Reports & Research

General Federal and State Reports

CONTEXT: Regardless of the prevailing party or policy, the arts is one of the first areas to lose government funding and public support during periods of economic concern (e.g. 0a), and most artists form a disparate underclass that is underpaid relative to their skills and the value they can provide for their community (e.g. 0b, 0c and 0d).  Few artists can sustain themselves by their craft and are likely to have a separate 'day job' (as is reflected in the reports below). Furthermore, even if one thinks of creatives as a "class", funding opportunities for the arts are never equal, with some arts, media or genres supported over others, and even within each discipline "high art" usually gains priority for funding at the expense of individual artists and community art projects.

Historically, funding and other support for the Arts has been handled by the Department of Communication and the Arts. The Australia Council is the federal body responsible for funding the arts, and the DLGSC's Culture and the Arts subdivision is WA's state body. 

The most dramatic recent change in the arts landscape was the 2019 Morrison Government decision to remove the Department of Communication and Arts, and subsume its role to the Department of Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development and Communications. The decision to abolish the existence of a federal department whose purpose is to name and support the "Arts" has been condemned by Australian artists, who were not consulted in the process, nor had any warning of the change, and was announced just prior to the end of year closure of parliament to minimise opportunities for debate (see 1a, 1b and 1c). 

The previous major change was the 2015 budget, in which George Brandis  took around a third of the Australia Council's funding and redistributed it to a "National Centre for Excellence in the Arts" under his own control without consultation or warning. This shift disadvantaged small to medium-scale art sectors, reduced creative freedom, and was strongly criticised by the arts community as a private "slush fund" that marked a shift from arts funding being at arm's length from government. Some of these funding cuts were restored in a policy reversal, but not enough to satisfy practicing artists (see (see 2a, 2b, 2c, 2e, 2d, 2e).

These trends and recurring cuts to the arts could be seen as resulting from a stereotypical view of the Arts and Humanities as unproductive, compared with the quantifiable products of traditional industries. For example, in 2016, Education Minister Simon Birmingham's stated that much training in the "creative arts" was a "lifestyle choice" when he cut funding to over 60 creative arts courses (see 3a and 3b), implying the issue was one of prioritising commercially viable careers and industries over wasting time and money on naive dreams of an artistic life. However the arts has been quantified in economic terms at $111.7 billion dollars a year by the government's own reports (see 4a ), its intangible benefits, such as mental health and a sense of community, have been quantified by government surveys (4b), and the LNP systematically subsidises industries and projects that are not economically viable (see 5a , 5b, 5c , 5d). 

Morrison's ostensible reason for the removal of the Arts department was to "bust congestion", but as it is self-evident that placing more things in the same space leads to increased congestion it is necessary to view the move in relation to the LNP's broader policies and rhetoric. From this one can identify four general ideological positions that explain the present attitude towards the arts in Australian politics:

• The LNP's fundamentalist/conservative Christian wing supports "traditional values" that are at odds with "modern progressive" values on issues of race, sex, class and religion (see 6a, 6b, 6c and 6d).  This is evident in the LNP funding private schools over public schools, funding chaplains over professional counselors, protecting the Church and individual priests despite evidence of paedophilia, criminalising same sex marriage, forcing a protracted and painful referendum before re-legalising same sex marriage, blocking the Safe School program, and so on.

• The LNP's neoliberal wing espouses a "trickle down" view of the economy, in which unregulated competition and greed is assumed to have a positive effect on society through job creation and price reduction (see 7a, and 7b).  Those who seek to regulate or criticise any aspect of the market and business are dismissed through 20th-century anxieties as communist, socialist or more broadly "leftist" (see 8a, 8b, 8c,  8d , 8e, 8f and 8g). This is evident in the anti-Labor and anti-Green prapaganda of Murdoch newspapers, the watering down of monopoly laws on behalf of media owners like Murdoch, the demonising of the unemployed and welfare, the robodebt scandal, systematic attacks on unions, and most noticeably reducing taxes for the wealthy, such that some of the wealthiest companies pay little to no tax.

• The LNP's nationalist wing views migration and multiculturalism as a threat to Australian culture, economy and borders. This is obviously more explicit in the rhetoric of the Nationals and extremist parties like One Nation, but is mainstream in the policies of both major parties towards migrants, refugees and offshore detention, notably the "stop the boats" rhetoric, claims that refugees are illegal, and notably Morrison's $180+ million photo opportunity opening Christmas island (for a family of four) and "how good is?" platitudes about Australia.

• The above find common ground in an authoritarian view that is threatened by any education or free expression that provides historical perspective and the intellectual tools for criticising the media and structures of power. Authoritarians prefer a quiet, obedient population, as reflected in Morrison's reference to "quiet Australians", but is more substantially evident across the LNP's cuts to  education, consolidation of police powers, hardline views against migrants and asylum seekers, pushes for facial recognition and other mass surveillance, the criminalisation of whistleblowing, refusal to crackdown on corruption, raids on the ABC, call for public shaming and punishment of protesters, Dutton's comments that parliament stands in the way of governance,  and so on (e.g. 9a and 9b). 

