Growingcommunities by Community Arts Network (CAN)

ÂŠ 2012 Community Arts Network WA Ltd (CAN WA) Why this work is important ÂŠ 2012 Jon Hawkes

CAN WA supports community arts and cultural development practice in local government in Western Australia through its nationally recognised Community Engagement and Cultural Planning training, the Creative Networks Fund and by offering other professional development and networking opportunities. See canwa.com.au for more information.

Project Management by Pilar Kasat, Sian Brown Edited by Jenny Bunbury, June Moorhouse, Sian Brown Written by Sandra Nicolaides, Bill Bunbury, Jon Hawkes Design by Qalam Design Photos of wildflowers by Pilar Kasat

The following photographs may contain the names or images of people who are now deceased. Some Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities may be distressed by seeing the name, or image of a community member who has passed away. TEN PROJECTS

contents 4 Foreword EMERITUS Prof. Margaret Seares AO 6 Introduction Pilar Kasat 7 Editorial Sian Brown 10 Why this work is important Jon Hawkes 26 Ten projects â&#x20AC;&#x201C; community arts and cultural development in local government BILL BUNBURY & Sandra Nicolaides 68 How to â&#x20AC;&#x201C; community arts and cultural development in local government Sandra Nicolaides 74 Recommended resources 77 Definitions 79 About the writers

foreword A decade or so ago the Australia Council for the Arts commissioned the first major research report on Australians’ attitudes towards the arts, which involved surveying and interviewing a broad cross-section Emeritus Prof. Margaret Seares AO Former Senior Deputy Vice-Chancellor at The University of Western Australia

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Previously CEO with the Western Australian Department for the Arts (now the Department of Culture and the Arts), and Chair of the Australia Council, the Australian Government’s arts funding and advisory board, Margaret Seares was also a member of the Foreign Minister’s Australia International Cultural Council and a Director of the Australia Business Arts Foundation.

of the population.

The research had many interesting findings, as well as some that were more self-evident. One that surprised many who worked in the arts was that, when a sizeable portion of the community spoke about ‘the arts’, they tended to refer to a very narrow range of creative activities. ‘Opera’ or ‘classical concerts’, for example, were regarded as ‘the arts’, whereas literature, novels and poetry were not. People who wrote or recited poetry, or who were potters, or artists, or craftspeople, or photographers, did not readily identify themselves with ‘the arts’, despite the fact that the activities they were undertaking as either a hobby, for leisure, or as an abiding passion are generally seen as being part of the creative endeavour of our community.

So it should come as no surprise that our local communities are actually full of artists, even if the people within them would not describe themselves as such. They may or may not earn a living from their art. They may or may not have achieved renown for it. It might be something they do every day, or only once a year. It may occur very publically or it may be undertaken totally within the home. So the questions for local governments are: Where and through whom are arts and culture occurring in your community? In what ways does your Council support them? In what ways could you facilitate even more activity in your local area and give even more people the unique experiences that the arts can bring, both as creators and participants? Some local government authorities have already embarked on the transformation of their communities through arts and culture. It is our hope that the others, having read what both Pilar Kasat and Jon Hawkes have to say, and having read the stories contained within this publication, will see it as a key priority to do likewise. Emeritus Prof. Margaret Seares AO

Margaret Seares has served on many boards including the Australian Broadcasting Corporation’s Arts Advisory Committee, the West Australian Symphony Orchestra, and the Creative Industries Innovation Centre, and the Expert Advisory Committee for Humanities & Creative Arts for the Australian Research Council. She is currently on the board of the Chamber for Arts and Culture and the Perth International Arts Festival. In 2003 she was awarded an Officer of the Order of Australia for her contribution to arts and education.

introduction I am delighted to present this publication to you; I feel it is long overdue. It has been more than ten years since CAN WA published a special resource for local governments. This was a guide to cultural planning which provided practical information to encourage local governments in Western Australia to take up arts and cultural planning with their communities.

