Proceedings
of the
National Arts Summit, Canberra,
Arts Quest – Heights and Hopes
Llewellyn Hall, ANU School of Music
Tuesday 12 February 2013
Speakers’ Addresses with the Summit Program
***
A Centenary of Canberra 2013 Project
Organised by the Australian Talented Youth Project,
Canberra, ACT
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Summit Organisers
Australian Talented Youth Project
ANU
Na onal Arts Summit
Sponsors
david b simmonds | photographer
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CONTENTS
National Arts Summit - Program
4-14
National Arts Summit - Proceedings
15-50
Robyn Archer - Opening Address:
The Importance of the Arts in Society
16
David Throsby – The Arts and the Economy
17-19
Lisa Colley – Healthy, wealthy and wise – why the arts
are important for the health of our nation
20-23
Hugh McKay - In what way are 'the arts' good for us?
24-27
Don Aitkin - What is government’s role in the arts?
27
Monica Penders - Balancing the "show" and the "business"
in the Australian screen industry
28-30
Richard Gill – The importance of music education
31-35
Claudia Visca – Crossroads
36-37
Deborah Stone – Results of the National Arts Survey
38-44
Peter Garrett – Keynote address:
The Arts and Arts Curriculum
45-48
Les Murray/Alan Gould – Three poems
49
Jolanta Gallagher – Closing Remarks
49-50
Acknowledgements
51-52
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MESSAGE FROM THE DIRECTING TEAM
Welcome to the National Arts Summit, 2013
How does positioning the Arts and Art Education measure up to the
aspirations of artists, cultural leaders and educators in today's Australia?
What are the present challenges and how can they be faced and resolved
resolutely, so the Arts take a deserved, respected place in our society?
These are the questions frequently asked in our artistic world and they
have to be taken seriously. Today, we may be able to not only gain insights
into the reality of artists' lives and their perceptions, but also, hopefully, to
carve much needed changes.
So, let us engage in shaping the future we want for ourselves and our
offspring, and while working on the very pragmatic outcomes - let us play
and dance, and celebrate!
Dr Jolanta Gallagher
Director
Wanda Horky
Deputy- Director
Liz Lea
Artistic Adviser
CHRISTOPHER LAWRENCE
Christopher Lawrence, MC & Panel Facilitator is one of Australia’s
favourite radio personalities working for ABC national and local radio. He
is also a successful recording producer, author and conductor.
He is best known for his work with ABC Classic FM, presenting the
network's Breakfast and Drive programs between 1994 and 2001. The
three Swoon collection CDs that evolved out of his Breakfast program
broke sales records in the Australian classical music industry, each
achieving Platinum status.
Christopher has various recording awards and a Churchill Fellowship. In
1999 he was awarded an Honorary Doctorate in Communications by the
University of Central Queensland for his career in broadcasting.
Christopher has written three best-selling books: Swooning - a classical
music guide to life, love, lust and other follies; Hymns of the Forefathers,
based on his documentary series about the history of hymns seen on ABC
TV; and Swing Symphony.
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National Arts Summit, 2013 Program
Arts Quest – Heights and Hopes
Llewellyn Hall, ANU School of Music, Tuesday 12 February 2013
Patrons are requested to be seated by 9.00 am
PART I
8.45-8.55
Musical Prelude
Contemporary Ensemble directed by John Mackey
9.00-9.15 Welcome
Christopher Lawrence
Fanfare for the Enhancement of the Arts by John Mackey –
World premiere
9.10-9.15 Opening Address
Ms Robyn Archer AO
9.15-10.20 Speakers’ addresses
Professor David Throsby
Lisa Colley
Hugh Mackay* (paper read in absentia by Don Aitkin AO)
Don Aitkin AO
Monica Penders
Richad Gill OAM
Professor Claudia Visca*
Les Murray AO* (poetry)
Those marked * are not on the Panel. Julie Dyson, Panel Member
10.20-10.30 Bluebird – dance performance by Liz Lea
Floating in a sea of silk this bird plays between Baroque,
Bharata Natyam and Burlesque
10.30-10.50 Results of the National Arts Survey
Presented by Deborah Stone, artsHub Australia
10.50-11.20 INTERVAL (Foyer, Terrace)
Morning tea featuring artistic surprises, installation
11.20-11.30 Keynote Address
The Hon. Peter Garrett AM, MP
Minister for School Education, Early Childhood and Youth
11.30-12.30 Q & A Panel
Questions from the live & online audience
12.30-1.30 Part II Thank You Canberra
Artistic Production
1.35-3.00 LUNCH (Foyers, Terrace)
Networking, artistic surprises, meet the artists, installation
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SPEAKERS
In order of presentation
Robyn Archer AO is a singer, writer, artistic director and public advocate
of the arts. She is currently Creative Director of the Centenary of Canberra
(2013), Artistic Director of The Light in Winter and Deputy Chair, Australia
Council for the Arts. She is also serving with the Commemoration and
Celebration Group for the ANZAC Centenary. Her career has spanned over
35 years giving many successful one woman shows, cabarets, concerts.
Robyn Archer is an Officer of the Order of Australia, Chevalier de l’Ordre
des Arts et des Lettres (France) and holds honorary doctorates from
Flinders University (SA), and the universities of Sydney and Canberra.
David Throsby is Professor of Economics at Macquarie University in
Sydney, Australia. He is internationally known for his research and his
many publications on the economics of art and culture. His interests
include the economics of the performing arts, the role of artists as
economic agents, heritage economics, and the relationships between
economic and cultural policy. His book Economics and Culture (Cambridge
University Press, 2001) has been translated into seven languages. His
book, The Economics of Cultural Policy, was published in 2010, also by
Cambridge.
Creative arts and the national economy
Discuss ways in which the fundamental importance of the creative arts in
the economy and in society can be properly recognised in contemporary
cultural policy.
Lisa Colley has led a national team for the last three years delivering
business advisory services to more than 800 creative enterprises through
the Enterprise Connect Creative Industries Innovation Centre (CIIC). The
value of creativity and its role in the health and economic future of
Australia, informs Lisa, both in her role working with the commercial
creative sector, and as a non-executive director of the Arts and Health
Foundation, a health promotion charity she founded that is dedicated to
supporting and promoting the role that arts play in the health and
wellbeing of Australians.
Healthy, wealthy and wise – why the arts are important for the health of our
nation
Unlocking the creativity within improves individual and community health
and wellbeing. All forms of art are being used to enhance health and
wellbeing across a broad spectrum of health services.
Hugh Mackay is a social researcher and the author of fourteen books,
including What makes us tick? His latest book, The Good Life, will be out in
April and his sixth novel, Infidelity, will also be published in 2013. In
recognition of his pioneering work in social research, he has been elected a
Fellow of the Australian Psychological Society and awarded honorary
doctorates by four Australian universities. Hugh is an honorary professor
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of social science at the University of Wollongong, a former Deputy
Chairman of the Australia Council, and was the inaugural Chairman of the
ACT government’s Community Inclusion Board.
In what way are 'the arts' good for us?
Participating in the arts provides for mental wellbeing, good relationships
and improves the ills of contemporary society. Why isn't more public
money going into community arts programs to simulate greater public
participation in the arts?
Don Aitkin AO, historian and political scientist, was the Foundation
Chairman of the Australian Research Council, Vice-Chancellor of the
University of Canberra, and after his retirement from that position,
Chairman of both the Cultural Facilities Corporation and the National
Capital Authority. He is the Chairman of the Canberra International Music
Festival, one of the organisers of The Musical Offering, and a supporter of
other community groups in the creative life of Canberra. His website is
www.donaitkin.com. He is the author of a dozen books, which include a
novel and a family memoir.
What is government’s role in the arts?
That government funding should facilitate the creative urge rather than
impose its ideas of what is good art. To get more funding requires a public
culture in which ‘the arts’ have the same status as ‘jobs’.
Monica Penders is the Director of ScreenACT. She has a diverse
background in business including advertising and public relations,
marketing with the Walt Disney Company and her last corporate role was
as Vice President of Corporation Communications at Lend Lease in New
York. In 2008 she produced the US$27million film The Secret of Moonacre
which was shot in Budapest, Hungary and enjoyed a global theatrical
release. She continues developing and producing her own projects under
the Batavia Creative brand and has been awarded grants from Screen
Australia and artsACT for her next feature project Eight Seasons. Balancing the "show" and the "business" in the Australian screen industry
Of all arts forms, film is the perfect blend of creativity, collaboration and
commerciality. And therein also lies the paradox – art/culture versus
commerciality. Can these opposed forces co-exist?
Richard Gill OAM, is one of Australia’s pre-eminent and most admired
conductors and is internationally respected as a music educator. He is
Founding Music Director and Conductor Emeritus of Victorian Opera and
is currently Artistic Director of the Education Program for the Sydney
Symphony Orchestra. He has been Artistic Director of OzOpera, Artistic
Director and Chief Conductor of the Canberra Symphony Orchestra, and
the Adviser for the Musica Viva In Schools program. He has conducted all
the major Australian orchestras and youth orchestras, and his extensive
operatic repertoire ranges from works of the Baroque era to 21 st century
Australian and international works. He has held several important posts
including Dean of the West Australian Conservatorium of Music and has
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received numerous accolades including the Bernard Heinze Award,
Honorary Doctorates from the Edith Cowan University of Western
Australia and the ACU, and the Australia Council’s Don Banks Award.
The importance of music education
Creativity in schools is being stultified by standardised testing. If we
obliterate arts education entirely from the curriculum then we obliterate
the potential imagination of a nation. Arts Education, led by Music
Education is our only hope.
Claudia Visca is Professor of Voice, University of Music and Performing
Arts Vienna. A soprano born in New York, she graduated from the
acclaimed Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia where she studied with
Anna Moffo’s teacher, E. Giannini.
During her long stage career she has been a guest artist at more than
25 opera houses in Europe and has embodied more than 75 opera,
operetta and musical roles and sung concert repertoire in more than 2,000
performances. She has performed with numerous conductors including
Leonard Bernstein, Eugene Ormandy, Istvan Kertesz and artists such as
Placido Domingo, Agnes Baltsa, Edith Mathis, Rudolf Serkin, Yo-Yo Ma,
Jean-Pierre Rampal among many others. Professor Visca travels widely
giving international master classes in voice technique and interpretation.
She is a jury member of international voice competitions. Her students are
engaged in acclaimed opera houses of the world.
