AUSTRALIA COUNCIL APPOINTS EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR OF ARTS INVESTMENT
Alice Nash, currently serving as Back to Back Theatre’s Executive Producer and co-CEO, has been appointed to a new role at the Australia Council for the Arts.
An honoured Nash said: ‘As Executive Producer and co-CEO of Back to Back Theatre for the past 17 years, I have served and sought out investment for an incredible team of artists with and without disabilities whose work has great social and cultural impact locally, nationally and globally. I now very much look forward to contributing to the capacity of the Australia Council to support artists and creative endeavour, for the benefit they provide to all Australians.
‘I believe that great art, made with time, care, attention, empathy, skill, intelligence, warmth, courage and rigour truly matter. I’m also excited to be joining Council's Executive team at this time and look forward to contributing to the next chapter of this important institution and the arts in Australia and across the world,’ she added.
The Australia Council’s CEO Adrian Collette AM said he was thrilled to have Nash joining the Australia Council’s Investment division in April.
‘Alice is a highly respected arts leader and strategic thinker with extraordinary stakeholder management and collaboration experience across government, the corporate community and philanthropic sector. On numerous occasions, Alice has contributed expert advice to the development of cultural policy. Most recently Alice served on the inaugural Creative State Advisory Board in Victoria,’ he said.
‘Alice’s support of exemplary artistic practice created by artists with disabilities in regional Australia has promoted diversity and strength in our sector. Her ability to effect positive change through creative practice is recognised globally. Her commitment to the long-term cultural and economic impact of the arts and creativity for all Australians will serve the Council and its stakeholders very well.
The Back to Back ensemble, staff and board said in a joint statement: ‘Although we will miss her greatly, we could not be more delighted for Alice.
‘Over the last 17 years Alice has been instrumental in the success of Back to Back Theatre. Working alongside the whole team, she has fostered a culture of excellence and unequivocal support of exemplary artistic practice made by artists with intellectual disabilities.’
In addition to her work with Back to Back Theatre, Nash has played an instrumental role in the arts sector including as Co-Founder and Deputy Chair of Theatre Network Australia; serving on various boards including the Victorian government’s inaugural Creative State Advisory Board, the Geelong Arts Centre Trust, and the Committee for Geelong; and providing advice and support to independent artists, families, peer companies and government agencies.
Recruitment of Back to Back’s new Executive Producer and co-CEO is now underway.
DIRECTOR, MULTI-YEAR FUNDING ALSO APPOINTED AT AUSTRALIA COUNCIL
In related news, Andrew Donovan has taken on the newly created role of Director, Multi-Year Funding at the Australia Council.
‘Supporting our new ED Arts Investment, Andrew will be responsible for the management of all multi-year funded organisations, including the National Performing Arts Partnership Framework, Four Year Funded organisations and the Visual Art and Craft Strategy. Many of you will know Andrew from his current work on the implementation of the National Performing Arts Partnership Framework,’ said CEO Adrian Collette.
‘We are fortunate to have someone of Andrew’s knowledge and experience taking responsibility for such an important part of our investment framework. Andrew will commence in the role on 2 March.’
OZASIA’s ARTISTIC DIRECTOR STEPS DOWN
After five successful and critically-acclaimed OzAsia Festivals, Artistic Director Joseph Mitchell is leaving Adelaide Festival Centre to pursue other projects, including directing Summer of the Seventeenth Doll for State Opera SA in November this year.
‘As Artistic Director, Joseph put OzAsia Festival on the map as the nation’s pre-eminent Asian/Australian cultural event. He has successfully showcased the best of contemporary Asian performing and visual arts in a way never before seen in this country,’ said Adelaide Festival Centre CEO & Artistic Director Douglas Gautier AM.
‘He has been a leader in presenting an event that speaks to multi-cultural Australia and the 200,000 attendances for last year’s festival show that his programming approach is very much in tune with modern Australia – now the most multi-cultural country on the planet.
‘Joseph is in my opinion one of the finest directors of festivals in the Asia-Pacific region. We all wish him well with his future career,’ Gautier said.
Under Mitchell’s Artistic Directorship, OzAsia pivoted from focusing on a different nation’s cultural output each year to presenting the best in contemporary art from across the Asian region. His tenure also saw over 100 world and Australian premieres at OzAsia Festival, and the presentation of 25 commissioned works.
In a statement, Mitchell said: ‘It has been an incredible opportunity to helm the past five OzAsia Festivals. During this time we have seen the Australian debut of many world-leading artists alongside our dedicated support for the development and commissioning of new work by Asian-Australian artists and Australian-international arts collaborations.
‘All of this was made possible thanks to a dedicated team of talented staff as well as support from our national and international partners and stakeholders. And finally, thank you to the audiences who have passionately supported the festival as it has grown from strength to strength over the past five years.’
