/451">huge government investments</a> without hesitation, and the argument for industry subsidy usually relates to supporting job growth. Why this argument cannot be used in relation to the arts sector is a mystery. </p>
<p>Perhaps being an artist is not seen as a real job. In addition, artists are not seen by governments as “appropriately” grateful for whatever is thrown in their direction. Instead any allocation of money to the arts is always qualified by feelings of obligation and charity. </p>
<p>Perhaps that’s because the arts can be a source of powerful social commentary and are thereby seen as criticising the “hand that feeds them”. Furthermore, in many quarters the arts receiving <em>any</em> government support is still a “contested” space. </p>
<p>In fact, the truth is that artists themselves are the major sponsors of the arts, even though their incomes are predominantly extremely low, as evidenced time and again by <a href="http://www.australiacouncil.gov.au/workspace/uploads/files/research/entire_document-54325d2a023c8.pdf">economic surveys of artists</a>. </p>
<p>Keeping our artists “poor” may be seen as an effective method of keeping them under control. But isn’t it time that Australia matured as a nation and starting treating the arts sector and artists with respect and validation? </p>
<p>It would be a great step forward for Australia if the arts were no longer regarded as the ideological plaything of a new minister or a new government. </p>
<p><br>
<strong>See also:</strong><br>
<a href="https://theconversation.com/out-with-the-npea-in-with-catalyst-expert-response-51026">Out with the NPEA, in with Catalyst: expert response</a>
<br></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/51106/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Jo Caust is a member of the South Australian Arts Industry Council and has been employed as a consultant by the Australia Council. </span></em></p>With a change in prime minister and a new arts minister there has been an acknowledgement perhaps that the arts matter. But have the needs and concerns of the arts sector have been understood?Jo Caust, Associate Professor, Cultural Policy and Arts Leadership, The University of MelbourneLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/510262015-11-20T03:45:05Z2015-11-20T03:45:05ZOut with the NPEA, in with Catalyst: expert response<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/102590/original/image-20151120-13460-o2mhdw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Following a sustained and vocal campaign by the arts sector, the National Program for Excellence in the Arts has been canned. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">AAP Image/Alan Porritt</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>The <a href="https://theconversation.com/us/topics/national-programme-for-excellence-in-the-arts">National Program for Excellence in the Arts</a> (NPEA) – the hugely controversial body announced in the May budget by George Brandis to reorder arts funding in Australia – has been renamed and revised. </p>
<p>More than <a href="http://www.smh.com.au/entertainment/art-and-design/thousands-lodge-submissions-to-the-senate-inquiry-into-arts-cuts-20150721-gih4e7.html">2,200 submissions</a> had been made to a senate inquiry into the funding changes, the vast bulk of which argued that the funding reallocated from the Australia Council to set up the NPEA – A$104.7 million over four years – should be returned, and that the <a href="https://theconversation.com/arms-length-forget-it-its-back-to-the-menzies-era-for-arts-funding-41743">arms-length funding principle</a> of the Australia Council should be maintained. </p>
<p>New Arts Minister Mitch Fifield <a href="http://www.smh.com.au/federal-politics/political-news/turnbull-government-overhauls-george-brandis-arts-slush-fund-20151119-gl35nc.html">announced last night</a> that the NPEA will be replaced by Catalyst — Australian Arts and Cultural Fund, which will distribute A$12 million annually, as opposed to the NPEA’s planned A$20 million.</p>
<p>The independent Australia Council will be re-allocated the difference – an additional A$8 million a year. The Catalyst Guidelines <a href="http://arts.gov.au/catalyst">can be accessed</a> on the Ministry for the Arts website. </p>
<p>Below, our experts give their initial impressions.</p>
<h2>Stuart Glover, Senior Lecturer, Creative Writing, The University of Queensland</h2>
<p>Mitch Fifield’s Catalyst Fund pretends to remedy the basic problems of George Brandis’s proposed NPEA – but really just sweeps up the mess into a slightly neater pile. The gains for writing and publishing in these latest changes are marginal – and still no news about <a href="https://theconversation.com/writers-and-publishers-are-all-at-sea-under-brandis-and-the-npea-44842">the Book Council of Australia</a>. </p>
<p>Brandis set up his NPEA without articulating clear policy imperatives to do so, and he then raided a long-standing program – the Australia Council funds for individuals and small and medium organisations – in order to fund it. The boy might have an Arts degree but he’ll go down as the biggest wrecker we’ve had as a Federal Arts Minister. </p>
<p>The new minister, Mitch Fifield, sensibly has returned some funds to the Australia Council and set clearer and more developed parameters for the ministerial funds he’ll hold onto, including (excuse my sarcasm) coming up with a much better name for his pot. The downsides to this scheme are the same: politicisation of arts funding decision-making on a scale not seen since the battle over Commonwealth Literary Fund in the 1940s – and cuts to the Australia Council’s capacity to support individual artists and small to medium organisations. </p>