Crossroads
Examines the importance of maintaining an international perspective in
the performing arts through interaction between artists and institutions.
Les Murray AO is an Australian poet, anthologist and critic whose work
has been published in ten languages. His career spans over forty years, and
he has published nearly 30 volumes of poetry, as well as two verse novels
and collections of his prose writings. His poetry has won many awards and
he is regarded as the leading Australian poet of his generation, and one of
the greatest poets writing in English.
Deborah Stone, Editor, artsHub Australia. She is a journalist and
communication professional who is passionate about words, people and
the arts. Deborah has been a reporter, feature writer and arts writer on
The Age, The Sunday Age, The Australian and the New Zealand Herald. Her
former leadership roles include Editor of the Australian Jewish News and
Executive Director of the Anti-Defamation Commission. She has also
worked as a communications trainer, speechwriter and freelance editor.
artsHub Australia is the leading centre for arts news, jobs and
information online. Its features, news, reviews and analysis are essential
reading for anyone working in the creative industries in Australia or the
UK. artsHub’s editorial provides independent, educated content for people
who know and care about the arts.
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The Hon. Peter Garrett AM, MP was elected to the House of
Representatives in 2004. He was Minister for Environment Protection,
Heritage and the Arts and is the current Minister for School Education,
Early Childhood and Youth.
He has twice been President of the Australian Conservation Foundation
and a former band member of the Australian band Midnight Oil. He is a
passionate advocate and campaigner on a range of contemporary Australia
and global issues. He has received many awards including the Member of
the Order of Australia in 2003 for his contribution to the environment and
the music industry. In 2009, the French Government appointed Peter an
Officer of the Order of Arts and Letters. In 2010, WWF Australia and
International presented Peter with their Leaders for a Living Planet award.
Jolanta Gallagher (PhD), the Director of the National Arts Summit 2013,
is a music educator, academic, researcher, and the author of “Music and
the Self-Esteem of Young Children”.
She is also the Founder and Director of the Australian Talented Youth
Project – www.atyp.org - the first residential mentoring program in
Australia for emerging young artists from six creative and performing arts:
Music, Dance, Visual Art, Film, Drama, and Creative Writing. Jolanta was
nominated for the Ross Bower Award (Community Arts and Cultural
Development) under the Australia Council in 2012.
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PART II
12.30-1.30
Thank You Canberra
Artistic production showcasing Australian Talented Youth
Project alumni with local & interstate talent
Liz Lea, Artistic Adviser
Recuerdos de la Alhambra
by Francisco Tarrega
Alison Plevey (dance), Kate
Rafferty (soprano), Alison
Laurens (violin),
Carl Rafferty (piano)
Sempre Libera from the opera
“La Traviata”
by Giuseppe Verdi
Kate Rafferty (soprano),
Alison Laurens (violin),
Carl Rafferty (piano)
Gypsy Dance from the opera “Aleko”
by Sergei Rachmaninoff
Alison Laurens (violin),
Carl Rafferty (piano)
Panis Angelicus
by Cesar Franck
Katie Senior (dance)
Nocturne in C# minor no.20, op. posth
by Frédéric Chopin
Bernice Chua (piano)
(ANU Pre-Tertiary Program)
Tarantella
by Franz Liszt
Roger Kong (piano)
Eastern Glow from “The Album Leaf”
by Jimmy La Valle
Michael Smith (dance)
Explores “One by one,
We force ourselves,
Turn it on, It comes in waves.”
We weave the skeins of life (Poem)
by James Woodman
Liz Lea (reciter)
The Power of Acceptance (Film)
Treya Long (dance)
The dance explores the
growth of a new creation
through metamorphosis –
from innocence and purity to
mature complexity
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Untitled
by Sidney Creswick
Sidney Creswick
Liam Budge, Matt Dixon
Summer from the “Four Seasons”
by Antonio Vivaldi
Dance by Project Beats
Hallelujah from the oratorio “Messiah”
by George Frederic Handel
Canberra Choral Society
The Llewellyn Choir &
Oriana Chorale conducted by
Tobias Cole.
Marko Sever (organist)
ARTISTS
Liz Lea is Artistic Director of Liz Lea & Co. and the Canberra Dance
Theatre and Associate Director at QL2 Dance. She is also Choreographer in
Residence at CSIRO Discovery, Canberra.
In 2013 she will premiere InFlight at the National Library of Australia;
direct Life is a Work of Art at the National Gallery of Australia; curate
DANscienCE – a dance and science festival based at CSIRO Discovery for
National Science Week; premiere two solos at The Street Theatre– Kapture
for herself and Magnificus Magnificus for indigenous dancer Tammi Gissell.
Liz’s international commissions include KZN Dancelink, South Africa; Maya
Dance Theatre, Singapore; Royal Opera House, London and Darpana, India.
John Mackey is one Australia's finest saxophonists and has performed
with national and international icons including James Morrison, Vince
Jones, Grace Knight, Mike Nock, BB King, Ray Charles, Dame Kiri
Tekanawa, Woody Herman, Jim McNeely, Roy Hargrove, Ronnie Scott and
many more. He looks forward to contributing his recent "Fanfare" to the
National Arts Summit as part of Canberra's centenary celebrations.
Artists in order of performance
Contemporary Ensemble, directed by John Mackey, contains professional
alumni from the ANU School of Music. Today’s performance will highlight
their creative skills of this talented ensemble. Members are Liam Budge
(voice), Oisin Smith-Coburn (saxophone), Matt Dixon (guitar), Evan
Dorrian (drums) James Luke (bass), John Mackey (saxophone). Liam, Oisin,
Matt are ATY Project Alumni and John was their mentor.
Kate Rafferty has played Hannah Glawari in The Merry Widow and Queen
of the Night in Magic Flute. Aged 22, Kate has a broad repertoire of opera,
operetta and musical comedy roles and a busy schedule of concerts. She
has enjoyed a profound learning experience with teachers Stephen
Delaney and Professor Claudia Visca in Vienna. Kate has been invited to
join the Martha Argerich Project in Europe this summer.
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Alison Laurens is on a scholarship at the Sydney Conservatorium where
she studies with Alice Waten. At age 14, the Finnish virtuoso Pekka Kuusist
invited her to join him in concert with the Australian Chamber Orchestra.
Alison’s playing has attracted international attention and she is counting
down the days to her 18th birthday when she can accept the backlog of
international invitations for performance engagements, including the
Martha Argerich Project.
Alison Plevey graduated from WAAPA in 2009 with a BA Dance (Hon).
She recently completed a year long site specific improvisation project,
documented on her blog '100,000 frames'. As a 2012 ArtStart recipient
she is developing her regional arts practice with collaborator
actor/director, Adam Deusien, through their collective Lingua Franca.
Their work 'right behind you' performed at the Brisbane Powerhouse and
in Bathurst in 2013. In Canberra Alison works as Education officer at QL2
Dance.
Kate Rafferty and Alison Laurens are accompanied by Carl Rafferty. Carl
performs as a piano soloist and accompanist, produces youth opera and is
a mentor and advocate of young musicians. His goal is to ensure that their
work is measured against international standards and that they are
nurtured in a performance culture of excellence and ambition.
Katie Senior is an actress, dancer and choreographer working in a
community, cross cultural and special needs context. Katie was a JUMP!
mentee in 2012 and choreographed ‘Angels’. She regularly performs with
Canberra Dance Theatre and interstate eisteddfods and competitions. She
volunteers as a student teacher with young dancers and a special needs
dance troupe.
Bernice Chua is a school student. Since completing the Early Childhood
Music Program, ANU School of Music, she is continuing her music studies
with Marie Cull (piano) and Lindy Reksten (cello). She is a member of the
Fridays@School of Music Chamber Program.
Roger Kong took part in the 2010 ATY Project under the mentoring of Dr
Geoffrey Lancaster. More recently he performed a recital on 2MBS-FM and
in 2009, he achieved his licentiate diplomas for AMEB and Trinity College
London with distinction. He also enjoys playing the saxophone and organ.
Currently he is pursuing an Arts Law degree at the University of Sydney.
Michael Smith is a Perth based emerging artist working in dance, theatre,
circus, puppetry, film and related art forms. Michael graduated from the
John Curtin College of the Arts in 2008 and in 2012 completed his
Advanced Diploma in Dance at the Western Australian Academy of
Performing Arts. He was nominated for Best New Comer, by the Media
Alliance Actors Equity West Australia.
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James (Jim) Woodman is a young writer who, following the ATY Project
in 2007, formed a young writers’ group in the ACT, which
published Roundabout Town, a collection of short stories.
Treya Long began dance in Karratha. Through the Michael Leslie
Foundation she benefited from various professional workshops and
participated in the Canberra Australian Talented Youth Program. In 2011
Treya performed in the American Blacks in Dance Conference, LA. She has
successfully graduated from the Certificate II dance course at WAAPA.
The Power of Acceptance. Director: Courtney Loney. Production Manager:
Natalie Hind. Editor: Ryan Svirac. Composer: Jack Perejuan. Dancer/
Choreograher: Treya Long.
Sidney Creswick is a Canberra based band. Since winning the ACT Band
Competition in 2011 they have gone on to record their critically acclaimed
debut E.P. A grant from artsACT will culminate in a dance and music
collaboration at the Street Theatre in 2013.
Project Beats is a Canberra based dance initiative aimed at bringing
Canberra into the Australian dance scene as one of the leaders in hip-hop.
Their Project Beats’ methodology is based on a single idea: A dancer
cannot exist in solitary. He/she must have a “scene”, or “community”, to
provide room for growth, support and inspiration.
Canberra Choral Society regularly performs works from the established
choral repertoire as well as 20th Century and contemporary works,
including specially commissioned compositions. It receives many
invitations to participate in significant events and anniversaries. It was
established in 1952.
The Llewellyn Choir from Canberra has close ties with the ANU School of
Music and Canberra Youth Music. It provides performance opportunities
for their graduates and other young professional musicians. It was
established in 1980.
Oriana Chorale is from Canberra and performs a range of styles from a
cappella to works with orchestra. It has won particular acclaim for its
innovative programming. It was established in 1977.
Tobias Cole is one of Australia’s most successful countertenors, having
performed throughout Australia, New Zealand, the UK and USA. He has
sung title roles with Opera Australia and Victorian Opera, winning a Green
Room award for Xerxes in 2009. He is the Artistic Director of the Canberra
Choral Society.
