One simple example is appointing more artists to government agencies and boards.

Creativity and innovation is now at the heart of much of the modern economy, and artists are amongst are societies most innovative people – not just in their own art practice, but in their everyday creativity in terms of getting projects to audiences. But how many artists are actually on the boards of cultural institutions? Not many. Even fewer are on represented on non-artistic cultural areas like innovation bodies and the like. Why shouldn’t artists be on the boards of bodies like Fair Work Australia, Tourism Australia, the Productivity Commission? Businessmen and economists are constantly being placed into areas they know little about, yet some of the most liateral-thinking and creative people in our society are ignored when it comes to the big policy debates of our times.

In May 2009 the Minister, Peter Garrett, announced that the ArtStart progam would happen – but it had turned into a grant program for emerging artists with no mention of key elements in the original proposal – like a ‘harmonisation’ of way artists are dealt with by the Aus Co, the ATO and Centrelink, and an artists and welfare policy. Basically, the progam as announced is a political cop out. What ArtStart now offers is 200 $10,000 grants per year for the next 4 years to artists under 30 … and these are supposed to allow artist to stop cross-subsidising their art practice with part time jobs. This is a bit of a joke as the 2003 Throsby report (Don’t Give Up Your Day Job) indicated that around 60% of all artists worked extra jobs to subsidise their practice. It really is very unclear that this relatively small grant will work to give emerging artists enough of a leg-up to get their practice operating on a self-sufficent basis. If the government wants to assist artsist to get their practice operating as a viable business (which I think is the point of ArtStart), thene they could simply have worked to modify the NEIS scheme … perhaps with a longer time frame to viability. The idea that most artists get their practice up and running in 12 months is a joke … it is more like establishing a small winery … a few years for the vines to grow, then time for the first wine to mature. Of course, you could try to speed it up … but then all you’d get is crap wine.

I do what i consider, cutting edge , innovative art, of huge benefit to the local and international arts community.
Handicapped with a speech impediment job hunting is hard.
The Job network system has a narrow view on ‘the artist’ , no matter what you do, your ‘unemployed’ and need spend 90% of your time job hunting even if theres no chance.
I started University this year just to escape the constant hounding and degregating ‘interviews’ and insane pressure.

i admit, Post modern new media isn’t a money earner, but its important for the arts (try telling that to the ‘job club’ supervisor!)

And grants? how to compete with a system where most now pay someone to write your application professionally? (also, theres a vague suspicion of ‘its not what you, know its who you know)

I would like to see a system where you could at least have access to ‘the dole’, giving sufficient proof and reference to a body of work and practice.
New Zealand and many country’s in Europe do it, for the benefit of everyone.

Oh and while im here..Dont let Senator Stephen Conroy destroy
the thriving virtual arts community with archaic censorship laws!!

When the Govt cut funding to and closed many indigenous art centres a few years back, the concerns of many of the people involved with those centres was not just the loss in income to the artists (many of those closed weren’t making much money anyway), but what the young people who came to those centres to make art would now do instead, most likely drugs and destructive activities.

The govt does not need to spend anything to reassess how it values the arts – beyond immediate financial gain or a contemporary cultural history for the ages. The arts needn’t just make money for an impoverished community, but can also allow people the opportunity to spend their time in a productive and meaningful way, rather then resorting to destructive and/or anti-social activities. The skills and critical engagement engendered by the production and consumption of art has flow on effects beyond the purely financial. It costs the govt nothing to realise the true value of what they already have.