marcus westbury

photo by Andy Mac
HOW is Melbourne dealing with the fact that one of its biggest tourist attractions and one of its most significant cultural movement since the Heidelberg School is illegal, outlawed and vilified?
I was at a forum in Sydney this week. I listened intently as a panel made up of artists, bureaucrats, and business [...]

A FRIEND of mine visited Melbourne for the first time in more than a decade last week. The last time he was here was in the early ’90s, in the middle of the last great recession to hit this city. The Melbourne he remembered was the one that was broke and broken. He’d heard about [...]

ARTISTS and sportspeople have a lot in common… really.
I’ve never understood the idea that art and sport are somehow opposed to each other. I’ve spent a lot of time with artists, and a little time with sportspeople, and I’ve come to the conclusion that they’ve got more in common with each other than just about [...]

Given that The Age web site folks haven’t exactly been enthusiastic about posting my columns online, i am going to start posting them here as well after a a bit of a delay. I’ll post a new (old) column here each week starting from today. I’ve been meaning to do this for a while but [...]

Based on the fact that i am sweating over my copy this afternoon, i think it is safe to say that I am now officially a newspaper columnist.
The downside is that “newspaper columnist” is a sub-profession of human being somewhere above politician and used car salesman and below journalist. I’m not sure that inflicting my [...]

From my small air conditioned bubble in a sweltering Melbourne the abstract economic gloom of stock shocks and far away corporate collapses is getting less and less abstract with each passing day. Anecdotal reports of jobs drying up, businesses closing, incomes evaporating and people fast becoming un or underemployed are mounting around me.
It is probably [...]

I have two separate speaking engagements this week.
On Wednesday night i’ll be speaking as part of the Inspired Media series organised by the folks at Portable Content:
Date:    Wednesday, October 29, 2008
Time:    6:00pm – 8:00pm
Location:    Horse Bazaar
Street:     397 Little Lonsdale Street
City/Town:    Melbourne, Australia
Their facebook group has all the information.
On Friday afternoon (31st October), i’ll be speaking [...]

If you were are all convinced that this site would be reserved for serious discussion of arts, cultural policy, the state of the nation and the odd tale of a bizarre night at the logies. Think again!
For the 8 weeks leading up to the Olympics i will be doing a regular spot on 774 ABC [...]