Marko Sever (L.Mus.A.) has just completed his first year at the ANU
School of Music studying organ with Dr. Calvin Bowman. He intends to
continue his musical pursuits at the Conservatorium of Music in Sydney,
once again studying under Philip Swanton.
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Courtyard & foyer artists
The Canberra College Jazz Band is critically acclaimed and invited to
perform at many community and ACT Department events. Graham
Monger has taught Music at the Canberra College for nine years. He has
lead the Band in approximately twenty performances per year, including
performances at the Merimbula and Moruya Jazz festivals (annually),
Parliament House, the National Gallery of Australia and the National
Museum of Australia.
Graham Adler, Chrissie Shaw (A Bunch of Posers), Cirquaholics (The Fool
Factory)
Arts Installation
Aimee Fitzgerald is a young Australian photographer. Born in 1990, she
holds a bachelors degree with first class honours in Visual Arts. Her
awards include the ANU Visual Arts Scholarship, the Canberra Grammar
School Exhibition Award, and the CASS Honours Scholarship. Her work has
been exhibited in Canberra and Sydney.
For the Summit, she has been commissioned to create temporary works to
decorate the foyer of the ANU School of Music. Inspired by op art and
French Impressionist explorations of colour, she has made improvised
stained glass windows using only cellophane and electrical tape.
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SUMMIT PROCEEDINGS
These proceedings include the complete or edited addresses of
the speakers, and the powerpoint presentations of Monica
Penders and Deborah Stone. Lisa Colley’s powerpoint
presentation could not be included due to the large volume of
images.
Short summaries by Robyn Archer, Peter Garrett, and Don Aitkin
are included.
Les Murray was unable to attend and Alan Gould read excerpts
of Les Murray’s poetry.
The Arts Summit was webcast in its entirety by the Dept. of
Education, Employment and Workplace Relations (DEEWR). It
includes Part I, Addresses, Panel discussion and Part II, Thank
You Canberra (Artistic Production).
It is available on YouTube:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M8-VPWtC6Fw
www.youtube.com/watch?v=M8-VPWtC6Fw&feature=youtu.be
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SPEAKERS’ ADDRESSES
In order of presentation
Robyn Archer AO is a singer, writer, artistic director and public advocate
of the arts. She is currently Creative Director of the Centenary of Canberra
(2013) and Deputy Chair, Australia Council for the Arts. Her career has
spanned over 35 years giving many successful one-woman shows,
cabarets, and concerts.
Robyn Archer is an Officer of the Order of Australia, Chevalier de l’Ordre
des Arts et des Lettres (France) and holds honorary doctorates from
Flinders University (SA), and the universities of Sydney and Canberra.
Opening Address – The Importance of the Arts in Society
Robyn Archer outlined four reasons for the importance of the arts in
Australian society defending it as a conduit to absolutely everything in the
world:
1. The ‘arts for arts sake’ or Ars gratia artis has the power to inspire and
hopefully change a person’s life.
2. The Arts are the safest place to have a dangerous conversation allowing
people to consider moral, ethical, other issues and come out with more
questions, answers without your life or values being in any peril.
3. The Arts are the only thing that gives a person an overview of life,
regardless of one’s expertise, career or leadership. It is impossible to live a
day without the arts because all the products of society are the work of
artists.
4. Artists are as essential as doctors, nurses, and miners. They must be
thoroughly trained in primary, secondary and tertiary institutions to
obtain their skills and take their rightful place in society.
The Arts are not just a frill on the frock of life but the fabric of life itself.

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David Throsby is Professor of Economics at Macquarie University in
Sydney, Australia. He is internationally known for his research and his
many publications on the economics of art and culture. His interests
include the economics of the performing arts, the role of artists as
economic agents, heritage economics, and the relationships between
economic and cultural policy. His book Economics and Culture (Cambridge
University Press, 2001) has been translated into seven languages.
Summary
The paper discusses ways in which the fundamental importance of the
creative arts in the economy and in society can be properly recognised in
contemporary cultural policy.
Where do the creative arts fit into the economy of culture?
 Imagine the creative industries as a series of concentric circles
 Artists and arts organisations at the centre
 The circles represent increasingly commercial industries
 Creative ideas, skills and talents originate in the core
The Arts and the Economy
First, my apologies that I can’t be here in person – I collected a
persistent bug in London last week that I am still trying to shake off.
It is impossible in a few minutes to give an adequate treatment of a
topic as wide-ranging as “The Arts and the Economy”, so I will simply
focus on one particular issue. In recent years there has been a
growing policy interest in the economic potential of the arts.
Economic policy in many countries in Europe, Asia, South America
and elsewhere is paying increasing attention to the idea of the
“creative economy”, the proposition that there exists in the economy
a group of so-called “creative industries” whose contribution to GDP,
employment, exports etc. is growing more strongly that in traditional
sectors such as manufacturing. Investment in these industries, so the
argument runs, will pay handsome dividends in re-vitalising sluggish
economic performance. This trend has had direct implications for
the arts because the cultural industries, which include the arts, are a
significant component of the creative economy.
Some people, including many artists, feel uncomfortable with a trend
towards an emphasis on the economic role of the arts. The creative
arts, they argue, are not an industry – artistic production has its own
rationale that has nothing to do with economics. Artists are involved
in pursuing whatever is their creative vision, and they resist the
implication that their work can be treated simply as a commodity. So
the question arises: How can we see the creative arts as contributors
17
to the economy, but do so in a way that doesn’t constitute a sell-out
to “economic rationalism”?
I suggest that it all depends on how you conceptualise the arts as a
component of the cultural sector in the contemporary economy. We
can interpret the contribution that the arts make to the economy as
arising from the fact that they depend on creativity – the arts
generate creative ideas and creative processes that feed other
industries in the cultural sector like television, publishing, etc. and
may flow on to other industries far removed from culture. The arts
also train people in creative skills and develop creative talent that
can be applied in many other industries.
The concentric circles model of the cultural industries
Core crea ve arts
Literature
Music
Performing arts
Visual arts
Related industries
Adver sing
Architecture
Design
Fashion
Other core cultural industries
Film
Museums, galleries, libraries
Photography
Wider cultural industries
Heritage services
Publishing and print media
Television and radio
Sound recording
Video and computer games
So an appropriate way to interpret the arts in the economy is to put
them at the very centre of a production system that derives benefit
from the things the arts do. I have suggested a model of the cultural
sector built along these lines. It sees the cultural industries as a series
of concentric circles with the creative arts as the core, and with other
industries producing output with cultural content represented as the
various layers or circles around the core. The layers represent
increasingly commercial industries as we move outward through the
circles. The industries are classified into four groups ranging from
industries with very high cultural content in the centre circle (music,
theatre, visual art, etc.), to industries with a very small cultural
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content relative to commercial content in their output in the
outermost circle (fashion, architecture, etc.).
The logic of this model is that ideas generated in the core diffuse
outwards through the layers and beyond, stimulating creative output
and innovation in other industries and sectors. Likewise creative
talent and skills nurtured in the core find application in other
industries through the movement of creative workers – artists, for
example, may employ their creative skills in other industries in
various ways such as visual artists designing websites, or actors
involved in management training in big corporations, or craftspeople
developing new materials and processes for use in industry.
So the message is this: of course the arts are to be celebrated,
encouraged and facilitated for fundamental artistic reasons, as well
as for the wide range of cultural and social benefits that they bring.
But we need to recognise that in addition they are a powerful
economic sector, and the model of concentric circles helps us get this
role into perspective. Not only do the creative arts deliver benefit to
the economy through their contribution to GDP and job creation, but
also they act as a source of creative ideas, skills and talents that have
direct impacts on economic performance in the whole economy. This
is as true in Australia as in any other country. The Discussion Paper
for the National Cultural Policy that was released last year made
much of these economic considerations in its discussion of
government policy towards the arts. It seems likely that these ideas
will help to shape the National Cultural Policy itself which we hope
will be released some time soon.

19
Lisa Colley delivers business advisory services to more than 800 creative
enterprises through the Enterprise Connect Creative Industries Innovation
Centre (CIIC). She is a non-executive director of the Arts and Health
Foundation, a health promotion charity she founded that is dedicated to
supporting and promoting the role that arts play in the health and
wellbeing of Australians.
Summary
Unlocking the creativity within improves individual and community health
and wellbeing. All forms of art are being used to enhance health and
wellbeing across a broad spectrum of health services.
Healthy, Wealthy and Wise –
Why the Arts are Important for the Health of our Nation
I spend a lot of my time analysing and advocating for the critical place of
creativity in our economy. These figures are no doubt familiar to all of
you - we contribute more than $31bn to our economy or 3.3% of GDP this
is a higher contribution than that of agriculture, forestry & fishing.
The creative industries are also at the forefront of the new business
models and ideas that must become standard operating procedures for
businesses in the 21st century. We know a lot about operating in this new
commercial world order than many other industries and businesses. For
example:
 We know about developing, managing and exploiting intellectual
property
 We know about collaborative consumption and the rise of the
service economy
 We know about marketing and promotion; telling stories and
creating narratives to build brands, audiences and followers;
 We know about working in digital mediums in a digital world;
 We know how to foster innovation and encourage employees to
participate in the creation of product and involvement in product or
service design
 We know about problem solving– be it creative, design-led,
innovative, conceptual, end-to-end, deep dive or whatever is the
fashionable term of the moment.
These are all skills that Australian businesses need to adopt. And
increasingly they are looking to our creative professionals to help them.
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Whilst the creative industries direct employment is estimated to be
around 270,000. If we count creative’s working outside the creative
industries the figures are close to half a million and growing.
The challenges being faced by our economy will require a different set of
solutions than have been applied previously and this is where the role of
creativity comes in. If we are to be a truly prosperous country then an
investment in our minds not just our mines is essential.
But this isn’t what I am going to focus on today – I want to cover an area
that has had less air time and is about the contribution creative
professionals play in reducing the cost pressure on other sectors of our
economy – in particular on the cost of health care.
To illustrate this I’m going to tell you two stories, both located in a hospital
setting, both dealing with pain and suffering and both involving artists.