It is wonderful to acknowledge that today it is a fact that local government contributes greatly to the planning and delivery of arts and culture for Western Australian communities. In 2008-09, local government funding for cultural activities represented 17% of total cultural funding provided by all levels of government.1 The provision of libraries (in partnership with the State Government) and cultural facilities is a highlight of local government’s commitment to the cultural life of their communities. Community arts projects, festivals and events have also become highlight activities for many local governments in metropolitan Perth and in regional WA. Some local governments have gone a step further and have embraced the broader role of arts and culture in addressing community and social challenges. Hence they are developing sophisticated approaches to effective cultural development and planning that builds community engagement, cohesion and resilience.

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It is also a fact that there are still some local governments in WA who are not entirely sure of the benefits and longterm impact that their involvement in arts and culture will have in their communities. This publication hopes to re-invigorate those who are already convinced of the positive outcomes of involvement in arts and culture and to encourage and inspire those who might still need to be persuaded of its benefits. CAN WA invited Jon Hawkes, author of the ground breaking ‘The Fourth Pillar of Sustainability: culture’s essential role in public planning,’ who is one of Australia’s leading commentators on cultural policy, to write a renewed case for why investing in arts and culture is now even more important than ten years ago.

In the past decade Western Australian communities have undergone profound changes, both economically and socially, and whilst some communities and regional areas are experiencing huge financial prosperity others are languishing. There are very real environmental pressures, social challenges and also huge opportunities. Within this context local governments have found themselves under immense sustainability pressures; questions about their role and their relationship to their local communities have become more relevant. It is in this complex array of global and local conditions that this publication emerges. I urge you to read Jon’s article entitled ‘Why this work is important.’ He makes a compelling case that reminds us that arts and culture are not the decoration and the trimmings which we can have once all the ‘important bits’ are in place. Culture is fundamental to our humanity, it helps us define who we are and through the arts and cultural expression we can manifest our collective creativity and sense of place and identity. At times of uncertainty, complexity and challenge, knowing ‘who we are’ provides a solid foundation to look forward with a clearer vision. We need imagination and creativity to develop that future. Our culture provides us with the values and aspirations to formulate a positive vision. The arts enable us to express today, the future of tomorrow. I hope this publication assists and inspires many more of you who are involved in local government to make arts and culture ‘your business’. Pilar Kasat Managing Director CAN WA

Growing Communities is designed to inspire people working in local government, to continue creating community art and cultural development projects. This publication celebrates the work that is taking place within local government in WA telling the stories of ten different projects that have occurred in recent years. These stories give you insight into the diversity of each of these communities and the creativity and strategic thinking of the local government staff, the artists and the participants involved. Firstly, read Jon Hawke’s article exploring the role of community arts within local government and the deeper significance of this for us all. Revealing the connections of ‘art-making’ in society with sustainability, social justice and democracy, his article urges local government to make community art a priority. Growing Communities aims to reveal the various perspectives and experiences of each project, from the big picture concerns of a CEO to the personal moments of transformation of the participants. Writers, Bill Bunbury and Sandra Nicolaides interview key representatives from each local government, including Mayors, CEOs, project managers, the artistic facilitators, project participants and project managers.

The stories have been gathered from all over the state with both writers travelling through changing landscapes, from the red dust of Port Hedland to the wildflower country of Mullewa.

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These stories include an arts project in Waroona, born out of the ashes of a fire that destroyed the one hundredyear old Drakesbrook School. This building that had played such an important role in the lives of the locals once again brought the community together as they relived their memories. You will read about a touching and amazing City of Perth project that reveals a history of returning Aboriginal servicemen and ‘The Coolbaroo League’ that began in a modest hall in East Perth. The ten projects showcased are all different however each demonstrates a collaborative approach with the community, arts administrators and artists working together. They all used creative mediums to explore or celebrate their community’s cultural identity, including its values and ideas. Growing Communities will be distributed throughout Western Australia to government, media, arts and community workers, and the general public. Through this publication we encourage and inspire you to do more of this important work in local government cultivating the creativity and well being of your local communities. Sian Brown Arts and Cultural Development Manager CAN WA

1 http://www.abs.gov.au/ausstats/abs@.nsf/Latestproducts/08D25D1FC1B64BB0CA2577C00013B5C6?opendocument

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9 TEN PROJECTS

why this work why this work is important

is important

Jon Hawkes

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Jon is one of Australia’s leading commentators on cultural policy. He is the author of the groundbreaking The Fourth Pillar of Sustainability, which is recognised around the world for its contribution to the understanding of cultural policies. He is the resident Cultural Analyst with the Cultural Development Network of Victoria and has been Director of Community Music Victoria, a Fellow of the Community Cultural Development Board (Australia Council), Director of the Australian Centre of the International Theatre Institute and a founding member of Circus Oz and the Australian Performing Group (Pram Factory). The United Cities and Local Government (UCLG) declared in 2010, that ‘Culture is the Fourth Pillar of Sustainability’.