<p>For literature, it seems that the proposed Catalyst fund will accept applications from writing and publishing organisations – which the NPEA wasn’t going to do – but even with some NPEA funds flowing back into the pot at the Australia Council, the literary sector will face a net reduction in funds compared to 2013/14. </p>
<p>Beyond this, the new minister still seems to be “umming” over the Abbott/Brandis Book Council initiative and its A$2 million budget. Following the demise of the Literature Board, I am pro-the Book Council – we need a whole-of-sector body for funding and policy making – but the provenance of its funds (also sourced from a cut to the Australia Council) has already problematised its relations with the sector, imperilling the Book Council’s future. </p>
<p>The arts budget is small beer – and literature and publishing barely an afterthought – but they deserve better than this. </p>
<h2>Joanna Mendelssohn, Associate Professor, Art & Design: UNSW Australia. Editor in Chief, Design and Art of Australia Online, UNSW Australia</h2>
<p>It is understandable that the arts community has been quick off the blocks to claim credit for the significant changes to the ill-considered “National Programme for Excellence in the arts” (to give its original George Brandis spelling). After all, they did run the most coordinated and targeted lobbying exercise I have seen for many years. </p>
<p>With the exception of the large companies, insulated by ministerial largesse, arts groups from many different cultural perspectives came together to campaign for their very existence.</p>
<p>While details are still sketchy it appears that the main beneficiaries of the A$8 million a year that is being refunded to the Australia Council will be individual practitioners. This is fair enough as they were the main victims of the original cuts. </p>
<p>The newly named Catalyst program is intriguing. The name is a popular one in the arts. In Western Australia it is given to a <a href="http://www.canwa.com.au/what-we-do/catalyst/">community arts funding program</a>, while in the UK it’s a culture sector-wide private giving <a href="http://www.artscouncil.org.uk/funding/apply-funding/funding-programmes/catalyst-arts/">investment scheme</a> aimed at helping cultural organisations diversify their income streams and <a href="http://www.artscouncil.org.uk/funding/apply-funding/funding-programmes/catalyst-arts/#sthash.5TE3yrCg.dpuf">access more funding</a> from private sources. </p>
<p>The arts community has been assured that funding from Catalyst, unlike its awkwardly named predecessor, will all be doled out in an arms-length, non-political process.</p>
<p>From what has been released so far the Australian Catalyst Arts and Culture Fund could be going down the UK path, or maybe after the embarrassment of “Excellence” the minister’s advisers are trying to politely distance their new policy from Senator Brandis, who is still in Cabinet. </p>
<p>But even though Mitch Fifield has made the announcement, it is fairly clear that the changes in funding are all a part of Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull’s larger purpose of moving government policies away from the impetuous extremism of the Abbott years, towards the effective centralism of Hamer, Menzies and Turnbull’s long-time mentor, Neville Wran.</p>
<h2>Julian Meyrick, Professor of Creative Arts, Flinders University</h2>
<p>To borrow a phrase: this is not the beginning of the end, but it may be the end of the beginning. The remodelling of the NPEA as the Catalyst Fund does three things. </p>
<p>First, it shifts government relations with the theatre sector out of the rhetoric of excellence and into the language of innovation. The latter might be equally opaque and decontextualised, but at least it doesn’t equate to the minister’s personal reading list. </p>
<p>Second, it gives some money back to the Australia Council that, by any rational measure, should never have been removed from it in the first place. The client base was already cut to the bone. The NPEA bit into the bone. Catalyst still means unnecessary pain for the sector, but less of it. </p>
<p>Third, it allows the Fund to better position itself on the horizon of small to medium theatre organisations. Key to this is the fact that the Fund can consider administration costs as part of its application process, even if “projects that include a high percentage of administration costs are likely to represent less value for money to assessors”. </p>
<p>This means it won’t be just the major companies – the ones who can absorb such costs in other parts of their budget – that are able to apply when the Fund opens in two weeks’ time. </p>
<p>Despite these positive aspects to the announcement, however, it won’t stop the job losses that many smaller organisations face come the end of the year; nor does it revive plans for a six-year reporting cycle; and it doesn’t meaningfully reconnect with the <a href="http://www.australiacouncil.gov.au/strategic-plan/">Australia Council’s 2014 Strategic Plan</a>, or the years of policy-making behind it. </p>
<p>As a blunder of the first water, the NPEA has been reduced in size, but remains visible. If Catalyst works, it will be duplicating the role of the Australia Council. If it doesn’t, it will be undermining it. </p>
<p>The only real way out of this problem is to seed the fund with new money, and make good in full the cuts to the federal agency. No doubt the minister has many requests on his Christmas list. He should put that one at the top.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/51026/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Stuart Glover is a peer assessor for the Australia Council</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Joanna Mendelssohn receives funding from the ARC through a Linkage Project on the History of Exhibitions of Australian Art and has been a recipient of an ARC LIEF grant for Design and Art of Australia Online.