The first is about Heather Frahn, musician and sound therapy artist who
runs the Sound for Relaxation program at the Flinders Medical Centre in
Adelaide. She spends up to an hour taking patients into states of
relaxation using Tibetan singing bowls, guitar, wooden flutes and her
voice. Last year she worked with a woman (we could call her Barbara), on
the ward who had advanced cancer and was in palliative care. Over a
period of weeks Heather used the Tibetan singing bowls to help relax her
and address her pain. The woman really loved the singing bowls and
would take the vibrations to her tumour where she felt they took the pain
away. Her husband bought her a set of bowls and she learnt to play them.
When she died the bowls were placed on her coffin and her 15 year old
daughter inherited them. Heather then taught her daughter how to play
them. The family said that this was a very supportive, nurturing and
positive focus for Barbara and the family to help them cope with her death
and the grief and loss experienced afterwards. It provided a way in which
Barbara could feel in control and empowered at a time when she was most
vulnerable.
The story of Arts in Health at FMC began in 1996, with a very modest
health promotion program and now Arts in Health at FMC has became a
permanent department of the Division of Allied Health, a mark of its
growing recognition as an integral part of the model of care at Flinders
Medical Centre.
The second story is located at the Kids Rehab Unit at the Children’s
Hospital at Westmead, where Dr Angie Morrow administers painful
treatments to young patients with severe illnesses. Frequently the same
kids need to return for injections and other procedures. As if the pain itself
isn’t enough, often they suffer high levels of anxiety caused by the
treatments despite being given drugs.
Keen to alleviate this suffering, Dr Morrow dug into research records to
see if there was any way of easing the situation without drugs. Her answer
came unexpectedly at an arts-science speed-dating event at the
Powerhouse Museum in Sydney where she met artist George Khut. Armed
with his laptop he showed Dr Morrow examples of his colourful, heart rate
controlled interactive artworks. This chance meeting between a physician
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and an artist has led to an innovative research project called BrightHearts,
at the Children’s hospital at Westmead where early tests have
demonstrated that it can help children to voluntarily lower their heart
rates through intentional relaxation.
Bright hearts is an app-based relaxation training system for managing pain
and anxiety experienced when undergoing recurrent clinical procedures. It
monitors a patients pulse, wirelessly feeding their heart rate to an iPAD
which is held by the patient or their carer. Dr Khuts unique interactive art
shows patients an abstract visualisation of their own heart rhythm and
invites them to explore how they can alter these patterns. As the patient
relaxes and slows their breathing the app responds by animating colourful,
abstract imagery. After a small amount of training, children can learn to
control the appearance of the work using their breath and relaxation.
Bright hearts and the Sound for relaxation program are examples of the
many innovative interactions between the health sectors and artists
occurring around Australia at hospitals, medical centres, research
institutes and in public spaces that are designed to address a broad range
of health and well being issues.
For over thirty years, many thousands of Australian arts practitioners,
clinicians and support workers in the health sector have understood that
unlocking the creativity within people provides tremendous power to
improve individual and community health and wellbeing.
We need to strengthen the capacity of the arts to contribute to the health
and wellbeing of our society and for the first time in Australia arts workers
and health workers have this opportunity.
A national framework on arts and health has been called for by the
Australian Standing Council on Health. This is a powerful body of Federal
and State Ministers charged with pursuing priority issues of national
significance that require a sustained, collaborative effort and to address
key areas of responsibility and funding.
For a relatively modest investment in arts and health programs,
government funding for health can be driven further to a degree well out
of proportion to the small amounts spent on arts and health. These modest
investments have been, and can continue to be, used to tackle some of
Australia’s more intractable health issues including chronic disease,
mental illness and reducing the gap in life expectancy and opportunities
between Aboriginal Australians, Torres Strait Islander Australians and
other Australians.
The evidence base for arts and health, the extent and quality of activity
over 30 years and Australia’s reputation for best practice in this area
warrant Australian governments to make a formal commitment to policy
and action in relation to arts and health in Australia.
This will provide a greater focus on this work, and thereby help to
strengthen and sustain arts and health initiatives in Australia, resulting in
a strengthening of individual and community health and wellbeing.
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I was asked to focus on the economic contribution of the arts to our
economy and in particular to health – that is what I have done – but it
would be remiss of me to leave it there. This is only part of the story and I
think best summed up in the words of Bobby Kennedy
Gross national product does not allow for the health of our children, the
quality of their education, or the joy of their play. It does not include the
beauty of our poetry ....the intelligence of our public debate or the integrity of
our public officials. It measures neither our wit nor our courage; neither our
wisdom nor our learning; neither our compassion nor our devotion to our
country.

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Hugh Mackay is a social researcher and the author of fourteen books,
including What makes us tick? In recognition of his pioneering work in
social research, he has been elected a Fellow of the Australian
Psychological Society and awarded honorary doctorates by four Australian
universities. Hugh is an honorary professor of social science at the
University of Wollongong, a former Deputy Chairman of the Australia
Council.
Summary
Participating in the arts provides for mental wellbeing, good relationships
and improves the ills of contemporary society. Why isn't more public money
going into community arts programs to simulate greater public
participation in the arts?
In What Way are the Arts Good for Us?
The assumption underlying public funding of the arts is that we all benefit
from a thriving arts industry, because our lives are so profoundly – and, we
hope, positively – affected by exposure to art in all its forms.
Perhaps the most obvious example of the effect of ‘art’ on our lives comes
from architecture, urban and industrial design: architects and designers
don’t only create structures, spaces and objects that we see as ‘beautiful’
or ‘ugly’; they also create the places where we conduct our lives. It’s a safe
assumption that beautiful architecture and design will have a positive
effect on us; perhaps it’s even true that provocative architecture and
design can expand our horizons and challenge us to see the world in new
ways – a process we don’t always enjoy, but which creative artists are sure
is ‘good for us’.
Because most architecture and design is created in a commercial context,
we don’t always think of it as ‘art’ and we don’t see the need to devote
public money to funding it. Many other art forms may have a profound
effect on our lives, for good or ill, but are similarly commercial and not
always thought of as art – and certainly not as art that requires
government support. Pop music, TV soaps, political cartoons, blockbuster
movies, pulp fiction … they all add to the creative ambience, but they don’t
attract government subsidies, presumably because they feed off their own
commercial success.
What about so-called ‘public art’: sculptures in parks and city squares,
murals, fountains – even music amplified in public places? The story might
be apocryphal, but it was reported a few years ago that the music of Barry
Manilow had been used by the British police to drive gangs out of troublespots: amplifying the music of Manilow was evidently enough to send
thugs running, hands clapped over their ears. But is Manilow’s work
uniquely suitable for crime prevention? Would Mahler, equally, repel
miscreants (or perhaps encourage them)? Might any kind of amplified
music deter acts of violence and other crime? Is this why music is played in
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lifts – to calm the savage breasts of would-be assailants? If it’s so effective,
should public money therefore be used to create ‘musical
neighbourhoods’? (Heaven forbid!)
Throughout history, many creative artists have relied on the patronage of
benefactors to support them – the church, monarchs and their
aristocracies, wealthy traders and, more recently, the state. So how should
we decide when to apply public money to the arts? It’s easy to defend
public funding of initiatives for bringing entertaining, inspiring and
educational art, music and theatre to small regional and rural communities
who would otherwise not experience them. And public money is necessary
to fund the creation of ‘public art’ designed to enrich public spaces (though
much of that is funded by private philanthropy). It’s probably also
defensible to use taxpayers’ money to support artists, writers, composers,
actors, singers, directors who need time to undertake groundbreaking
work with the potential to deepen our understanding and appreciation of
the human condition.
Similarly, many people (including me) see virtue in supporting producers
and performers committed to maintaining and reinterpreting the musical
and theatrical canon that has shaped our culture, just as the literary canon
must always be accessible to everyone in public libraries.
The heavy emphasis in government arts funding is, naturally, on art-forms,
artists and activities that aren’t likely to be commercially viable, but that
we see as somehow ‘civilising’ us. (Even charging seat prices of up to $288,
Opera Australia must rely on a combination of commercial sponsorships
and government grants to survive.) But there’s an implicit assumption in
the arts world that the funding of ‘highbrow’/elite arts (The Ring Cycle) is
inherently worthwhile, or even virtuous, because exposure to it can make
us better people in a way that ‘lowbrow’/popular arts (We Will Rock You)
can’t – not just by giving its patrons pleasure, but by actually improving
them in some moral or spiritual or even mystical way. Is that assumption
justified?
In a remarkable book called Everyday Ecstasy, the British writer
Marghanita Laski examined whether the ecstatic response to art is
normally – or ever – translated into ‘moral uplift’, resulting in increased
enthusiasm for, say, charitable works designed to alleviate the suffering of
those who may never experience such ecstasy. Is that how ‘the arts’ benefit
society, she wondered, by making us more altruistic, more compassionate,
more sensitive citizens? Her reluctant answer was ‘no’ (and she didn’t
even quote the infamous example of the 20th century’s greatest art lover,
Adolf Hitler).
In his 2006 book, What good are the arts?, the Oxford scholar and critic
John Carey echoed Laski, musing upon the strangeness of the fact that ‘this
farrago of superstition and unsubstantiated assertion [about the value of
the arts] should have achieved a position of dominance in Western
25
thought’. Carey, like Laski, contends that the arts do not ‘improve’ us any
differently or any more than other forms of entertainment or recreation –
including exposure to nature or, indeed, sporting contests – that give us
pleasure.
Both Laski and Carey were talking about exposure to the arts, rather than
participation in them. To that extent, they may have missed a crucial point
I want to raise in a moment.
In any case, we don’t have to believe in the moral superiority of the arts to
decide they are worth funding. We could simply say that audiences who
enjoy that kind of entertainment are as entitled to their pleasure as those
who like going to commercially viable art-forms like mainstream movies
or football. There’s nothing wrong with subsidising art, music or drama
that will only ever appeal to audiences too small for commercial viability,
as long as the wider community is happy with that arrangement. Or
perhaps we believe that if we put enough money into the promotion of
‘high’ art it would become more accessible to people at large, who might
then find they appreciated it. Some arts funding does seem to encourage
the process of bringing highbrow music, opera, paintings and theatre to
people who might not otherwise think of ‘the arts’ as being intended for
them and for whom such exposure might unlock a new source of pleasure.
__________________________
In thinking about government’s role in stimulating and supporting the arts,
we are in danger of overlooking a simple yet crucial point: the greatest
value of the arts – to individuals and to local communities – is
through participation in them, rather than merely being exposed to
them as spectators. If the most intense public benefits of the arts flow
from engagement with the arts through creating and performing, an
obvious question arises: why aren’t we using public money to extend those
benefits more widely?
