Note: I have a self-imposed embargo on writing about Australian arts when not in the country, which I am (again) breaking to write this due to the extreme nature of the government cuts and their wider implications. I am conscious that taking pot-shots from afar is not ideal, and no attempt is being made to capitalise on this position.
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Reading Alison Croggon’s self-published submission to the Senate
Inquiry into the Arts Budgets of 2014-15, which is reviewing a reallocation under direct government control of almost 50% of Australia's major arts funding body's budget allocates to artists, one can make some casual notes which result in
an alarming whole. Putting aside Alison’s undeniable authority on the issue
established in an intimidating autobiographical introduction, the irrefutable nature of the argument is its most shocking component. Some statistics presented are alarming to those new to
them: that the Arts sector is nearly as big as Mining, that it is a far greater
employer, that it receives substantially less government subsidy than mining, not to mention benefiting
to Australian life in terms of education, togetherness, and identity. These
arguments are not new to Croggon, who has been championing these statistics for
some time to anyone who will listen.
Nor, unfortunately, is it news to the Australian government,
which has full access to this data. They know how big the arts sector is, they
know how big an employer it is. They have mapped out precisely how the cuts will
affect everyone – as Alison puts it, "individual artists, who already substantially fund the arts through their unpaid work, will be forced to compete in a diminishing pool", moving overseas or opting for different
careers to keep off the dole queue. This is not an accident, it is precisely
the point. As ad hoc and reckless as the Abbott government’s strategy may
sometimes seem, the cause and effect has been fully mapped, and it is certainly
not something drawn up on the back of a napkin at Rockpool Seafood Restaurant
over a few glasses prior to a helicopter ride home to Double Bay. The reality is not casual - it is much worse.
The question that naturally arises from Alison’s argument is as follows:
why would any government, especially one from a party nominally interested in
economic prosperity (at least historically), want to smother a sector
that is seemingly performing so efficiently and productively – employing so
many people with so little government expenditure? The answer to this question
lies in their overall electoral strategy, which involves marginalising target
groups and decimating their influence on the political narrative.
Removing the real
opposition
Among the greatest threats to the Australian government at the next
election is the potential for communities and collectives of critical thinkers
to collectively emerge in opposition to it and form coherent counter-narratives.
The money from Arts Council Grants is one of many methods of support and growth
for these communities and can indirectly feed critical public dialogue. The free time that
people from these communities have to be active – many of which, it should be
noted, are still in fledgling stages and are still defined by individualism, career-driven and institutional objectives –
is removed when you starve them of money. Furthermore, cherry-picking certain
artists to receive funding allows the government to distribute the flow of
finance only towards those artists which are not likely to even inadvertently feed
this community. The comments from the CEO of Opera Australia, Craig Hassall,
that he was “delighted” and that “my first thought is that I am relieved and
delighted that major performing arts companies' funding hasn’t been cut […] I
don’t really have a view on where the money comes from, as long as the
government is spending money on the arts” should be read in this light – further,
not only will Opera Australia benefit
from the changes through its funding being maintained, it will directly benefit
from the removal of its primary competitors in the marketplace, which includes
small and independent organisations thriving on some sense of collectivity,
community and solidarity. Furthermore, the beneficiaries of the cherry-picked
funding – Brandis’ own Artists Army if you like - are likely to be
classically-trained artists from wealthy backgrounds, who include most of
Australia’s opera singers, it being an expensive activity, further benefiting
from another individual source of funding.