The "high arts" are, of course, often stereotyped as traditional or conservative, while "commercial art" tends to be conformist, uncritical and profitable, which makes them palatable to the above positions. However, "contemporary art" is stereotyped as non-traditional, progressive, left-leaning, open to diversity, and anti-authoritarian, and so is a clear ideological threat on all four of the above fronts. 

Needless to say, the role of the arts in playing the role of critic does not endear itself to those in power, and can be confronting to those who have spent their lives in submission to the beliefs that legitimate their everyday lives. To exemplify this, it is worth noting that artists are the sort who are eager to point out contradictions like those below:

• The religious fervour with which neoliberalism is pursued only makes sense because it has no supporting evidence and can only be taken on faith (e.g. 10a, 10b, 10c).

• Conservatives support neoliberalism despite it embodying Christian sins, i.e. reducing the world to monetary terms and promoting greed as good (Mammon), the sloth of landowners who passively earn rental income, disdain of the poor as morally deserving of their poverty ("prosperity Gospel"), the related arrogant notion that the wealthy are morally superior and born to rule ("Social Darwinism"), as well as the dismissal of compassion for the vulnerable ("bleeding hearts") as a weakness (e.g. 10d, 10e, 10f ).

• Although proponents of neoliberalism attack "socialism" as a threat to capitalism, Australia has a long history of government-owned infrastructure (e.g. hospitals and roads), most accept some form of social safety net is necessary (e.g. for the disabled), and neoliberals are "corporate socialists" in that they lobby for, and justify, public subsidies and tax cuts for private companies and the wealthy (e.g. 10g, 10h, 10i).

• Nationalists paradoxically view immigrants as taking jobs while bludging on welfare, as contaminating Australian culture while refusing to integrate,  are opposed to Islamic headgear but cover their faces when protesting to avoid being recognised, and buy into the rhetoric of "stopping the boats" even though the majority of illegal immigrants come by plane (e.g. 10j, 10k, 10l).

• Authoritarians invoke a double standard when they argue that people should not object to their privacy being violated if they have nothing to hide, but resist scrutiny when under criticism, as with the LNP's refusal of freedom of information requests in relation to environmental policy, union-busting and other allegations of misconduct (e.g. 10m, 10n).  

• The LNP appeals to many voters on the basis of classical liberal issues such as individual rights and free speech, but their leadership deploys those rights defensively to protect conservative sexism and racism, not to actively support the rights of those with different opinions, and actively shuts down the free speech of public servants and non-government organisations (and, as noted above, has criminalised whistleblowers) (10o, 10p, 10q, 10r).

However it must be noted that no party is singular, beyond contradiction, or exclusive in their deployment of contradictions. Many individual LNP ministers and supporters genuinely profess 'socially liberal' values that include support for the arts and the right to dissent, and Brandis' comment that people "have the right to be bigots" was technically true (just uncomfortable, and problematic because it de-emphasised the salient point: that people in Australia still have free speech, just not freedom from the consequences of their speech). 

It also is worth emphasising that Labor's working class culture is predisposed to dismiss education and the arts as elitist, which may make LNP attacks on the Arts more palatable. However, owing to the LNP's profound ideological fractures, and despite some internal contradictions, its a simple truism that the policies of Labor policies,the Greens and the old Democrats have better supported individual rights, free expression, and the Arts (see 11a, 11b and 11c). The issue usually is that conservatives feel under-represented when their bigotry is criticised, displacing their offence on "political correctness" as the enemy of free speech, whereas most actual artists revel in impropriety and subversion as a vehicle for speaking out against what is incorrect in politics. 

It is especially sad that many artists who have no particular interest in engaging with politics, and simply wish to pursue their craft, lose funding, opportunities and respect owing to the broader ideological issues around the status and value of 'Art'.

Film Reports & Research

CONTEXT: The Film and Television Institute (FTI) (see here) was the main incubator for emerging WA filmmakers for 47 years, but closed in July 2017. The obvious cause of this is roll on effects from infrastructure issues at FTI's Fremantle headquarters. The building, being heritage listed, required careful repairs which would have cost around $30 million, and while this was underway they moved to the State Library, but suffered from a range of government cuts and other budgetary challenges until they lost staff and collapsed. 

The closure of FTI led it to be be folded into Screenwest (see here), leading to a loss of knowledge, resources and funding, and the WA's film sector took time to adapt to the new framework. The most significant issue is the loss of funding opportunities such as Raw Nerve, Oomph and Link, although grants such as elevate 30 and Elevate 70 have emerged in their place. The WA Screen Awards (WASA) also has ceased to operate, and while some newer events such as Unlocked and the Goonie festival have emerged,  there is still no WA specific award ceremony to fill its place; Cinefest has expressed interest in expanding its role in this area, but lacks funding.

Nonetheless, the film industry in Perth is still thriving. Funding opportunities do persist through Screenwest, including some forms of match funding, and there are opportunities in TV advertising, documentaries, children's television, and sports broadcasting. The relatively cheap costs of recording equipment, combined with the opportunities to network and distribute video through social media, and the ongoing range of screen courses, means that individuals and groups can still find recognition for good work.

• ScreenWest Publications:

  • Annual Report PDF 2017-18

  • ScreenWest Strategic Plan

  • Emerging Screen Sector Review - by Calquhoun Arts Management (CAM)

• Screen Australia Annual Report PDF |  2018 Year in Review Summary