You Slacker!

To answer Jana, Alison and Geoffrey - it is true - I have been extremely slack with my 'unnannounced hiatus' and left my poor blog to squalor in the virtual basement of the world wide web.

I can put it down to teething problems after I took on the role of reviewer at The Sun Herald. I can put it down to my full-time day job as a political media advisor (yes, I am still doing that). Or I can put it down to the fact I have had a horrendous flu twice this winter. Or that the Tour is on. Or how about the Ashes...

Regardless, they're all just useless excuses and my July resolution is to update SAJ far more regularly. I also need to go back and upload the last two months of published reviews, which I can hopefully finish by the start of next week.

In the meantime, the biggest arts news today is the decision by the Productivity Commission on the future of literature industry. I am still not quite sure why this Howard-era bastion of conservative gnawers had the right to make this call, but either way I'm still very much in two minds about the affair.

You have Bob Carr on one hand saying the decision is "a win for Australian literacy, as downward pressure on book prices brings more books into homes and puts them within reach of youngsters."

And then you have David Marr stating that the Commission's "enthusiasm to get rid of the old isn't matched by any great clarity about the future".

Indeed - what is the future?

The Commission talks of a need to "directly subsidise any deserving writers".

What will that subsidy look like and who or what is deserving?

Hopefully it won't look anything like the gradually diminishing local television content rules which networks flagrantly ignore... which brings me to the other great news item of today - "The Nine Network has axed its news and current affairs program This Afternoon after just three weeks on air."

Thank god their determination to create some type of 24 hour news channel just got a spoke in its wheel. Maybe you people could try to make a locally made program that isn't reality TV or about cops and robbers or doesn't have Eddie Maguire in it? Just a suggestion.

I wonder what Kevin Rudd has to say about the cancellation of This Afternoon? Surely he'd be sad to see another Daddo job disappear.

If he doesn't say anything about the Nine Network, then at least he may say something about the Melbourne International Film Festival after his mates in the Chinese Government demanded the festival 'dump a documentary about an exiled minority leader whom it labels a terrorist'.

I think we can all just be thankful that our illustrious Arts Minister has given the nod to another uranium mine. That might shut the Chinese up about the festival and even get Stern Hu out of gaol as well.

Between the Lines tomorrow

As Geoffrey mentioned yesterday in my previous post, there's an interesting doco being screened on ABC-TV 1 tomorrow afternoon about Adam Hill an indigenous artist based in Sydney.

After two years following him, friends of mine Monica Garriga and Esther Lozano will finally see the 25-minute version aired at 1.30pm on Messagesticks, which is then repeated on Monday at 4.30pm on ABC-TV 2 and again on Friday at 6.00pm ABC-TV 1.

I first saw the 55-minute version last year when it was presented by Performance Space at Carriageworks and it is really interesting to see the way these two Spanish film-makers give perspective to not only Hill's work but to his relationship with his father.

It follows Hill as he goes on an artistic and personal journey of identity through his music, paintings and political activism.

It is quite a unique and intimate glimpse into Australia’s identity through the critical eyes of the art activist and it shows Hill confronting his frustrations and his commitment towards his own aboriginality while struggling with the views held by the society around him and the people closest to him.

Bob his father, was brought up with his white cousins after his mother died, never having any contact with his aboriginal family. He then married a 'beautiful girl' of European origin and led a typically suburban Australian life with her until she recently passed away.

The documentary highlights the stark contrast between Adam and his father’s social identity and I think it is a moving insight into the individual’s search for meaning in a world dictated by imagery and stereotypes.

Adam and his father have taken very separate paths in defining their aboriginality and the intergenerational disparity between them hits a raw nerve as they head in opposite directions. Bob has never been exposed to aboriginal culture and in no way does he share the strong opinions his son portrays through his exhibitions or his canvasses.

It's a touching story and I highly recommend it. So if you are around tomorrow afternoon, check it out.

No wonder they're crawling all over...

Just in case you missed the Sydney Theatre Company "documentary", In the Company of Actors, you will be delighted to know that the ABC are airing it tonight at 8.30pm.

The blurb on the website explains;

In raw and intimate detail the documentary takes the audience behind the curtains to observe the actors immersed in the creative process. We discover that presenting a seemingly effortless performance is a complex, detailed, technical and exhaustive process, with the director Robyn Nevin, writer Andrew Upton, and their teams of artists and technicians working 18-hour days. As we enter their world, we feel and understand their deeply ingrained love of theatre and their passion for telling stories.

Oh, I nearly forgot... there is also the review I wrote when I first saw it at the premiere last year HERE.

So get your mates together, get comfortable on the couch with your red wine and popcorn and sit down for the big event. You could even do a Eurovision type thing and even dress up. The possibilities are endless!

How embarrassing

Did not qualify. Last. Sixth. Did not qualify. Did not qualify. Last. Fifteenth. If you saw the look on the faces of the SBS presenters including Jane Flemming and Les Murray during the closing ceremony of the Athletics Championships in Osaka you would know what I was talking about. It looked like something had dropped on them from a great height and it wasn’t gold.

The Australian athletics team delivered what is probably one of the worst performances at an international meet in recent memory and we are now only eight months out from the Beijing Olympics.

The Australian Sports Commission, the Federal Government’s agency responsible for implementing the national sports policy released figures that showed that the Australian taxpayer spent $6.3 million on athletics in the last financial year.

More than $580,000 was spent specifically for the lead up to the Osaka meet which was to allow “medal potential athletes and their coaches to spend more time in Europe for valuable training and competition in the all-important European Grand Prix circuit events”.

It’s no wonder that the SBS Commentary team was totally lost for words.

It appears that many other commentators are also lost for words. Andrew Bolt, Tim Blair and Piers Akerman who are always quick to condemn failures in the arts sector have been deathly silent about the abysmal failure of the athletics squad.