</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Julian Meyrick does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Following a sustained and vocal campaign by the arts sector, the controversial National Program for Excellence in the Arts has been rethought and renamed. Should we be celebrating or concerned?Stuart Glover, Senior Lecturer, Creative Writing, The University of QueenslandJoanna Mendelssohn, Associate Professor, Art & Design: UNSW Australia. Editor in Chief, Design and Art of Australia Online, UNSW SydneyJulian Meyrick, Professor of Creative Arts, Flinders UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/478352015-09-21T06:51:29Z2015-09-21T06:51:29ZWas it but a dream? Post Brandis, we need a reordering of national arts priorities<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/95500/original/image-20150921-13437-12ixox6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">The new Arts Minister, Mitch Fifield, is in a fortunate position ... </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Rachel.Adams</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Last Tuesday, with a huge sigh of relief, Australia awoke to a new prime minister. Suddenly it seems that the last two years have been a dystopian nightmare. Malcolm Turnbull is prime minister and, at last, after years of kindergarten antics, the adults are in charge.</p>
<p>People involved in the arts, as is their wont, have been especially vocal in <a href="http://www.news.com.au/national/anti-abbott-poster-erected-by-castlemaine-secondary-college-students-sparks-row-over-censorship/story-fncynjr2-1227462138349">venting their spleen</a> at the chaotic dogma of the Abbott years. </p>
<p>It could be argued that the arts community was a bit unfair to the Abbott government. One aspect of the arts at least flourished under the <em>Ancien Régime</em>. <a href="https://www.facebook.com/David-Pope-Cartoons-338496664912/timeline/">Cartoonists</a> and <a href="http://www.smh.com.au/entertainment/theatre/wharf-revue-plays-tony-abbott-and-co-for-laughs-20141024-11b1sx.html">satirists</a> simply had to visualise or perform <a href="http://www.theshovel.com.au/2015/02/15/a-weeks-a-long-time-in-politics-the-tony-abbott-diaries/">news items</a> in order to make comedy. </p>
<p>The makers of digital mischief with onions, blue ties and <a href="https://www.google.com.au/search?q=Tony+Abbott+red+budgie+smuggler+satire&espv=2&biw=673&bih=620&tbm=isch&imgil=xG2E-NUGNgGikM%253A%253BivuBGvEewzc4yM%253Bhttps%25253A%25252F%25252Fmoroniclodge.wordpress.com%25252Ftag%25252Ftony-abbott%25252F&source=iu&pf=m&fir=xG2E-NUGNgGikM%253A%252CivuBGvEewzc4yM%252C_&dpr=2&usg=__JBbcOPnYF2Ut08sEH-EKaIWg1PY%3D&ved=0CCcQyjdqFQoTCPj7xL-vhcgCFQONlAodA14IBw&ei=_IX-VfiNA4Oa0gSDvKE4#imgrc=xG2E-NUGNgGikM%3A&usg=__JBbcOPnYF2Ut08sEH-EKaIWg1PY%3D">red budgie smugglers</a> had a field day. The rest of the arts community took a more sober view. </p>
<p>Those who could, made preparations to establish their careers in Europe, the USA or China. Berlin, a city that understands the consequences of unleashed bigotry, never looked so good, especially when Angela Merkel spoke for her people.</p>
<p>One reason for the intensity of the arts community’s response to the Abbott government was the behaviour of the Minister for the Arts, Senator George Brandis. </p>
<p>In a move that indicated his desire to cling to the past, Tony Abbott had recycled most of the former Howard ministry in his 2013 government. In his first stint as arts minister under Howard, Brandis had impressed some senior arts administrators from major organisations for the way he accepted their gross flattery as a sound assessment of his abilities. </p>
<p>The ability to flatter the wealthy and the powerful is an essential tool in the repertoire of any arts organisation seeking funding, but Brandis’s behaviour indicated he was more gullible than most captains of industry. So there was initially little disquiet when this minister was reappointed. </p>
<p>This was especially so as the amended <a href="https://www.comlaw.gov.au/Details/C2013A00071">Australia Council Act of 2013</a> had been passed with the support of all political parties. The policy shifts that came with the restructured Australia Council of 2014, with documents brandishing the heading that Australia was “a culturally ambitious nation”, was at first seen as the usual reconfiguring of an administration to suit the flavour of Abbott’s new jingoism. </p>