Perhaps there are lessons to be learned from sport. The way to build a
sporting culture is not only to pay top players a fortune and give promising
youngsters special attention, but also to foster grass-roots participation
across the nation. Personal participation, whether in sport or art, is also
likely to enhance our interest and enthusiasm as spectators, though that
isn’t the main point.
The more you look at the ills of contemporary society – alienation,
fragmentation, isolation, depression – the more compelling the need for
community participation in the arts seems. What better way of fostering a
sense of community, promoting mental health and wellbeing, and reducing
the pressures of a competitive, materialistic society than by encouraging
widespread participation in the arts?
Learning to paint or write (in a class that creates its own sense of
belonging), staging plays and musicals, organising festivals, making
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movies, taking up photography, puppetry or tapestry, singing in choirs,
dancing, playing in bands ... these are well-defined pathways to mental
health for people whose daily lives are mostly spent in non-creative
pursuits.
We talk endlessly about the need for ‘balance’, by which we usually mean
the balance between work, family and leisure. But there’s another quite
magical possibility: balancing the stresses, disappointments and tedium of
life with the therapeutic release of tension through some form of regular
creative outlet.
Many people recall with intense pleasure their participation in school
plays, orchestras, choirs and art classes. Sometimes they look back
wistfully and wonder where all that pleasure (and all that talent) went.
Why did it stop when they left school? And why couldn’t it be recaptured?
A former Australian prime minister once dreamed of a nation of
shareholders, enriched by their participation in the adventure of
capitalism. Another goal of governments could be to create a nation of
individuals and communities enriched through their participation in the
arts adventure. Perhaps it’s time to dust off all those abandoned Schools of
Arts across the nation, and put them to the use for which they were
originally intended.

Don Aitkin AO, historian and political scientist, was the Foundation
Chairman of the Australian Research Council, Vice-Chancellor of the
University of Canberra, and after his retirement from that position,
Chairman of both the Cultural Facilities Corporation and the National
Capital Authority. He is the Chairman of the Canberra International Music
Festival, one of the organisers of The Musical Offering, and a supporter of
other community groups in the creative life of Canberra. His website is
www.donaitkin.com. He is the author of a dozen books, which include a
novel and a family memoir.
What is Government’s Role in the Arts?
Government funding should facilitate the creative urge rather than impose
its ideas of what is good art. To get more funding requires a public culture
in which ‘the arts’ have the same status as ‘jobs’.

27
Monica Penders is the Director of ScreenACT. In 2008 she produced the
US$27million film The Secret of Moonacre, which was shot in Budapest,
Hungary and enjoyed a global theatrical release. She continues developing
and producing her own projects under the Batavia Creative brand and has
been awarded grants from Screen Australia and artsACT for her next
feature project Eight Seasons. Summary
Of all arts forms, film is the perfect blend of creativity, collaboration and
commerciality. And therein also lies the paradox – art/culture versus
commerciality. Can these opposed forces co-exist?
Balancing the "Show" and the "Business"
in the Australian Screen Industry
Slide 2
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Slide 3
Source:(Screen(Australia(
Slide 4 – Audience expectations
In terms of delivery methods, everything has changed
 Heritage media (theatrical films and TV) in competition from new
media (games, internet)
 How people watch content is different – on demand, iView,
download, iTunes Mobiles, iPad, computer, internet
 Audiences have a growing expectation that they can get their
content on multi platforms when they want it
Slide 5 – Lets talk numbers
Avatar
 US$237 million to make
 Huge hit grossing over $2.8 billion world wide
 In the US alone $790 million
 This is box office only – not DVD, pay per view etc…
John Carter
 US$250 million to make
 Add at least 40% for P&A (print & advertising) which is marketing
and distribution
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 Needed to make $375 million at the box office (and the distributors
would prefer most of that to be in the US). Not even close
 $100 million short fall
Slide 6 – Australian examples
Red Dog
 AU$8 million to make
 Nearly $20 million at Aus box office
 Approx. $8 million internationally
The Sapphires
 AU$9 million to make
 $14 million at Aus box office
 Bought up by Weinsteins for the US market
Slide 7 – Conventions of genre
A specific audience that has specific expectations – that can be handled by
the conventions of genre
 The rom com (the couple get together at the end)
 The horror (the couple may not be alive at the end)
 The thriller (the couple are in peril until the end)
 The sci fi (the couple are floating in space until the end) and so on
Don’t mess with genre!
Slide 8 – Educate yourself
 Film schools
 Screen agencies – such as ScreenACT
 Screen Australia
 Guilds
 Internships and attachments

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Richard Gill OAM, is one of Australia’s pre-eminent and most admired
conductors and is internationally respected as a music educator. He is
Founding Music Director and Conductor Emeritus of Victorian Opera and
is currently Artistic Director of the Education Program for the Sydney
Symphony Orchestra. He has been Artistic Director of OzOpera, Artistic
Director and Chief Conductor of the Canberra Symphony Orchestra, and
the Adviser for the Musica Viva In Schools program. He has conducted all
the major Australian orchestras and youth orchestras, and his extensive
operatic repertoire ranges from works of the Baroque era to 21 st century
Australian and international works. He has held several important posts
including Dean of the West Australian Conservatorium of Music and has
received numerous accolades including the Bernard Heinze Award,
Honorary Doctorates from the Edith Cowan University of Western
Australia and the ACU, and the Australia Council’s Don Banks Award.
Summary
Creativity in schools is being stultified by standardised testing. If we
obliterate arts education entirely from the curriculum then we obliterate the
potential imagination of a nation. Arts Education, led by Music Education is
our only hope.
The Importance of Music Education
In 1989 Donald Horne wrote a book called Ideas For a Nation. The book
opens with a section entitled WARNING, followed by a further heading
which reads: DANGER! IDEAS AT WORK.
Horne writes in this section, and I quote:
‘ A central concern of the book is that, objectively, existence is meaningless
but that, as cultural animals, we provide meanings by creating ‘realities’
and it is from these creations that we can think and act. This means that it
is the imagination, among other places, that one must seek for change.’
Donald Horne uses three words in that short paragraph, which have
implications for all arts practitioners: creating; realities; imagination.
Creativity, or the process of making things is, I believe, vital for the social,
emotional, physical, spiritual and mental well-being of a nation. I cannot
imagine that this view, in this company, would be widely challenged.
WARNING
However, I believe that the notion of creativity within the current school
system nationally, is being watered down or weakened, as schools vie for
higher positions on the NAPLAN tables. Preparation for standardised
testing in many schools in Australia consumes an enormous amount of
teaching time. I have first-hand evidence of schools in New South Wales
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and Victoria where time, which would be spent on Music, Art and Dance,
for example, has been reduced in favour of extra time being spent in
pursuing activities to increase literacy and numeracy.
Children go to school for two reasons and for two reasons only: the first, to
learn how to learn, and the second to learn how to think. Both of these
ideas, learning how to learn and learning how to think are inextricably
linked.
Children learn things in a variety of ways, most of which involve
perception, observation, imitation, experimentation and analysis and
ultimately one hopes creation.
In teaching music to very young children the perception of music, is by its
very nature, quintessentially aural. Even if the child observes the sound
coming from an instrument or voice, the perception of the instrument or
voice maybe visual but the perception of the music itself is aural.
Music can be perceived by the unborn child and pregnant women speak
convincingly of ways in which their babies respond to sound, especially
musical sounds.
Once the child is born, its fairly strong dependence, among other things, on
its ability to hear and to be heard is vital to its survival. It is the human
being’s capacity to listen to sound and to discriminate sounds which point
very clearly to making a case for the serious study of music as early as
possible in a child’s life.
Singing a wide variety of songs and nursery rhymes, playing rhythmic
games and dancing, listening to a wide range of recorded repertoire with
very young children, may help to increase the child’s capacity to
concentrate, focus and imitate. These activities introduce the child in the
early stages of its life to the world of organised sound, involving repetitive
patterns of pitch, rhythm and harmony, which aid the development of
aural comprehension, memory and discrimination.
So why we do we teach music and indeed, why should we bother?
We teach music because it is good. We teach music because it is unique.
We teach music because it acts in a unique way upon the hearts, minds,
spirits and imaginations of children. We teach music so that children can
make their own music. We need no other justification for the teaching of
music or indeed any other arts subject. These are the real reasons for
teaching music.
As a result of teaching music we may notice that children’s capacities to
listen, to focus, to discriminate, to reason, to comprehend, to concentrate,
to analyse and to apprehend the abstract, start to improve radically and
that these qualities and abilities may transfer themselves into other areas
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of learning. If that is the case then this must be seen as a bonus, and a
glorious bonus at that, but never a reason. In short, we do not teach music
because it helps children to develop bigger brains and become smarter at
languages or mathematics. I wonder how many language or maths
teachers teach their disciplines because it helps children become smarter
at music?
I define music as organised vocal and/or instrumental sounds, which are
in the first instance aurally perceived. The sounds are temporal, that is
they pass through time depending exclusively on time for comprehension.
The sounds are abstract, intangible, incapable of describing things, have no
specific meaning in and of themselves, but yet are capable of evoking
strong and powerful independent reactions in listeners.
Even a piece of music with a title, such as The Hall of the Mountain King or
a similar piece of program music, does not cause the music to become
suddenly descriptive. What the title might do is assist the listener in
evolving ideas or evoking notions about the music, ideas or notions which
will be completely subjective.
Creating music, making one’s own music, lies at the very heart of music
education. The reason we sing songs, play games, play instruments, move
and dance with children is to provide them with a vocabulary of ideas
which they will in turn use in their own special way. In the school
circumstance, particularly early childhood education, we should not teach
music only for the sake of performing music. While there is clear and
special satisfaction derived from teaching children how to perform,
initially the goals should be set to direct children towards a creative path
as soon as possible in their education. By directing children towards
thinking imaginatively and creatively we increase their chances to
comprehend, analyse, think and subsequently learn. If we are depriving
children of these opportunities to make and create, not only in music but
also in any of the art forms, for the sake of spending extra time on
standardised tests, then we are in serious danger of strangling the
imagination of the country. I know that children have to be tested an a
good teacher is constantly testing his or her charges simply from the point
of view of planning what must be taught next at any given time. The maxim
we use at Teachers College back in the Palaeolithic period was, plan - teach
- test. Results from all over the world reveal that standardised testing
achieves very little. Apart from anything else, we educate children because
we believe intrinsically in the right of every child to have access to
knowledge. The testing of that knowledge should not be the reason for
teaching it. Standardised testing has nothing to do with genuine education.
