A review of the Major Performing Arts (MPA) companies (Australia Council 2003) purportedly showed that the companies had improved their performance in terms of artistic vibrancy, access and financial viability. In fact, a detailed examination of the data suggests a mixed outcome with annual fluctuations in the number of new works, the proportion of Australian works, participation and measures of effective ‘outreach’. Most worrying are the financial results, which show that there are fluctuations in box office income, private sector income and assets while ‘aggregate negative net assets have increased by 74%’ meaning increasing deficits across the companies in just four years (Major Performing Arts Board 2004: 17). The cost of companies ‘doing more’ – as required by the ‘tied’ nature of funding (e.g. touring, commercialising, exporting, etc.) on top of escalating overheads (salaries, training, administration, infrastructural maintenance, etc.) has aggravated financial viability.
Thus, irrespective of performance and auditing requirements, the performance of these companies is continuing to falter at an alarming rate. Costs are outstripping income, repertoire is becoming more conservative and less Australian, and free tickets still artificially bolster attendance figures. Moreover, the reliance on subsidised seats noted in the Nugent Report — from $25 per seat in Sydney and Melbourne to $282 per seat in Hobart across all the performing arts (dance, music, opera and theatre) — remains essential to inflate the audience aggregate.
The most parlous situation is in the area of symphony orchestras, which were conveniently omitted in the MPA review but have been analysed elsewhere (Boyle 2006). Boyle concluded that productivity has barely increased, while audiences are continuing to decline (as well as aging and not being replaced by a younger cohort). Indeed, he concluded that ‘the classical music attender has become increasingly marginalised’ (Boyle 2006: 16). More worryingly, his analysis shows that organisational costs have doubled and, although revenue has tripled, organisations have only been kept afloat because of increasing (compensatory) government subsidy. In short:
… the various changes in organisational structure have not been effective in addressing the cultural objectives of increasing audience attendance or performance levels. However, they have been more effective in attaining economic objectives of diversifying the funding base and increasing earned revenue opportunities, but not in creating cost efficiencies. (Boyle 2006: 17)
We are, thus, left with a conflicted situation in which major performing arts companies are beneficiaries of a special arrangement for funding and support that is both ineffective and monopolises the limited resources of key cultural administrative organisations such as the Australia Council and DCITA. Meanwhile, instrumentalist policy attachment strategies sit uneasily alongside elite nurturing approaches, such as that embodied in the MPA funding strategy. Furthermore, cultural statistics provide evidence of the organic and dynamic nature of cultural participation, consumption and production that challenges the underlying philosophy of much arts and cultural policy.
A consequence of these developments is that management of the MPA funding protocols now forms an increased proportion of the activities of the Australia Council to the ultimate cost of other artforms and support functions. It has, as a result, become a more insular organisation: inward looking and resistant to external scrutiny or engagement. Moreover, the Australia Council resists innovation and is perceived to be out of touch with developments in newer and competing artforms (Gallasch 2005; Glow and Johanson 2006; Marr 2005). Perhaps the siege mentality exhibited by the Australia Council arises from it arm’s length approach. More likely, it arises from the fact that the Council is in direct competition with DCITA for the role of leading cultural agency for, indeed, many of its roles and functions could easily be absorbed by the department. In short, the Australia Council may be — as an agency structure — out of synch with arts and cultural policy today and the needs of cultural development in the future (cf. Craik 2006).
A major restructure of the Australia Council in 2005 was designed to address some of its perceived failings (Australia Council 2005a, b). At the heart of the restructure was the decision to abolish two of its artform boards: Community Cultural Development and New Media Arts. Yet, this was an odd decision given that these two boards were:
The newest and least conservative. Both these boards evolved to get around the failures of the old structure, which had become too anachronistic. (Marcus Westbury, artistic director of Melbourne’s Next Wave Festival, quoted by Dimasi and Paech 2004)
Former Deputy Chair of the Australia Council, Lex Marinos, observed: ‘They are effectively taking away the opportunity for local communities to partake in their cultural expression.’ He also called the move ‘retrogressive’, and added, ‘I’d like to think if a sensible debate can be had, there is a possibility to reverse the decision that is disadvantaging a lot of Australia’ (Dimasi & Paech 2004).
The abolition of two innovative artform boards certainly seemed to contradict the stated intention of the restructure, namely to position:
… the Council as an ‘arts catalyst’, an agent of support and change for the arts in Australia, and a more flexible, well-informed and responsive organisation … designed to engage more Australians in the arts, deliver the arts to more Australians, and help shape a more vital and sustainable arts sector. (Australia Council 2005b)
Despite the optimism of then CEO, Jennifer Bott, and then Chairman, David Gonski, there is little evidence that the restructure has achieved its aim of:
Moving away from a rigid model of grants and services towards one with far greater flexibility and more about innovative ideas and partnerships. (Gonski quoted in Australia Council 2005a)
Rather, it might be argued that the ‘new look’ Australia Council is further alienated from its clients and the broader arts and cultural community of interest — not to mention from public opinion and media analysts. The restructure was more about bureau politics than policy reform. In short, the Australia Council’s fortress mentality and isolation within the cultural sector suggest that it is a victim of the lack of direction in the policy arena. The appointment of Kathy Keele, former CEO of AbaF, as the CEO of the Australia Council, reflected a desire of the government to consolidate the ‘neo-patronage’ model and ‘forge closer ties with the business community as a way of generating cash support for the low-income sector’ (Perkin 2007b: 44. See also Keele, 2005).
Perhaps there is a need to create competition among cultural agencies to offer a range of support strategies for which cultural practitioners and organisations compete. This has occurred with the decision to fund a new building for the National Portrait Gallery in the parliamentary triangle of Canberra. This Gallery now challenges the pre-eminence of the National Gallery of Australia, the National Library of Australia and the National Museum of Australia as having the ‘right’ to stage definitive exhibitions of visual art that reflects national culture.[3]