I got distracted yesterday doing some blog admin work (not just the Share This button), by moving as much of my pictures off my web host and onto Flickr. Luckily for me, it’s only really old posts that have pics to be moved; unluckily, there’s a lot of pics. I took a look at my disk space used on my hosting, and my image files are taking up a lot of space (first in line for that is my email account, which it seems is ridiculously high), so I’m clearing out. Actually I’ve been meaning to do this for a while but never really bothered or had the time. But it seems as though I might need to resell some more hosting space, which means I have to make some room.

Unfortunately, I didn’t get around to the video, but will spend the weekend working on it.

While I’m here: Wed night I met up with good friends Jeany and Susan… it was the first time I’d seen Susan in a year, which is sad. The good news is that we’re all busy and have work (well, them more than me), and relatively happy. Several things arose during dinner: Jeany is now teaching sound classes at Swinburne (yay for her!), and she is somewhat enjoying it. She tends to get tired of students, which is true of any teacher, especially if they are drama students who are mostly 18 or 19. She’s also keen on getting into festivals, and wants to set up a puppetry festival? I’m definitely holding her to that! I’d love to do something like a festival!

Susan, who is actually doing a double Honours in theatre and history, has been doing something in theatre lately, but I forget what. The bigger news is though… she’s handing me full responsibility of our puppetry company, Sticky Apple Legs. Apparently our screwy tax people don’t think she is qualified for a student loan because she is owner of a company. When she explained that it’s a puppetry company, that it’s art related, that we haven’t done a show in several years, and that we lost money every time we did a show, they still told her that if she works part time, studies and has a company, she shouldn’t need financial assistance.?:crazy:

So yeah, I’m now going to be sole owner… technically, Jeany can now be an owner too - when we set up the company we were waiting for her to get permanent residency, so she couldn’t be a legal partner, but a year or so ago, she became an Australian citizen. All of this begs one question though: if I’m unemployed, am a sole owner of Puppets in Melbourne and Sticky Apple Legs, get occasional income from selling puppets/running classes and freelance writing, would the government turn me down for things??

One often wonders if our government even knows that arts exists sometimes. For the first time in… well, probably ever… we have a federal arts minister who is actually an artist (Peter Garrett from band Midnight Oil). He also doubles as the environment minister, and understandably, there’s more concern over the issue of environment than the arts. Still, when the other party was installed up until last year, there was no federal arts minister. You read that right. For some reason our right-wing party decided to, well, never decide because it got moved around a lot, who was actually in charge of the arts. So for a long time Peter Garrett was the ‘arts secretary’, a shadow minister shadowing a non-existent portfolio. He campaigned quite a lot for the arts, and it’s a surprise when he didn’t say anything regarding many recent controversial arts issues (a nude photo of an underage girl - uncoerced and with parental permission - by a well-known artist, at which point our Prime Minister decided to have a moral conniption about, instead of saying "it was done legally, and it’s art"… or at the very least, allowing the arts minister to speak on the subject, or actually, scratch that, at the very least keeping his own personal opinion to himself and speaking as a representative of the government instead)… Anyway, I really don’t feel like the guy is doing much for us as artists. I’m entirely disappointed, because I like the guy, and have even interviewed him. He’s not a regular politician and he got into politics because he was an environmental advocate.?

But you know what my federal arts minister is doing right now? … If you guessed it’s not art related, you’re close. He’s not organising some big arts changes. He’s not sponsoring a bill to get visual artists resale royalties (an issue for which he took a strong stance, and why I ended up interviewing him) which would help thousands of struggling artists including Indigenous groups who usually see very little by way of profits. He’s not talking about more funding.?

No, instead, he and his band are reuniting to perform at a special concert for the victims and families of the recent bushfires. Now don’t get me wrong, I’m all for the fundraising, victim support, fire awareness, etc etc. But how often can you say, "my federal arts minister is performing this weekend", and not consider it both weird and an odd way to spend his valuable time. This is the man who is looking after issues such as global warming, greenhouse gases, relief for those affected by (take your pick, as there seems to be all of these going on right now) floods, fires, (very recent and felt in my house!) earthquakes and cyclones… I’m all for the guy wanting to help, and it goes with his job, but somehow I think I’d prefer it if my federal arts and environment minister took my taxes and did something instead of playing at a concert… Something like sitting in on the commission about what happened during the bushfires, talking to firemen and other services to improve warning systems… Something like ensuring that the stupid sedition laws were removed and playwrights no longer scared that just writing about terrorism will land them a visit from a spook (oh, that’s another long post for another time), or making sure that artists don’t get ripped to shreds in the newspapers because a certain conservative percentage of the public don’t like art that actually includes a naked body…. You know, something a little more in line with his actual job, the one people elected him to, and not… you know, a return to his former job as a band member.?

Morale booster aside, I just think it’s a little screwy that my federal arts minister is going to be belting out a song on stage, whilst his colleagues are going about making changes to this country.?

I know I say ‘federal’ a lot, but it’s important to remember I’m not talking about some local council or state politician here. Federal arts funding is ridiculously hard to get, and even if you have it perpetually, companies here fold. Our arts funding body is so out of touch, every few years they discuss and rediscuss whether or not they should open/close one line of funding - yep, that’s right, they can’t decide whether or not they should have funding set up for one particular area of the arts - and think that funding should go to development of artists, but do nothing to actually support them (ie. they fund development of scripts, ensuring a play is scored, drafted and redrafted; but don’t really do anything to see that it is performed, or anything that would actually support the playwright to sell, restage, or promote the script). As businesses here are notoriously unwilling to help fund the arts, we’ve basically got nothing to support us. Especially if you’re small fry like me. So I’m really not upset that a person wants to help the fundraising effort for relief to the victims of a large tragedy. I’m upset that at a time in my history when not only is there an actual federal arts minister, but one who actually gives a damn about the arts, a person who could affect real change to our local arts industries, influence copyright and royalty laws, campaign for more funding and better placed funding, discuss free speech - of which we legally don’t really have, or at least not like the Americans do - and censorship? … is going to play in a concert. Say it enough times, and it really does sound weird. He’s a nice guy, and a good musician, but I’m glad he’s not the politician in my district. I liked to think I would vote for him given the chance: now I really would have to be convinced to do it.

/End rant … Sorry, that’s been in my head for a while now and it just had to come out!