As recently as June, Tim Blair led a scathing attack on arts funding in NSW by suggesting that if the health sector is in such a bad shape, maybe they should apply for arts funding grants. “Health department needs a big slice of this action. It should be easy enough; application forms are available online and Arts NSW has lots of cash to throw around,” he said in The Daily Telegraph.

Blair has also made consistent attacks on performing arts groups, such as Circus Monoxide, a troupe that travels around regional NSW entertaining kids and families referring to the performers as ‘creatively unemployable’.

Bolt has similarly condemned publicly funded arts programs, most notably the Melbourne International Arts Festival and Piers Akerman consistently takes aim at the ABC.

Central to all of their arguments is that ‘your’ dollar is being wasted and that any failure by artists or arts organizations is wasteful. This is surely remarkable double standards by commentators such as Blair, Bolt and Akerman.

Imagine the contempt they would have for Opera Australia, the Sydney Theatre Company or any other arts organization if performers gave the same excuses as the athletes did in Osaka

Australia’s best sprinter, Josh Ross was reported to have been afflicted by homesickness, depression and was too fragile to compete at his best and ended up coming home early without any success.

Other athletes used similar excuses of not having done enough preparation or hadn’t done the right preparation. If an opera singer in any major Opera Australia production had been in a similar predicament and suddenly sung off key due to a ‘lack of preparation’ abuse would be hurled at them from audiences, it would be critically slammed by the mainstream media and commentators would be quick to draw blood.

The Australian public expects a lot of our professional sports men and women and many of us share the highs and lows without a hint of antagonism towards the public sponsorship which aims for excellence on the world stage.

Attacks by commentators on artists or arts organizations if placed on agencies such as the Australian Institute of Sport would see them quickly face the wrath of the Australian public. Somehow, abusing artists is an easier point scoring tactic but is just as less justified.


Image credit: Jupiter images

Agent disappears with actors money

The hard earned dollars of potentially hundreds of film and television actors has gone missing after a Queensland based talent agent appointed a liquidator last week.

Pacific Artists Management (PAM), run by Jillian Rollo with assistant Stefanie Parry, was representing actors in NSW for several years illegally and without a license.

"The problem is a regulatory one," said Simon Whipp of the Media Entertainment and Arts Alliance, the union which has been investigating Rollo and Parry for over four years.

"You don’t need a license to run an actors agency in Queensland, but in NSW you need to register with the Office of Industrial Relations before you start trading," he said.

One actor who has been affected by the dealings of Rollo and Parry is Charlotte Gregg, an up and coming actor who recently starred in a feature film that premiered at the Brisbane International Film Festival.

"I was with her for several years as she represented me while I was in Queensland and then when I moved to Sydney," she said.

"There were always inconsistencies with what I was earning and what I was actually being paid. I would chase up money months later only to be told by Jillian that ‘the production company has gone bust and we can’t pay you’."

"She was also charging me 'administration fees' which she wasn’t supposed to be doing. Thankfully the union got some money back for me earlier this year but there are other amounts of money that I don’t think that I will ever receive."

Others are less likely to recoup any of the losses estimated to be in the hundreds of thousands with a further twenty actors filing as creditors in the last week and with one individual actress owed nearly $30,000.

It seems, however, that the forced closure of the agency hasn't stopped the pair to continue representing actors. A union representative informed Arts Hub that as recently as July, Rollo's assistant Stefanie Parry registered two more companies through ASIC, Performing Artists Management (PAM) and Entertainment Playhouse at exactly the same address as the now liquidated company.

An article from last month in their local newspaper said that Parry was now looking for "Vietnamese, Malaysian, Indonesian and Islander extras for the film Nim's Island, which is to star Jodie Foster and Abigail Breslin". According to corporations law it is perfectly legal for Rollo to now work under the umbrella of her junior assistant’s company.

Another actor, Barton Ware, who stars in the Government’s Ice drug campaign advertisement, is owed over $5,000 by PAM.

"We filmed the advertisement in mid-May and I started calling Jillian towards the end of June only to have none of my calls returned or emails answered. After a while I did some research only to find out other actors in other agency’s had been paid," he said.

It's a familiar story for many Sydney and Brisbane based actors and the union deems that actors should be paid within six to eight weeks of doing a job and that agents must pay their actors within ten working days of receiving payment.

One source said that it was a disgrace that Rollo and Parry should get away without paying money to struggling actors, especially when "Jillian [Rollo] is currently putting in a pool".

Neither Rollo nor Parry returned any phone calls.

As published in Arts Hub


Image Credit: descramble/flickr

The Art Life

For anyone that missed last Tuesday night's inaugural episode of The Art Life (ABC TV 10pm), make sure you catch it when the second episode comes around tomorrow evening.

It's a beautiful breath of fresh air. Here you have Mr Andrew Frost, blogger extraordinaire, who has for the last three or four years thrown down the gauntlet to poncey mainstream arts critics by hammering away at a site that is breaking down big barriers between audiences and artists.

Frost disarmingly looks like a rugby player. In fact, if you put a backdrop of green grass, some cheerleaders and a cheering crowd you would be convinced that this man is a footy commentator.

But it's all part of the method. It's bringing art to the people in a clear and accessible way that doesn't dumb down and is dripping in a Clive James-esque dry humour. Central to his method, however, is how he uses social relevance to explain complicated modes and expressions of contemporary art.

If you want a taste of how he presents his show, check out The Art Life Blog (if you haven't already). It gives you a good idea of where he comes from and if you dig around just a little, you will find some beautiful commentary on his argy bargy with the mainstream critics.

Here's hoping that the ABC take the series from a measly three episodes to a year long series and beyond.

Image: aerialphotgraphy.ca