Let’s return to music. Every child in Australia deserves access to a fully
qualified and properly trained music teacher. Achieving this is not as
difficult as it at first may seem.
33
All over this vast land there are dozens of excellent teachers whose
energies could be harnessed in training and teaching other teachers. It
would not be a difficult matter to put this teacher-training program into
place and I am currently exploring the concept of establishing a National
Institute of Music Teaching to address this very problem. It would require
the unification of all teachers who espouse the numerous philosophies and
methodologies of teaching music to agree that music is bigger than a
method of teaching it and that most methods have some good somewhere.
It is indeed our fault, the musicians’ fault I mean, that music education in
this country is so fragmented. If we can all agree that music is essential in
the life of a child, and we all do, then the way is really clear.
In short, the solution to a universal music education lies within ourselves;
those who are still in the field and practising and who are not necessarily
within the university system as the following statistics reveal. In Finland,
the generalist classroom teacher, not the specialist teacher, receives 270
hours of music instruction. In Korea, the generalist receives 160 hours of
music instruction. In Australia, in those places where it is offered, the
generalist classroom teacher receives 17 hours of instruction. All of these
hours are offered over a four-year span.
If we are to be a truly educated country then we must place the arts at the
very centre of the curriculum and stop pretending that we do. We must
also agree that all children should have access to the arts and not just the
privileged few. We must also agree that the arts are necessary in the loves
of young children and are central to the way in which human beings create
and evolve new ideas.
I’m not advocating a diet of so-called Classical music. I’m talking about a
wide and deep range of musical repertoire from an equally wide and deep
range of the earth’s multiplicity of cultures, taught with compassion and
understanding with a view to encouraging creativity. It can’t be that hard,
can it? But, what do I know?
I will finish with the words of the essayist Michel Eyquem de Montaigne
who is accredited with coining the expression ‘What do I know?’ simply
because his eloquence, perspicacity and clarity are infinitely superior to
mine and because these minds such as Montaigne’s say brilliantly and
succinctly what we would say in an otherwise less brilliant and succinct
style. I’m quoting from an essay which the Australian polymath and public
intellectual, Melbourne University’s Barry Jones wrote recently on
Montaigne and in whose debt I am for introducing me to these essays.
Barry Jones cites these two paragraphs of Montaigne’s.
‘When the mind is satisfied, that is a sign of diminished faculties or
weariness. No powerful mind stops within itself: it is always stretching out
and exceeding its capacities. It makes sorties which go beyond what it can
achieve: it is only half-alive if it is not advancing, pressing forward, getting
34
driven into a corner and coming to blows: its enquiries are shapeless and
without limits; its nourishment consist in amazement, the hunt and
uncertainty, as Apollo made clear enough to us by his speaking (as always)
ambiguously, obscurely and obliquely, not glutting us but keeping us
wondering and occupied. It is an irregular activity, never-ending and
without pattern or target. Its discoveries excite each other, follow after
each other and between them produce more.’
I am also chastened by the following quote and the sentiments expressed
therein sentiments, which have been alien to me until recently:
‘It is to my inadequacy (so often avowed) that I owe my tendency to
moderation, to obeying such beliefs as are laid down for me and a constant
cooling and tempering of my opinions as well as a loathing for that
distressing and combative arrogance which has complete faith and trust in
itself: it is a mortal enemy of finding out the truth. Just listen to them
acting the professor: the first idiocies which they put forward are couched
in the style by which religion and laws are founded: “there is nothing more
shocking than to see assertion and approval dashing ahead of cognition
and perception.’ (Cicero).
[Translated by M.A Screech, Penguin Classics, 1993 from an essay by Barry
Jones]
Ladies and gentlemen the only thing we have is hope and the hope for this
country to become a truly educated country lies fairly and squarely within
its capacity to teach and offer all its children a first rate arts education. It is
a much better investment, in my view, to spend money on arts education
than on standardised testing. Thank you.
An edited version of this speech was given at The National Arts Summit in
Canberra, held on February 12th in the Llewellyn Hall at the Australian
National University.

35
Claudia Visca is Professor of Voice, University of Music and Performing
Arts Vienna. A soprano born in New York, she graduated from the
acclaimed Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia where she studied with
Anna Moffo’s teacher, E. Giannini.
During her long stage career she has been a guest artist at more than
25 opera houses in Europe and has embodied more than 75 opera,
operetta and musical roles and sung concert repertoire in more than 2,000
performances. She has performed with numerous conductors including
Leonard Bernstein, Eugene Ormandy, Istvan Kertesz and artists such as
Placido Domingo, Agnes Baltsa, Edith Mathis, Rudolf Serkin, Yo-Yo Ma,
Jean-Pierre Rampal among many others. Professor Visca travels widely
giving international master classes in voice technique and interpretation.
She is a jury member of international voice competitions. Her students are
engaged in acclaimed opera houses of the world.
Summary
The paper examines the importance of maintaining an international
perspective in the performing arts through interaction between artists and
institutions.
Crossroads
The theme of my talk today is about crossroads – by this I mean a potential
decision point that may influence the nature of the relationship between
artists in Australia and Austria.
I’d like to relate my theme of crossroads and the theme of this summit by
drawing some parallels in space, distance and time. You might wonder
why a person from Austria, on the other side of the globe, is speaking with
you today. This links to my theme of space and distance. Travelling to
Australia certainly made me aware of distance, as does the sweeping
landscape here. But distance does not have to be an impediment to
connection. According to Leonard Bernstein, “Any great artwork . . .
revives and readapts time and space, and the measurement of its success is
the extent to which it makes one an inhabitant of that world.”
This Summit is bringing together generations of artists — seniors and
mentors, established artists, and the emerging generation. You may not be
aware, but over 70 years ago, thousands of Austrians, many of them
musicians, attempted to flee the oppression in Europe prior to the Second
World War. Albrecht Dumling, a German musicologist, just last month
gave a presentation in Vienna entitled: “Finding refuge in
Australia. Vienna musicians at the other end of the world.” He noted that
more than 10,000 visa applications for Australia were lodged by Austrians
during that period.
During the post-World War Two period, an abundance of emerging
artists from Australia travelled to Vienna to accept the challenge of
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competing on the European stage, and succeeded. This established another
important step in the crossroads between these two countries.
May I use my own personal story to further this analogy? I was born in
New York and brought up in a musical family of Scottish-Italian
background. After my education in America, my crossroad led to Europe,
where I was able to fulfill my dream of becoming an opera singer. My
parallel passion was teaching, which has also been fulfilled, by taking
me to numerous countries, including Australia.
A large number of my Australian artistic colleagues, now living in major
cities of Austria, share similar stories. They include dancers, conductors,
composers, singers, and instrumentalists in the Volksopera and Vienna
State Opera, as well as pianists, teachers, musicologists, and managers of
contemporary music. And the list is growing! These established artists are
paving the way for the next generation — the young and emerging.
On the institutional level, the Sydney Conservatorium of Music at the
University of Sydney and the University of Music and Performing Arts,
Vienna, where I am based are partner universities. The head of my
department, Professor Karl-Heinz Hanser, is keen to make this exchange
even more profitable for both.
On this, my first visit to Australia, I have had the privilege to work in
Canberra with talented young singers, one of whom is performing for us
here today.
I hope that this visit, in hindsight, will represent another crossroad – the
strengthening of international collaboration between artists and
institutions of our respective nations. In this way, we are bridging what
seems to be an enormous physical distance.
This may appear to be a daunting task, yet Peter Sculthorpe, the Australian
composer, has noted that distance can be inspiring. When discussing the
Australian
landscape in
relation
to his famous
composition
‘Maranoa Lullaby’, he stated that despite looking monotonous and
featureless to many observers, “the beauty of the bush lies … in the sense
of space and distance.”

37
Deborah Stone, Editor, artsHub Australia. She is a journalist and
communication professional. She has been a reporter, feature writer and
arts writer on The Age, The Sunday Age, The Australian and the New
Zealand Herald. Her former leadership roles include Editor of the
Australian Jewish News and Executive Director of the Anti-Defamation
Commission.
She has also worked as a communications trainer,
speechwriter and freelance editor.
artsHub Australia is the leading centre for arts news, jobs and information
online. Its features, news, reviews and analysis are essential reading for
anyone working in the creative industries in Australia or the UK. artsHub’s
editorial provides independent, educated content for people who know
and care about the arts.
Summary
Results of the National Arts Survey conducted online throughout 2012 and
based on 2,000 responses.
Challenges & Changes – National Arts Survey 2012
What are the biggest challenges for the artists & the arts?
 Local
 National
Slide 3 – Challenges - Local
Challenges- Local
% of responses highlight
Financial/Funding
Opportunity/Access
Community attitudes
Education/Training/Skills
Marketing/audience build/new media
Support/structure
Government policy issues
Arts community & artistic issues
Artistic issues/attitudes
Regional/local issues
32.0%
24.3%
13.5%
7.5%
5.2%
5.0%
4.8%
3.1%
2.7%
1.9%
0%
5%
10%
15% 20% 25% 30% 35%
•No surprise top funding – about 1/3 responses had something to do with
money includes grants, corporate sponsorship, expenses
•Next was opportunity & access about ¼ of responses
•Community attitudes were also very important – real sense of concern
that problem for the arts is not in structure of industry but in how
governments and potential audiences view the arts
•Other issues education, marking, new media, structural and government
policy issues and arts community issues,
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•Interestingly regional & local issues are very low as concerns – hang on to
that thought because much more significant w potential changes.
Slide 4 – Challenges - National
Challenges- National
% of responses highlight
Financial/Funding
community attitudes
Support/Structure
Gov/Policy
Education/Training/Skills
Opportunity/Access
regional/interstate issues
marketing/audience build/new media
Artistic issues
multicultural/indigenous issues
international issues
28.8%
14.8%
9.7%
9.5%
9.3%
8.9%
6.4%
4.5%
4.0%
2.1%
2.1%
0%
5% 10% 15% 20% 25% 30% 35%
•Again funding is very important, as you would expect though relatively
less important than on a local issue – which is interesting consider most
arts funding does come at the federal level.
