Sorry everyone. SAJ lost his mojo there for a while and found himself in a land far, far away. One reader woke me from my slight slumber this afternoon with a message with enough profanities to sink a small ship.
I've started and stopped and started and stopped reviews on The Pig Iron People, A View of Concrete and the Importance of Being Earnest so many times it isn't funny. Is this what they call writers block? That blank look at the screen and nothing remotely passing through the fingers to the keyboard.
Or maybe my brain decided to stay on holiday even after I physically returned two months ago.
Despite the delay, I thought that I would have a quick look around the traps at a few things I missed in recent headlines.
The Sydney Festival launched two weeks ago (on the worst possible day for a publicist - the election of Barack Obama as US President-Elect) but it seems that the programme is resonating with the public quite well.
La Clique, of course, has already sold out and I heard through the grapevine that the Sydney Theatre Company's The War of the Roses was doing much better than anticipated. In fact their publicist was able to confirm that the epic production starring Cate Blanchett and Robert Menzies "broke the one day sales record for Sydney Theatre Company, selling 1814 tickets on Monday 10 November. It even surpassed "the previous record that was set last year by The 25th Annual Puttnam County Spelling Bee when 1285 tickets sold in one day."
There has also been a overwhelming number of launches which I have to look at closely including Company B, Bell Shakespeare and the Seymour Centre. Last week Griffin also launched their '09 season with an interesting twist - the starting time for their shows will all now be 7pm breaking the long-standing convention of an 8pm start.
In other news, I should draw your attention to the fact that our Rudd Labor Government has this nauseating tendency to have a war on everything (fuel, groceries, unemployment, drugs, homelessness, whalers, pokies, doping in sport etc etc etc blah blah blah).
But now his Government has turned its attention to our little world with some type of war on artists through its instruction to the Australia Council of the Arts to create some protocols for artists to work under. It fits in comfortably with their other new policy of censoring the internet.
If you haven't checked out the draft of the artists protocols on the Australia Council website, I advise you to saunter over and check them out. They're a hell of a read. Interestingly, the draft protocols will only apply to "recipients of government funding". So for those outside the funding loop, eat your heart out.
The nine page document has the simple aim helping "artists and arts organisations
understand existing laws that impact on any work they might do with children." It goes through the usual standards/requirements of police checks, parental permission, restrictions on nudity and sexualisation.
At the end of the draft document, there is a 'draft funding agreement clause' which, if you apply for funding you will no doubt have to sign when you submit your application. In its present form it says something along the lines of the following;
You agree that if you will be employing people under the age of 18 in this Project, with or without financial compensation, that you will comply with the Australia Council’s Protocols for working with children in art as well as any relevant laws as they exist in the state or territory in which you will be working. This may include obtaining background checks, permits and parental consents. If you fail to do so, we may immediately terminate our agreement with you and require you to return the funding provided to you under this Agreement.
What is interesting about this paragraph is the term "with or without financial compensation" and it appears that it may have caused a minor headache for the staff at the Australia Council.
In quite an astonishing article, David Marr revealed that the Arts Law Centre of Australia, while doing some research into how artists can legally work with children, came along this fine bit of legislation;
Employment of children when they are naked or when any other person is naked is specifically prohibited.
Bang.
So, as Marr puts it, "Bill Henson has broken the law. So has every artist in Victoria, NSW, Queensland and Western Australia who in the past few years painted or photographed a naked child ... The laws of those states forbid the employment of naked children anywhere and any time. That includes on the stage, in films and in artists' studios. They must not be naked and most of those states do not allow them to work where anyone else is naked either."
You have just two weeks to respond to the Australia Council's draft protocols ... which in light of the Arts Law Centre's revelation would seem a bit of a futile process ... unless of course we start advocating for even more unpaid work in the arts industry.
In other news, Crikey writer Alex Mitchell has revealed today that Edmund Capon will be leaving the Art Gallery of New South Wales after 30 years at the helm. Before this story gets too out of hand, my understanding is that the rumour is absolute rubbish.
The Sydney Morning Herald has already swooped but there is nothing in the article. It's just the same old rumour doing the circuit again.
More later and those reviews a little bit sooner than that.
