Ditch the director!

Why do Australian festivals have a mania for moving their Artistic Directors on after only three or four years?
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Company Here and Now will perform Perhaps Hope at the 2017 Castlemaine State Festival. Photo by Karen Lowe.

It’s an accepted wisdom in Australia today that regular injections of fresh blood are beneficial for arts festivals but the insistence on turnover hasn’t always been usual practice.

The late David Blenkinsop was Artistic Director of Perth International Arts Festival for 24 years between 1975 and 1999, while on the east coast, Stephen Hall ran Sydney Festival for 18 years from 1977 to 1994.

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Richard Watts is ArtsHub's National Performing Arts Editor; he also presents the weekly program SmartArts on Three Triple R FM, and serves as the Chair of La Mama Theatre's volunteer Committee of Management. Richard is a life member of the Melbourne Queer Film Festival, and was awarded the status of Melbourne Fringe Living Legend in 2017. In 2020 he was awarded the Sidney Myer Performing Arts Awards' Facilitator's Prize. Most recently, Richard was presented with a Lifetime Achievement Award by the Green Room Awards Association in June 2021. Follow him on Twitter: @richardthewatts