Established in 2007, OzAsia Festival has played a vital role in showcasing Asian arts and culture to audiences in Australia with collaborations between Asian and Australian artists, institutional partnerships, internship programs, large-scale conferences and the popular Moon Lantern Parade event.
The process of appointing a new Artistic Director for OzAsia Festival will commence shortly.
Two new staff join PICA
Perth Institute of Contemporary Arts (PICA) has appointed two new staff. Jeremy Smith joins PICA as the organisation’s new General Manager, marking his return to Perth after four years at the Australia Council for the Arts as Arts Practice Director – Community, Emerging and Experimental Arts.
Smith will commence his role at PICA in mid-April, with Georgia Malone stepping up as Acting General Manager prior to his arrival. Smith has previously held a range of senior positions in the corporate, not for profit and government sectors in WA, including as Manager – Community Investment with Rio Tinto Iron Ore, and Manager – Regional Arts and Strategic Development at DADAA. He brings a wealth of leadership experience as well as strong local, national and international networks amongst artists, arts organisations and arts supporters. As a disabled man, Smith is a fierce advocate of celebrating differences and transforming othering attitudes. He also promotes actions to ensure these values are central to our arts, cultural and creative industries.
In related news, Ashley Yihsin Chang recently joined PICA as Engagement Programs Curator. A Perth based Taiwanese art curator with over 20 years' experience as an art curator, arts manager and coordinator in museums, government and diplomatic institutions, community arts centres and art consultant agencies, her previous roles include Cultural Program Manager at the American Institute (Taiwan), Deputy Director of Taipei Artist Village, Public Art & Arts Festival Coordinator at L’Orangerie International Arts Consultant Company and curator at Taipei Fine Arts Museum.
She has also worked on several cross-cultural projects in Perth including Turner Galleries’ participation in Art Taipei 2016, the Perth-Taipei Curatorial Residency Exchange Program, A Portrait of Taiwan in Perth, and Antipodean Encounters: Western Australian Artists and Taiwanese Culture. She co-curated Unfolding Acts: New Art from Taipei and Perth and facilitated a curatorial partnership with Taipei Fine Arts Museum.
PACT announces five-member Artistic Directorate
Esrkinville-based arts organisation PACT has announced a dramatic re-visioning of its artistic direction, piloting a collaborative leadership model that puts artists at the heart of all decision making.
As part of this process, the five members of PACT’s Artistic Directorate for 2020, comprised of mid-career artists who are leaders in their respective artforms, have been announced.
The 2020 Artistic Directorate members are:
Working across dance, theatre, performance, interdisciplinary work, curating and creative producing, these artists will all bring a unique perspective to artistic decision-making at PACT.
The Directorate will advise on the artistic program and help devise the call-out and assess applications for the 2020 @PACT Residencies alongside PACT’s Executive Producer/ CEO, Nuala Furtado.
The Artistic Directorate will each run a Masterclass in their area of practice, providing our emerging resident artists with a unique opportunity to engage with mid-career practitioners in a rigorous environment.
‘We are thrilled to launch this new artistic collaborative leadership model which creates a new pathway for mid-career artists into creative leadership and increases the advocacy for the incredible development opportunities PACT provides to artists annually,’ Furtado said.
‘This new approach supports the ecology of the sector and the rigorous learning opportunities that are needed to foster contemporary Australian culture.’
NEW DIRECTOR APPOINTED AT Queensland College of Art Griffith University
Queensland College of Art Griffith University has appointed its new director, Professor Elisabeth Findlay – the first time a woman has held the top post since the College was established in 1881.
Queensland College of Art is the longest running art college in Australia, and counts some of the country's best artists among its alumni, from Davida Allen and Tracey Moffatt to Tony Albert, Megan Hess and Michael Zavros.
Findlay is an art historian whose special focus is portraiture, and who was also involved in establishing last year's inaugural Brisbane Portrait Prize. She was raised in Papua New Guinea and first became interested in art as a teenager while living in London.
MEMBERSHIP AND ADMINISTRATION COORDINATOR JOINS WRITERS SA
Melanie Pryor has joined the team at Writers SA as the organisation’s new Membership and Administration Coordinator.
Pryor is a literary nonfiction writer with a background in administration and media. Her work has been published in Meanjin, Overland, Southerly, and Lip, and on wine bottles as part of the Overland Story Wine Prize. She holds a PhD in creative writing from Flinders University and writes about the relationship between place and the body, wild landscapes, and women’s stories of being in them. Throughout 2018-2019, Pryor spent time in the US as a writer-in-residence at the Wellstone Center in the Redwoods in California and at the Vermont Studio Center, and was a Visiting Scholar at the Center for Women’s Health and Human Rights in Boston, Massachusetts, before joining Writers SA.
Pryor co-founded The Hearth: A Night of Readings in Adelaide, and has volunteered for community arts programs and international women’s rights organisations. She is deeply committed to the writing communities in South Australia and to Writers SA as an organisation that nurtures, connects, and promotes them.
More recent appointments