A brief guide to Melbourne's artist run galleries: Ether Ohnetitel, The Women's Gallery, Gallery Gecko, The COOP, A For Art Space, Making Sense Contemporary Art Space, The Basement Project, Argyle Street Studios, West Space, Arts Post, RedPlanet, Another Planet Posters, Red Letter Community Workshop, A.R.T. (artaroundtown), First Floor, Store 5, Room 4, ROAR Studio, Temple 29 and 41 Gold Street.
The Cultural Services Unit of the Liverpool City Council has increased substantially over the last 2 years as has the number of artists employed by them.
During the 1990s a number of initiatives have been undertaken in Western Australia which aim to improve the lot of the State's artists. The article examines three particular initiatives.
Written with Lee Salomone exploring the utilisation of prominent billboards on the tram track in Adelaide for the term of one year at no cost for them to be used as public art spaces.
Bark painters of Arnhem Land are experimenting with a new medium - canvas- and in so doing both increasing their output and responding to market forces.
The time is post-recession, the economic climate is uncertain, Australian designers and consumers inhabit the suburbs but are cut off from each other, and someone decided to do something about it in the City of Caulfield, Victoria.
The Thousand Handed Hydra has been an experiment of difference and opposition in practice. Hydra began in May 1993 as a one year pilot program of education, transition and introductin for migrant artists to the professional networks of Australian (Melbourne) art, culture and practice. Includes the work of artists Fernando Ronquillo, Anita Lorina and Rafael Rojas.
Artists were left out in the cold at the 1994 Festival of Arts. Examines issues facing organisers of events such as Artist's week in the context of the Adelaide Festival of Arts.
A recurring feature of recent initiatives is to be self-funded or to operate with a minimum level of government funding and frequently to begin with a limited time frame in mind. The social side of such organisations cannot be underestimated and is probably as important as any art that eventuates.
How do artists survive when they are not able to sell work in galleries -- sales are at a record low and many galleries have folded-- or get commissions through State agencies -- because these are few and far between?