Photo by Lucy Hawkes

This book describes a range of wonderful activities. The stories are inspirational; they are filled with images of empowerment – people working and playing together and, in the process, expressing their identities, hopes, achievements and respect for each other. After the glow, the questions that emerged for me were: • Why isn’t the value of these processes more widely embraced? and, • Why isn’t work like this the major part of what is encouraged with public support, particularly at a local level? I think it may be because public arts support tends to focus on the outward manifestations of professional production while not recognising the need to care for the ground that supports these emanations. The largest items of public investment in the arts are usually for the development, upkeep and management of facilities for the storage and presentation of traditional artefacts and rituals; next is usually subsidy of the industry that makes content for these facilities; third is the training of personnel for employment in these fields;

and fourth is often schemes to increase consumption of the products available from these facilities. If it is there at all, the smallest item is always for the support of community-based, community-envisioned and community-implemented arts activities. That is, the sorts of activities described in this book. These investment priorities may make sense if arts production is viewed through an industrial or commercial lens. But they start to look a bit threadbare when other points of view are brought to bear. If art also describes a social process, a creative process, an experience, as well as an industry that makes stuff for consumption, then some other priorities raise their heads. To recognise that the most profound impacts of artistic endeavour come through the actual process of making, and to recognise that all people have the capacity, right, need and desire to directly experience these impacts, and to recognise that this experience has profound social benefits must surely alter, if not reverse the traditional priorities.

ExtravagANTza at the ‘Keela Dreaming Cultural Festival’ 2011, Kellerberrin, photo by Toni Wilkinson

why this work is important

I don’t question that witnessing the results of arts production can be profoundly moving, but that should not divert focus from the benefits communities derive from actively making their own art. Energetic local arts production is the foundation of a healthy arts ecology. It is also at the foundation of much more: our sense of ourselves, our sense of each other, our collective memories, our collective problem-solving capacities, our pleasure in living. The stories in this book beautifully document the truth of this assertion. I simply do not understand how investment in local art-making is not a top priority for any government committed to sustainability, social justice or democracy. Perhaps it’s because we live in a world where that old saying, ‘what can be counted counts, what can’t doesn’t’, holds sway. To the point that we fear that if we can’t express (I mean articulate in rational language) the significance of an activity then it can’t have any. This leads to the not uncommon suspicion among many public servants that art (and even more so, community art) is really just decoration that should only be thought about after the real issues have been dealt with (or at least that their colleagues and superiors are of this opinion).

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The consequence of these fears is that a great deal of government rhetoric about the arts lacks a confident and grounded demonstration of what is at stake. Instead of bold clarity we get desperate and defensive rationales, new age sentimentality, aggressively enthusiastic corporate speak, dull bureaucratese, unsupportable quality of life claims and cries for the preservation of ancient rituals. And I haven’t come across any poetry. It is little wonder that local arts development remains relatively invisible1. This publication being a notable exception. My purpose in this essay is to offer some alternate ways of thinking about art and its function in society. The ideas that emerge from this other way of looking may make it a little easier to present a convincing case to and within local government.