•Community attitudes were very significant, possibly because artists are
aware that on a national level funding is dependent on political will and
therefore on community attitudes.
•There was also quite a lot of concern about structures and government
policy
•More specific issues including artistic issues, multicultural & indigenous
issues and international issues which also got some mentions in this
section
Slide 5 - Financial & funding
•Making a living
•Finding and funding gallery/studio space/Rent for venues
•Getting grants
•Art dealers
•Paid work verses practice
•Attracting financial support
•Being paid more than the cleaner for a gig
Slide 6 – Opportunities & access
• Getting noticed
• Job security
• Sustainable careers
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•
•
•
•
Lack of professional advice to artists starting out
Big companies drown out small
Regional distance
Access to affordable venues/spaces
Slide 7 – Community attitudes
• Constant need to defend the value of the arts
‘We need to stop proving ourselves and accept that the arts are a given, not
an exception. They are essential 'services' and they need to be discussed from
this point forward. Increasing the profile and understanding of the
importance of arts to our society’
• Still not respected and valued in Australia as a worthy vocation/
industry
• Under valuing of creativity to economy and resilience
• Little understanding of the creative process
• Too much sport
Slide 8 – Support, structure & government policy
• Bureaucracy/grants application system/too many hoops to jump
through
• Lack of cultural leadership
• Government not interested in the arts
• Acknowledgement & financial support by local govt.
• Rethinking business models in an environment of reduced
government support
Slide 9 – Changes you would like? How they can be achieved?
• Local
• National
Slide 10 – Changes – Local
Changes- Local
% of responses highlight
20.3%
Community education & access
16.6%
13.5%
Government funding
9.3%
8.3%
7.2%
7.0%
5.6%
5.6%
3.7%
1.9%
1.0%
Spaces
Government policy changes
Jobs & career structures
Public art
0%
5%
10%
15%
20%
25%
40
•A lot of suggestions for local or regional support, many specific to certain
areas
•A lot of ideas for improving community education & access
•Quite a lot of suggestions for things the arts community could do to help
itself
•Unsurprisingly many suggestions to just increase government funding
•Quite a number of suggestions involved education and career structure
•Other significant issues included program ideas, suggestions for more
space, private sector initiatives, and government policy changes
Slide 11 – Changes – National
Changes- National
% of responses highlight
Government policy changes
21.4%
20.3%
16.8%
16.0%
Government funding
Private/commercial sector initiatives
5.1%
4.3%
3.2%
2.9%
2.7%
2.4%
1.6%
1.1%
1.1%
0.5%
0.5%
International engagement
regional/local support
international engagement
Business education for artists
multicultural/indigenous issues
0%
5%
10%
15%
20%
25%
•Government policy was key focus for suggestions for change on a national
level
•Also a huge number of suggestions on how to improve community
education and access which were really worth close examination
•Unsurprisingly there were a significant number of suggestions focused on
increasing government funding.
•There were also a lot of great program ideas.
•Other suggestions were in private sector initiatives, arts community
actions, international engagement and also some regional and local issues,
which were more based on equality of access and national co-ordination.
Slide 12 – Policy & structural change
•Less red tape, especially simplified grant applications
•Tax reform to recognise the nature of erratic artist’s incomes
•Australian content requirements
•Integration of the arts into the health sector
•Integrated action by all levels of government
•Decentralisation of national arts funding services
•Better scrutiny of commercial galleries
•Stop outsourcing mgmt of state venues to private companies
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Slide 13 – Community education & access
•Huge number of responses focused on improving arts education in
schools and giving young people the opportunity to experience the arts in
order to develop audience: e.g. Arts training for all primary teachers as
part of the National Curriculum, placing creative front & centre of the
curriculum
•A lot of comparisons between arts and sport, with suggestions for getting
arts the kind of profile sports get.
•Commonwealth govt run a public campaign like they do for the
importance of exercise, anti-smoking etc to promote the physical,
emotional and psychological benefits of the arts.
•Many responses on how the media should do more to promote the arts &
educate the community about its value
Slide 14 – Funding
•Mostly more funding, increase arts budget, more grants
•Incentives for business to invest in the arts
•Increase arts tourism
•More equitable funding – interpreted differently by different respondents
•New ways of funding the arts (e.g. social enterprises)
Slide 15 – Education for artists
•Many respondents recognised the value of business education for artists
and wanted the opportunity to develop skills in marketing, social media,
arts business management. Some suggested that should be a compulsory
part of any creative arts degree.
•Develop training programs in creative industries leadership innovation
•A lot calls to improve the quality of arts education and reinstate lost
funding to TAFEs & university creative courses
Slide 16 – Jobs & career development
•Call for more mentoring opportunities
•Call for paid internship opportunities
•Continuing education and professional development
•Call for longer term commitments e.g. support for three-five years
participation in art fairs for artists and dealer galleries
•Arts officers in every community centre consult annually
•An arts worker to coordinate all the scattered groups and help artists apply
for funding
Slide 17 – Arts community actions
•More collaboration
•More advocacy
•Curators & producers who will take risks and not stick with the tried and
true artists.
•More connected thinking between art forms
•Larger companies helping out smaller
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Slide 18 - Programs
•A lot of interesting & creative ideas for specific programs
•Career stage programs: emerging artists but also mid-career and senior
artist programs
•Seed funding for artists to manage small business studio complexes
•Subsidised tickets for under 40s funded by corporate sponsors.
•Rent subsidies for arts ventures (not just funding, but access)
•Reduced housing for Artists and families as like "ArtScape Toronto”
•National salon exhibition - no award no selection criteria
•Artist bursaries: a wage to make work not fix community problems
•Quick response, small grant programs for individuals and small groups
•Art banks/ lease artworks
Slide 19 – Demographic differences
Demographic differences
%
22.8%
18.1%
60+
30 &
under
31-60
59.1%
Do younger artists have different concerns from older or established
practitioners?
Do they have different ideas about what should change?
More than half mid-career 30 to 60
The rest fairly evenly divided between 30 & under and over 60s
Slide 20 – Areas of difference
 Opportunity & access
 Local versus national
 Education
 Government policy
• Few surprises
• Younger people more concerned about opportunity & access
• Younger people are more inclined to see funding as a national issue,
where established artists think more broadly in terms of local funding &
private sources.
• Similarly older artists were more likely to come up with regional/local
suggestions for change.
• Younger people on the other hand had more concrete ideas for programs
43
• Interestingly, older artists were more concerned about education,
training and skills than younger people. The over 60s were much more
concerned about the training issue than the under 30s
• It may be young people think they are getting adequate training and
those who have lived through times when opportunities were different see
the weaknesses.
Slide 21 – Recommendations
 Intrinsic value
 Instrumental value
 Community education
 Funding – access not just quantum
Implications for the National Cultural Policy (NCP): obviously artists
want more money in the system, but that’s not all they want.
1. Effective NCP needs to acknowledge value of arts at two levels:
- Intrinsic
- Instrumental, especially health also education and community building
2. Strong commitment is needed to community education, building
understanding and knowledge of the arts. In particular we need to see
much better integration of the arts into education system. We are in danger
of the arts becoming a luxury item that gets cut out of public school
curriculum.
3. In terms of funding, there is an obvious need for more but also for
smarter and more targeted delivery – less red tape, systems that improve
access, systems that acknowledge and support a career structure for
artists.
Slide 22 – The take home message – It’s my job and it matters
Artists are not airhead creatives. The modern Australian artists is very
aware that he or she needs to survive in an industry, to mediate complex
funding and earning opportunities, to be part of a broad social discourse
and to contribute to the community. At artsHub we find many of our most
popular articles are those that concentrate on practical skills from social
media to how to get the most out of a business partnership. Yes, many
artists feel underfunded and underappreciated but they also appreciate
the complexities of the industry and have great ideas on how to integrate
arts better into our society.
The take home message from reading through 2,000 odd responses to this
survey is that artists see their work as a valuable It’s not an extra, they say.
It’s my job and it matters to our society, our economy and our well-being.

44
The Hon. Peter Garrett AM, MP was elected to the House of
Representatives in 2004. He was Minister for Environment Protection,
Heritage and the Arts and is the current Minister for School Education,
Early Childhood and Youth.
He has twice been President of the Australian Conservation Foundation
and a former band member of the Australian band Midnight Oil. He is a
passionate advocate and campaigner on a range of contemporary Australia
and global issues. He has received many awards including the Member of
the Order of Australia in 2003 for his contribution to the environment and
the music industry. In 2009, the French Government appointed Peter an
Officer of the Order of Arts and Letters. In 2010, WWF Australia and
International presented Peter with their Leaders for a Living Planet award.
Keynote address – The Arts and Arts Curriculum
It’s exciting to join you all here in Canberra for this National Arts
Summit and to give the keynote address. I have huge regard for the
arts sector in Australia, all the more so following my time as Minister
for the Arts, and personally as a musician as well.
I also understand the importance of creative industries as part of the
emerging services economy in Australia. They contribute more to the
economy - both in terms of output and employment - than is
commonly recognised. For example, in 2008–09, the creative
industries were valued at more than $31 billion in terms of industry
gross product.
This summit theme of ‘Living and Learning Creatively – Shaping Our
Future Together’ resonates strongly with my own experience and
with what we would like to see as a nation. This summit and its
theme dovetail well with the Government’s plans for the Arts
curriculum and our National Plan for School Improvement.
Importance of arts education
As Minister for School Education I am well aware of the increasing
body of evidence that shows arts education is a strong contributor in
improving school attendance, academic achievement and student
wellbeing. Participating in a high-quality arts program has many
benefits, including improved academic performance, especially for
students from a low socioeconomic background.
45
And, of course, because the arts help define and express who we are,
for young people the arts can be a powerful form of self-expression
that helps share experiences and emotions with others, fleshing out
identity, expressing hopes and aspirations.
Participation in the arts can help young people as they move through
troubled periods in their lives, and explore challenging personal
issues in a non-confronting way. Ultimately, immersion and exposure
to the arts enriches the citizen because, through the arts, we do
understand our own lives better, and the lives of those around us.
The arts reflect the diversity of our community and our world, our
many cultures, our traditions and our belief systems. Arts help us to
share that richness of culture, ideas and emotion with others. The
other dimensions are innovation and creativity in action and, finally,
a driver of new economies and job opportunities.
For all these reasons, it’s vital that we give opportunities to all young
Australians to experience the arts in their life, and at school.