<p>There were a few signs that not all would be well. In June 2014 the minister made a unilateral decision to fund a new facility for <a href="http://www.smh.com.au/federal-politics/political-news/budget-help-for-ballet-australian-ballet-schools-new-47m-mansion-20140603-39h29.html">the Australian Ballet School</a>. At the end of the year Tony Abbott changed the prizewinner for the <a href="http://www.theaustralian.com.au/arts/books/tony-abbott-overruled-panel-to-insist-critic-richard-flanagan-shared-award/story-e6frg8nf-1227150433925">Prime Minister’s Literary Award</a>. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/95495/original/image-20150921-13484-4a8n82.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/95495/original/image-20150921-13484-4a8n82.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/95495/original/image-20150921-13484-4a8n82.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=786&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/95495/original/image-20150921-13484-4a8n82.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=786&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/95495/original/image-20150921-13484-4a8n82.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=786&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/95495/original/image-20150921-13484-4a8n82.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=988&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/95495/original/image-20150921-13484-4a8n82.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=988&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/95495/original/image-20150921-13484-4a8n82.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=988&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">‘His final judgement…’</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Ben Clarke/ The George Brandis Live Art Experience/ Facebook</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>But these were just tasters for the main event of the 2015 Budget when, without any warning whatsoever, <a href="http://theconversation.com/arms-length-forget-it-its-back-to-the-menzies-era-for-arts-funding-41743">the principle of arms-length funding for the arts</a> was destroyed by the creation of Senator Brandis’ own <a href="https://theconversation.com/au/topics/national-programme-for-excellence-in-the-arts">National Program for Excellence in the Arts</a> (NPEA). The arts advocacy group, #Freethearts, has made an extended visual joke of Senator Brandis’ <a href="https://www.facebook.com/TheGeorgeBrandisLiveArtExperience">ability to insert himself</a> into any arts event. The reality, however, was less of a laughing matter.</p>
<p>If the government had not been so dysfunctional this kind of personal ministerial frolic, created without any of the standard checks and balances, would never have got underway. The NPEA’s creation out of money previously allocated to the Australia Council has means that many arts organisations catering to rural and regional centres are no longer viable. </p>
<p>Grants to individual artists, essential for buying time, have all but vanished. Larger arts organisations, especially those with the capacity to create social events that flatter politicians, were immunised from the cuts. </p>
<p>The new arts minister, Mitch Fifield, is in a fortunate position. If he abolishes the NPEA and diverts its funds back to the Australia Council, he will increase arts funding at no cost to the budget bottom line. He could do more. The complacency of the major organisations in the face of the threats to small arts bodies has led to talk about the relative value of subsidies. </p>
<p>It might be time to look again at the way Opera Australia and other flagship companies keep so sweet with government and the media. There is a good case to be made for a more cost-effective reordering of national arts priorities.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/47835/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Joanna Mendelssohn receives funding from the ARC through a Linkage Project on the History of Exhibitions of Australian Art and has been a recipient of an ARC LIEF grant for Design and Art of Australia Online.</span></em></p>If the new arts minister, Mitch Fifield, abolishes the National Program for Excellence in the Arts and diverts its funds back to the Australia Council, he will increase arts funding at no cost to the budget bottom line.Joanna Mendelssohn, Associate Professor, Art & Design: UNSW Australia. Editor in Chief, Design and Art of Australia Online, UNSW SydneyLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/467512015-08-30T20:05:36Z2015-08-30T20:05:36ZThe Senate Inquiry into Arts Funding: a new live performance work<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/93141/original/image-20150827-381-1lb2ulw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">If we have learned anything thus far it is this: one man’s excellence is another man’s mediocrity. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">AAP Image/Mick Tsikas</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>In live performance, when developing a new work and before getting to the final rehearsal period, previews and season, there is often a public showing. It’s an opportunity to get wide-ranging feedback, refine your research, adjust your process, and source new ideas and inspiration.</p>
