Thoughts on Art in a Pandemic
I have a friend who used to get angry about arts grants. He didn't see why the Government or the general public should have to pay for your shonky mural or bad poetry or experimental novel. This was back when living was cheap and the few arty people I knew were able to live off their part-time work in the inner-city and creating on the side. I mention this, because for a long time I patterned my thinking after it ... back then I didn't think of the arts as an industry - but of course, that is what it is, and if our tax dollars have to go somewhere then I would rather them go to your shonky mural or bad poetry or experimental than the ADF or churches or Transport.
I have been grateful to receive grants in the past. I received my first in 1997 - $5000 from the then-called Arts Victoria - for a novel that was ultimately unpublishable. But on the back of that (and other) failures I wrote a book that did get published, and I have managed to sustain something of a career for over t…
I have been grateful to receive grants in the past. I received my first in 1997 - $5000 from the then-called Arts Victoria - for a novel that was ultimately unpublishable. But on the back of that (and other) failures I wrote a book that did get published, and I have managed to sustain something of a career for over t…