Or maybe my brain decided to stay on holiday even after I physically returned two months ago.
Despite the delay, I thought that I would have a quick look around the traps at a few things I missed in recent headlines.
The Sydney Festival launched two weeks ago (on the worst possible day for a publicist - the election of Barack Obama as US President-Elect) but it seems that the programme is resonating with the public quite well.
La Clique, of course, has already sold out and I heard through the grapevine that the Sydney Theatre Company's The War of the Roses was doing much better than anticipated. In fact their publicist was able to confirm that the epic production starring Cate Blanchett and Robert Menzies "broke the one day sales record for Sydney Theatre Company, selling 1814 tickets on Monday 10 November. It even surpassed "the previous record that was set last year by The 25th Annual Puttnam County Spelling Bee when 1285 tickets sold in one day."
There has also been a overwhelming number of launches which I have to look at closely including Company B, Bell Shakespeare and the Seymour Centre. Last week Griffin also launched their '09 season with an interesting twist - the starting time for their shows will all now be 7pm breaking the long-standing convention of an 8pm start.
In other news, I should draw your attention to the fact that our Rudd Labor Government has this nauseating tendency to have a war on everything (fuel, groceries, unemployment, drugs, homelessness, whalers, pokies, doping in sport etc etc etc blah blah blah).
But now his Government has turned its attention to our little world with some type of war on artists through its instruction to the Australia Council of the Arts to create some protocols for artists to work under. It fits in comfortably with their other new policy of censoring the internet.
If you haven't checked out the draft of the artists protocols on the Australia Council website, I advise you to saunter over and check them out. They're a hell of a read. Interestingly, the draft protocols will only apply to "recipients of government funding". So for those outside the funding loop, eat your heart out.
The nine page document has the simple aim helping "artists and arts organisations
understand existing laws that impact on any work they might do with children." It goes through the usual standards/requirements of police checks, parental permission, restrictions on nudity and sexualisation.
At the end of the draft document, there is a 'draft funding agreement clause' which, if you apply for funding you will no doubt have to sign when you submit your application. In its present form it says something along the lines of the following;
You agree that if you will be employing people under the age of 18 in this Project, with or without financial compensation, that you will comply with the Australia Council’s Protocols for working with children in art as well as any relevant laws as they exist in the state or territory in which you will be working. This may include obtaining background checks, permits and parental consents. If you fail to do so, we may immediately terminate our agreement with you and require you to return the funding provided to you under this Agreement.
What is interesting about this paragraph is the term "with or without financial compensation" and it appears that it may have caused a minor headache for the staff at the Australia Council.
In quite an astonishing article, David Marr revealed that the Arts Law Centre of Australia, while doing some research into how artists can legally work with children, came along this fine bit of legislation;
Employment of children when they are naked or when any other person is naked is specifically prohibited.
Bang.
So, as Marr puts it, "Bill Henson has broken the law. So has every artist in Victoria, NSW, Queensland and Western Australia who in the past few years painted or photographed a naked child ... The laws of those states forbid the employment of naked children anywhere and any time. That includes on the stage, in films and in artists' studios. They must not be naked and most of those states do not allow them to work where anyone else is naked either."
You have just two weeks to respond to the Australia Council's draft protocols ... which in light of the Arts Law Centre's revelation would seem a bit of a futile process ... unless of course we start advocating for even more unpaid work in the arts industry.
In other news, Crikey writer Alex Mitchell has revealed today that Edmund Capon will be leaving the Art Gallery of New South Wales after 30 years at the helm. Before this story gets too out of hand, my understanding is that the rumour is absolute rubbish.
The Sydney Morning Herald has already swooped but there is nothing in the article. It's just the same old rumour doing the circuit again.
More later and those reviews a little bit sooner than that.
2 comments:
Wow. Missed that one.
I think that this will cause such headaches that artists will stop working with children (nude or not nude), or at least think several times before they do. A major problem is that this reaches into every mode of representation - books, film, digital images, and so on. Children - and especially adolescents - will become a no-go zone. I'm not sure that this is a good thing for children at all.
Ah, SAJ. I hate it when the mojo goes walkabout. In any case, sounds like you're back - bravo!
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