<p>On August 5 in Melbourne, the arts sector’s new work, <a href="http://www.smh.com.au/entertainment/art-and-design/arts-organisations-condemn-brandis-budget-decisions-at-senate-inquiry-20150805-gisbxl.html">The Senate Inquiry into Arts Funding</a>, was the equivalent of a public showing. </p>
<p>The work was established in response to Minister for the Arts George Brandis’ <a href="http://www.abc.net.au/radionational/programs/booksandarts/arts-minister-brandis-responds-to-feedback-on-national-program/6651316">diversion of $104.7 million</a> from the Australia Council to the new <a href="https://theconversation.com/au/topics/national-programme-for-excellence-in-the-arts">National Program for Excellence in the Arts</a> (NPEA) earlier this year.</p>
<p>In Perth tomorrow there will be a <a href="http://www.aph.gov.au/Parliamentary_Business/Committees/Senate/Legal_and_Constitutional_Affairs/Arts_Funding/Public_Hearings">standing-room only preview</a> of this “new work”, followed by a national tour comprising Hobart, Brisbane, Adelaide, hopefully Sydney, and a much-anticipated regional outing in Far North Queensland.</p>
<p>By all accounts the Melbourne event was an unusual affair for a senate inquiry, marked by an unfolding narrative, intermittent applause and a <a href="http://www.aph.gov.au/Parliamentary_Business/Committees/Senate/Legal_and_Constitutional_Affairs/Arts_Funding/Public_Hearings">high rotation of characters</a> that would please the most rabid exponents of theatresports. </p>
<p>I offer my best efforts from that day, below:</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/uf3TKP1GjWE?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
</figure>
<p>As is often the case between a “public showing” and the actual season, new and critical information has emerged in subsequent conversations and consultations within the sector. Some startling statistics may help to create a potentially compelling narrative.</p>
<p>The arts minister’s profiling of arts touring during <a href="http://www.limelightmagazine.com.au/news/senator-brandis-admits-no-consultation-arts-sector">Senate Estimates in May</a> was flawed. In his words at the time:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>[L]et us not forget that the major performing arts companies are the heart and soul of the performing arts sector in this country. They are the big employers of artists and arts workers. They are the people who undertake most of the touring, including the regional touring, as well as the international touring. </p>
</blockquote>
<p>He continued that:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>They [the AMPAG companies] are the people who provide the performances that the great audiences of Australia enjoy. </p>
</blockquote>
<p>The second point is manifestly false, as was outlined <a href="https://theconversation.com/philosophy-vs-evidence-is-no-way-to-orchestrate-cultural-policy-42487">previously on The Conversation</a>.</p>
<p>And the first point, regarding touring?</p>
<p>The “small-to-medium and independent” arts sector <a href="http://www.crikey.com.au/2015/08/20/big-companies-tour-more-do-they-george-bungles-the-arts-again/">accounts for</a> 82% of Australia’s international touring and 73% of the country’s national and regional touring. </p>
<p>The small-to-medium and independent arts sector’s funding allocation from the Australia Council is around <a href="http://artfacts.australiacouncil.gov.au/overview/support-15/ov-fact76/">30% of the organisation’s total budget</a>, which means it punches way above its weight. </p>
<p>In 2013, Australia’s 145 so-called “<a href="http://www.crikey.com.au/2015/06/15/the-145-arts-companies-gutted-by-brandis-swingeing-cuts/">key organisations</a>” (a sizable chunk of the small-to-medium sector) received <a href="http://artfacts.australiacouncil.gov.au/overview/support-15/ov-fact76/">A$21 million from the Australia Council</a>. That’s almost the same as just one of the 28 <a href="http://www.ampag.com.au/">Australian Major Performing Arts Group</a> (AMPAG) companies, Opera Australia (OA), which received <a href="https://d30bjm1vsa9rrn.cloudfront.net/res/pdfs/2014%20pdfs/oa-financial-report.pdf">A$20.5 million</a> that year. </p>
<p>OA’s <a href="https://d30bjm1vsa9rrn.cloudfront.net/res/pdfs/opera-australia-2014-financial-report.pdf">2014 Financial Report</a> shows that it is carrying an accumulated deficit of almost A$10 million, as the group’s current liabilities exceeded current assets by A$9,662,802.</p>