The special importance of music
And while all the dimensions of the arts are important, you know of
the special affection I have for music and how I believe music
education can be taught.
In its most basic form, like regular exercise, music is good for you.
And we do have research from national not-for-profit organisation
The Song Room, which has conducted world leading research which
examines the impact of arts-based intervention programs on
disadvantaged children in Australia.
Participants from schools in disadvantaged areas of NSW showed
increases in self-esteem, student engagement, and classroom
participation, as well as an improvement in their academic subjects
and improved results in reading and literacy.
Students involved in longer term Song Room programs were more
likely to be at the top two levels of what’s described as the “SocialEmotional Wellbeing Index” – the indicators of resilience, positive
social skills, positive work management and engagement skills.
This research and similar evidence provides a compelling reason –
given the education declines we have seen over the past decade – to
maximise creative opportunities for young people.
46
Australian Curriculum
Through the development and implementation of the Australian
Curriculum, I want to ensure all Australian children have access to an
arts-rich education, including visual arts, music, drama, dance, and
media arts.
I advocated for the inclusion of an Arts Curriculum when I was
Minister for the Arts and it’s good to be able to see that through in my
current role. There is no question that the new Arts Curriculum is an
unprecedented opportunity to embed best-practice arts education in
our schools and draw on the rich experience across Australia of arts
educators and, where possible, arts practitioners.
The release of the new Arts curriculum will be an important new
chapter in the unfolding story of arts education in Australia, and in
recognising its importance in the development of individuals and
communities. I am committed to making sure that once we have an
agreed best practice curriculum, that States and Territories take the
necessary steps to provide the resources to their schools to allow the
final curriculum to be fully implemented. I want all students from
Kununurra District High to Melbourne High School and other across
the country, to have access to the educational benefits a quality arts
education can bring.
National Plan for School Improvement
As well as the Curriculum, we’ve been supporting arts education
through a range of initiatives, including: the already mentioned Song
Room’s ‘Bridging Equity in Education through the Arts’ Project;
Music: Count Us In; Musica Viva in Schools; The Australian Children’s
Music Foundation; and The Bell Shakespeare Education Initiative.
And the operation of the National Broadband Network offers
opportunities to bridge the difficulties for education imposed by
distance in this country.
But to really get to the heart of the issue you are considering today –
how to get young Australians participating in the arts who are limited
by where they live or for other reasons – we need a new approach.
The Government’s National Plan for School Improvement is a key
reform to establish fair and sustainable funding arrangements that
support every child in every school to have access to a great
education which is absolutely essential. The report by David Gonski
and his team that we released at the beginning of last year makes it
very clear that some children are missing out, because of issues
including where they live or where they go to school.
47
That’s not fair, but we are also missing out on the untapped potential
of kids who are not getting sufficient opportunities from the current
school system.
Under the National Plan for School Improvement, we want to see
increased funding for schools linked to investments in the things that
lift individual student results. Like teacher quality, effective school
leadership and quality learning, including the implementation of the
National Curriculum with the resources to make sure students gain
the full benefit of its entitlements.
Under our plan, we want to see a benchmark funding amount for
every student based on the costs of schools already getting great
results. There would be extra funding for students who need more
support, such as students with limited English skills, those from
lower income families, and students with disability. There would also
be extra funding for small schools and schools in rural and remote
areas that face higher costs.
We want to see our plan implemented nationally and detailed
discussions are underway with state and territory governments, and
the Catholic and Independent Schools sectors. I believe we have a
once-in-a-generation opportunity to improve our schools and ensure
every student gets the opportunity to reach their full potential.
Conclusion
It is great to be at this summit today, to outline the importance of the
arts for me, the importance of getting a quality curriculum for the
arts in all schools and the next steps in resourcing our schools to be
the best they can be.
My best wishes for the rest of your discussions today and for the
future.

48
Les Murray AO is an Australian poet, anthologist and critic whose work
has been published in ten languages. His career spans over forty years, and
he has published nearly 30 volumes of poetry, as well as two verse novels
and collections of his prose writings. His poetry has won many awards and
he is regarded as the leading Australian poet of his generation, and one of
the greatest poets writing in English.
Alan Gould read three extracts of Les Murray’s poetry:
Rainwater tank
Vindaloo in Merthyr Tydfil
Dog fox field
Alan Gould is a close friend of Les’ since 1975. He is the author of 21 books.
Among his awards are the NBC Banjo Award For Fiction (1992), The Grace
Leven Award for Poetry (2006) and a shortlisting for the Prime Minister’s
Fiction Award (2010). His most recent novel The Seaglass Spiral was
published in 2012. He served on the Literature Board of the Australia
Council for fours years (2002-6).

Jolanta Gallagher (PhD), the Director of the National Arts Summit 2013,
is a music educator, academic, researcher, and the author of “Music and
the Self-Esteem of Young Children”.
She is also the Founder and Director of the Australian Talented Youth
Project – www.atyp.org - the first residential mentoring program in
Australia for emerging young artists from six creative and performing arts:
Music, Dance, Visual Art, Film, Drama, and Creative Writing. Jolanta was
nominated for the Ross Bower Award (Community Arts and Cultural
Development) under the Australia Council in 2012.
Closing Remarks
I grew up in Poland, a country devastated by war, but we had a baby grand
piano in every classroom of our music school, and it was just one of four
music schools in Warsaw. Our parents didn’t have to pay fees. They just
bought us music scores and the uniforms. The rest was paid by the
government.
We could have one pair of shoes, but we could get tickets to the best
theatre plays and concerts at the price of a bus ticket.
Our role models were national heroes: writers, poets and artists.
In Australia, this rich and abundant country, can we create a reality in
which every child and young person can develop their creative potential?
49
In which the arts and artists are respected and honoured, and are our
national pride?
How about taking on a journey where rational meets mysterious,
pragmatic meets inspirational, and artistic excellence embraces
community engagement?
Let us value and cherish our arts and artists. Let the arts live and flourish.
Let them touch our minds, let them touch our hearts, and raise us to daring
heights and hopes.
Jolanta Gallagher also acknowledged the hosts, sponsors, donors, and
supporters of the National Arts Summit. She made a special reference
and called to the stage Wanda Horky, the Deputy Director of the
Summit. She thanked Wanda Horky for her outstanding commitment,
dedication, and perseverance with her work towards the event’s
successful outcome.
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ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
The Australian Talented Youth Project (ATY Project) warmly thanks our
valued hosts, sponsors, donors, supporters, guest speakers, Master of
Ceremonies, artists and patrons of the arts around Australia for making
this significant Summit possible.
Their inspired words and performances aided by the wonders of modern
technology has meant that all Australians will reap the benefits and to
think and act for a vibrant, diverse and sustainable arts in Australia –
partly from the experiences of today’s Summit, the emerging artists of
today will become the cherished established and senior artists of
tomorrow’s Australia.
SUMMIT SPONSORS
Australian National University – Host
ANU School of Music
Professor Peter Tregear, Niven Stines, Craig Greening, Tim Levy &
assistant, Deanna Riddell, Christopher Wind, Kirsty Guster.
ANU Marketing and Communications, CASS, Kathleen Rolfe, Manager.
Photography and Media Arts, School of Art, CASS, Jean-Philippe Demarais.
ANU Volunteers
Magdalena Kucharska (President), Katrina Marson (Founder, ExPresident) with a dedicated group of volunteers.
Australian Dept. of Education, Employment and Workplace Relations
Jose Robertson, Jonathan Dyer, Rosa Dacic.
artsHub Australia - Andrew Murray, Deborah Stone, Lachlan Richardson.
Molonglo Group - Johnathan and Agapy Efkarpidis, Suzie McKinnon.
Coordinate - Jamie Wilson, Logan Knight, Andrew Kominek.
David B. Simmonds, Photographer, Rosanna Horn Design
ATY PROJECT ALUMNI
Following are the alumni who greatly contributed towards the Summit:
Liam Budge, Sarah Campbell, Emily Criticos, Matt Dixon, Aimee Fitzgerald,
Roger Kong, Treya Long (with parents Vicky and Peter Long), Natalie
Price, Kate Rafferty (with father Carl Rafferty), Michael Smith, James
Woodman.
Special thanks to John Mackey for his composition of the Fanfare,
performed with the Contemporary Ensemble.
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SUMMIT SUPPORTERS
Canberra100, ArtSound FM Radio, Belconnen Arts Centre, ACT Dept.
Education and Training, Ausdance, The Canberra College Jazz Band with its
Director Graham Monger, Canberra Dance Theatre, Australian Capital
Tourism, 666 ABC Canberra, Biginelli Café, Monica & John Andrew,
Wojciech E. Horky, Paul Gallagher, Octavia Doerschmann, Anne Murn,
Moya Pacey, Ben James, Emily Criticos, Gail Kingston.
Special thanks to: Canberra Choral Society, The Llewellyn Choir, and
Oriana Chorale
ATY PROJECT SPONSORS
Canberra Grammar School, The Street Theatre, Minter Ellison, Murrays
Coaches, Dr Ann Villiers - Mental Nutritionist, Lake Burley Griffin Cruises,
Elite Taxis.
ATY PROJECT DONORS & SUPPORTERS
Barbara Blackman, Mundango Charitable Trust, National Film and Sound
Archive, artsACT, National Portrait Gallery, Canberra Museum and Gallery,
National Gallery of Australia, National Library of Australia, National
Museum of Australia, Australian War Memorial, ABaF, Canberra
Glassworks, Franz Kornfeld.
ORGANISERS
Australian Talented Youth Project (ATY Project) provides a biennial,
multi-arts mentoring program for talented young Australians especially
those from remote and rural areas not readily able to access high level
tutorship. Please visit http://atyp.org
The main aim of the Project is to develop artistic capacity and community
leadership skills in young artists, and provide them with ongoing support
through continuing guidance and artistic networking in the areas of music,
dance, visual art, creative writing, film production, and drama.
ATY Project Committee
Johnathan Efkarpidis (Chair), Dr. Jolanta Gallagher (Vice-Chair), Wanda
Horky (Secretary), Liam Budge (Treasurer). Members: Gordon Bull,
Caroline Stacey, Leanne Craig, Adrian Keenan, Natalie Price.
National Arts Summit Committee
Dr Jolanta Gallagher (Director), Wanda Horky (Deputy-Director), Liz Lea
(Artistic Adviser), Natalie Price, Sarah Campbell, Liam Budge.
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