Sedition was the buzzword in the arts sector in the first half of 2006, and political themes kept cropping up across artforms, although as previously noted, they were not always successful.
Something that was a success was the Festival Melbourne 2006, the free arts festival run in conjunction with the Commonweath Games. Expect to see more cash thrown at sporting events in the years to come...
Meanwhile, ‘Queen’ Mary Delahunty retired as Arts Minister, and also as the member for Northcote after seven years in state Parliament, prior to
Delahunty’s replacement, former Education Minister Lynne Kosky, was markedly silent for the couple of weeks it took to appoint her new Media Advisor after the election, but came out with guns blazing as soon as that appointment was finalised.
“Arts push the boundaries,” she told The Age in a recent interview. “It's good to have controversy.”
Kosky’s comments were made during an interview conducted by senior arts journalist at The Age, Robin Usher, and were specifically in reference to a question posed to her regarding the decision by the Board of Directors of the Melbourne International Arts Festival (MIAF) to appoint Kristy Edmunds as the festival’s Artistic Director until 2008.
Given Usher’s self-appointed mandate to belittle Edmunds’ approach to arts programming, apparently (as far as can be judged) on the basis that she has failed to include the sort of archaic, 18th Century artforms that Usher values, i.e. ballet, opera, and classical music, his slant on Kosky’s comments should be taken with a grain of salt.
Nonetheless, I look forward to seeing if Kosky will defend the arts with as much passion in 2007 – especially if the Herald Sun is publicly opposed to certain causes.
Roll on the year of the Pig – also known as the year of the Boar, which I hope will be far from boring!
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