<p>The company has an operating deficit of A$2 million. As <a href="http://www.smh.com.au/entertainment/opera/opera-australia-2014-report-bigger-audience-fails-to-equal-big-enough-returns-20150505-gguc6m.html">was reported in the Sydney Morning Herald</a> in May, OA chief executive Craig Hassall considers this “an outcome we cannot sustain over time”.</p>
<p>You really have to feel for OA. First, it has to negotiate and explain this not-inconsiderable deficit. On top of that, its <a href="http://www.smh.com.au/entertainment/art-and-design/george-brandis-turns-arts-into-political-football-with-1047m-australia-council-cuts-20150513-gh0d0n.html">hasty public support</a> for the NPEA puts it in a rather invidious position. </p>
<p>Any funding OA might receive from the NPEA – in addition to the ringfenced <a href="https://theconversation.com/majors-and-the-majority-planning-for-australias-artistic-legacy-starts-now-45290">funding arrangements</a> the AMPAG companies continue to enjoy through the Australia Council – could be construed as propping up an ailing arts company and perceived as contingent on the OA’s public support for the NPEA. </p>
<p>Let me be very clear: I’m sure that’s not the case in reality but it’s an industry perception that’s gathering momentum. </p>
<p>And as we know from all the business workshops artists have been encouraged to undertake over the last decade, in business perception is everything. Any funds OA might receive from the NPEA will now be subject to intense public and government scrutiny. </p>
<p>This may adversely affect the allegiance of the company’s sponsors and audiences, who might become wary of associating with an arts company that’s <em>perceived</em> to be politically partisan. </p>
<h2>Another plotline</h2>
<p>Another plotline that might be developed in this “new work”, The Senate Inquiry into Arts Funding, is the allocation of Australia Council funds to the classical music heritage sector. </p>
<p>In 2013, orchestras and opera account for <a href="http://www.australiacouncil.gov.au/workspace/uploads/files/news/australia_council_annual_report_2012-13.pdf">more than 75% of the major organisations allocation</a>. Individually, the major organisations have received [sustained and stinging criticism](<a href="http://dailyreview.com.au/editorial-shameful-silence-over-arts-cuts/25269">sustained and stinging criticism</a> over their silence to the minister’s cuts but one wonders how the dance and state theatre companies feel when the funding discrepancy in their pool is so inequitable. </p>
<p>Is it actually worth the bad blood? Will the rest finally join Circus Oz, the State Theatre Company of SA and Black Swan <a href="http://www.limelightmagazine.com.au/news/arts-leaders-head-canberra-challenge-funding-reforms">in voicing concern</a>?</p>
<p>Banned, censored or self-censored, the major organisations’ deafening silence simply adds to that of the Australia Council, which has not asserted <a href="https://theconversation.com/arms-length-forget-it-its-back-to-the-menzies-era-for-arts-funding-41743">its independence</a>; nor has it advocated for the arts and artists in the precise circumstances in which such advocacy is critical. </p>
<p>Had ABC management taken this path the national broadcaster would have been reduced to a radio service long ago. The Australia Council and the major organisations are fast losing their relevance as principal players in Australia’s cultural narrative. </p>
<p>They are now officially characters in the tired “old work”: still living at home, too scared to speak up, unable to save enough for their first trip overseas, waiting for their parents’ approval or jockeying for Daddy’s patronage.</p>
<p>Fortunately, a whole new cast of protagonists is rising up to create a wholly new narrative in which equity, integrity, distributed authority, artistic and intellectual rigour are placed centre-stage. </p>
<p>The new cast will be revealed during the national tour of this new work – and the new work’s “excellence” will be partly judged on that cast’s performance. Although, if we have learned anything thus far in this story-in-the-making it is this: one man’s excellence is another man’s mediocrity. </p>
<p>The strangest plot twist of all may yet be the manifestation of any Coalition politician whose ghostly absence in Melbourne hung like Banquo over the proceedings. Could Australia’s latest new work simply be a rehashing of Shakespeare? Sounds like a bell already rung.</p>
<p>Roll up. Roll up.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/46751/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>David Pledger does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>In live performance, when developing a new work and before getting to the final rehearsal period, previews and season, there is often a public showing. Enter the Senate Inquiry, stage left.David Pledger, Artist, PhD Student, School of Architecture, RMIT UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.