A view from the top

As published by Arts Hub Australia here.



I only live up the hill from the Australia Council offices in Surry Hills. They sit on the busy Elizabeth Street just a stones throw away from Central Station.

It's an area dominated by Korean Restaurants, 24 hour convenience stores and late night hotels. I suspect that the infrastructure is there to support News Limited staff situated in a building just behind rather than Council staff.

Then again I could be wrong.

I have a midday meeting with Kathy Keele, the newly appointed Chief Executive Officer of the Australian Government's principal arts funding and advisory body. The only time I have ever been to these offices was to seek advice about an application I was doing for a New Work proposal a few years ago. An innocent and naive young theatre director hoping for a few grand to help put on some strange Serbian play about war. Needless to say, they didn't fund it.

The OzCo foyer is filled with flyers, booklets and programmes advertising every possible artistic event, pretty much all occurring in Sydney. Whack a coffee shop in there and artists might feel more at home. But it's got that corporate feel - complete with secretary, the desk, security detail and forms to check in.



Ms Keele's personal assistant comes down to meet me and escorts me to the fifth floor of the Council's Home Office, a pleasant waiting area of leather lounges with quite a nice painting of Sophie Lee.



I am starting to feel uneasy. I check my recorder one more time. A complicated contraption with one cord for microphone, one cord for earphones and enough buttons to stock Lincraft for a year.


I check I have my notes - again, pen - again, pad - again, and before I know it, my lap looks like my desk at home. With immaculate timing the CEO walks in to greet me. I put one hand on my lap to try and keep the clutter from falling to the floor as I stand to shake her hand. Good start.


We head into a beautiful room with soft furnishings, balcony and a view out to the spires of Sydney University.


Kathy Keele is a tall and gracious woman. She has a soft north western American accent, easy on the ears.


Originally from Oregon, Ms Keele's career is solidly entrenched in corporate sponsorship and marketing with tenure's at Siemens, Telstra and BHP. It's obvious from the outset that we both come from very different quarters of the arts.


She has only been in the role as head of the Australia Council for a few months, after making the leap from the Australian Business Arts Foundation. Indeed, Chair James Strong and George Brandis, our new Federal Arts Minister, are all relatively new to the organisation which she says "presents us with an opportunity to go through our strategic planning process in a fresh way".


Traditionally, artists are wary of conservative governments and their arts policies. The Australia Council is often at the centre of these disquieted attacks as organisations call for more funding, more assistance and less bureaucracy.


The height of criticism occurred two years ago when the council decided to dissolve the CCD and New Media Boards and merge them into the other existing boards. Since then, it's been relatively plain sailing for the council as arts organisations and artists waited to see what this new CEO will do.


Ms Keele's appointment sits very comfortably with the Federal Government's arts policy of leveraged public funding through corporate partnerships. Her experience and insight are ideal as a champion for growing better and more comprehensive relationships between the arts and business.


Ms Keele explains that "James [Strong] and I knew how many missed opportunities there were just by the fact that there were two different ways of talking about the same thing. A lot of the art organisations will talk about how 'wouldn't it be great to produce this art', so its primarily about them and producing the art. But for the business, if the arts organisation is approaching the business through the marketing area of the business it has to remember that the business is required to have a return on the investment.


"But if they are just talking about producing the art they need to go through the door of the foundation or get a donation, which is fine because a lot businesses accommodate that.


"But because of that lack of understanding, it becomes more of an exercise in saying 'no' than rather in how to get to 'yes'. James and I are adamant that there a lot more opportunities with arts and cultural organisations than business realise. But they are so primed to say 'no'. If both sides are more geared to getting to yes then they will a lot better off.


It is clear that her perspective of the arts is clearly defined by her years of work in sponsorship. For the Australia Council, it might be a blessing to have such a strong advocate of the arts to attract even greater investment at a time when the Federal Government has very little intention of altering the funding scale of the arts at present.


She is, however, unafraid to throw the gauntlet down to the Federal Government and seek more funding. Keele even raised the ire of the Herald Sun's Andrew Bolt, after she and Strong asked for an additional $19 million for second tier arts organisations in December last year.


But it's her work at ABAF that will influence the organisation more than anything. There, she implemented comprehensive systems and networks that were the envy of every arts organisation in the country. They established an advice bank to tap into the infrastructure of businesses, a board bank to get the best board members for arts companies and promoted shared learning in skills development. The annual awards night is, according to the Sydney Morning Herald, the one arts event that Prime Minister John Howard makes a point of attending. This is along with the 900 or so arts organisations that want to rub shoulders with potential corporate investors.


"At ABAF we spent time helping arts and business in developing their own business cases in how they might use each other. They start using the same language and they think in terms of the challenges that they each have to measure," Keele says.


The way she talks about the potential of corporate relationships is exciting, even for a small time theatre director like myself. But I wonder where the small to medium sector fits into this.


She believes that "more and more small to medium arts organisations are becoming skilled at being able to attract that type of funding.


"I think what we are going to find is that a lot of businesses are investing in the small to medium organisations - not enough, never enough - but these organisations are good value for them and they are getting more and more skilled in developing the business case to attract those guys.


She admits that "it is a tough call for small to medium organisations because they are resource short and they almost have to come to a decision to either raise funds or service partnerships. And they have a tough call in working out which is going to give them a long term sustainable piece of investment for them."


Many are wondering whether there will be a merger between ABAF and the Australia Council. In one sense, it seems that has already occurred. If Ms Keele's pledges manifest, the national arts community can look forward to a diversified and more streamlined peak body that will advocate for culture to not only to government, but to the community and especially, to business.


She believes that "we really do have to understand what it is that makes the Australia Council perceived as cumbersome and hard to deal with." Business case, investment, partnership and skills are words we are going to hear a lot more of from the Australia Council. It will alter the way it is viewed to the business community, to society as a whole and to arts organisations.


It is going to be an interesting experiment to see how far the business artists relationship will go. But if major arts organisations can become more reliant on partnerships, it may free up extra opportunities for the individual artist or small theatre company. We may even find arts advocacy being shared around for the common good of the industry. Keele's tenure will see a change of philosophy and that may not be such a bad thing when we consider the alternative.