Imagine convincing oneself, and then others, that Council would be mad not to go all out supporting the participatory arts activities of its constituents. My mission is to help develop the language that achieves just that. I have structured this material around five themes: • The importance and value of participatory and collaborative art-making • Independent perspectives (eg, needs and rights) from which art-making can be usefully viewed • The value of art-making to Local Government • Approaches to engagement • What’s needed. As I’ve already mentioned ‘community art’ and ‘artmaking’ and now that I’ve dropped ‘participatory’ and ‘collaborative’, I should begin with some clarity about the ‘art’ that I’ll be attempting to express the value of. I’ve read reams of material about the value of art, and the one thing they all have in common is that they’re talking about: • the value of the ‘work’ of art (be it book, poem, pot, painting or event), and/or

Which is to say that, while I recognise the worth of the Keeping Place, the Artefact and the Artist, in this instance I’m on about a more fundamental level – what was known for a while as community arts and now, most often, as participatory arts. This phrase denotes empowered and hands-on community involvement in collaborative artmaking. Its practice embodies the principle that we are all creative and that we all have the capacity, need, right, responsibility and desire to be actively involved in making our own culture. The ‘we’ in the above is not just the aggregation of individuals, but also the overlapping and shifting groups into which these individuals connect. That is, communities also have collective capacities, needs, rights, responsibilities and desires. I’m trying to emphasise the point that I’m not just talking about individual needs, etc, here but of the needs of communities as well. I’m also accepting that art-making is, at its most effective, a social, co-operative, fulfilling and engaging activity. Now, as I’ve said, nearly all current evaluations of the arts focus on the value of the product/result: • Its sale price • Its popularity (bums on seats, queue length)

• the value of the facilities that house this stuff, and/or

• The profundity and/or innovation of expression

• the value of witnessing the work.

• As an aesthetic contribution to civilisation

Very few talk about the value of making art. For me, making is both the most valuable and the most undervalued aspect of ’arting’. I say ‘arting’ in homage to Christopher Small who invented the word ’musicking’ to emphasise the fact that music is an activity not a thing, a verb, not a noun2. And so it should be with all arts. The fundamental value is in the doing.

• The skill of the techniques • As a symbol of a society’s views, aspirations • As a manifestation of individual (and often, national) genius • The number of jobs it involves • The economic activity it stimulates. Despite these impressive traits, I’m convinced that the value of the product dribbles into insignificance in comparison to the value of the practice. That is, the value of collaborative and participatory arts practice in communities – its value both to the wellbeing of each individual and to society at large.

L>R ‘Fired Up Youth Arts Project’, City of Stirling/CAN WA, photos by Sian Brown

Very few talk about the value of making art

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Creative and collaborative play: in order to survive, we NEED to learn, and to learn to enjoy, doing things co-operatively; if our life’s journey is undertaken with experientiallybased expectations that co-operative work can be productive and fulfilling, then it’s more likely to turn out that way. Song, dance and music-making in particular, give us that opportunity, but it seems to me that most other creative activities (from imagemaking to story telling, from gardening to cooking, from games to rituals) offer a similar context. Art-making is fundamental to collaboration and social cohesion.

The importance and value of participatory and collaborative art-making

Art-making facilitates the outpourings of our innate creativity. It lets us document our dreams.

If one puts aside the usual criteria outlined above, one has to come up with a different but at least as persuasive a framework. One that:

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• Identifies the essential characteristics of the arts; and, • Demonstrates why art-making is an essential aspect of becoming human and of maintaining community. The first step is to express what art ‘is’ as distinct from what art is good for – its intrinsic value.

Making sense:

Connection: Art-making puts us in touch with the unknown, the unconscious, the muse, the irrational, the imaginative. It is our link with the mystic, with that aspect of ourselves, and of others, that is apart from reason.

our insatiable quest to make sense of our surroundings is facilitated through art-making. We NEED art-making to compose patterns and ‘connect the dots’. We don’t choose to make sense of the world around us, and our place in it; we are hardwired to go at it from the moment we are conscious. Long before logic, science, philosophy and faith become tools, our creative imaginations are hard at work.

Expression: Art-making facilitates the outpourings of our innate creativity. It lets us document our dreams.

Art-making is fundamental to how we make meaning.

One can think of art as a channel through which we breathe in (connection) and breathe out (expression). These characteristics offer every person a way of applying their imagination in their lives3.

Different ways of seeing:

With these foundational values expressed, it becomes possible to demonstrate that these qualities give artmaking the capacity to enhance many of the fundamental conditions of human existence. It is indeed a tool with a myriad of applications. These include:

making art opens us to seeing ourselves, others and the world we live in, in entirely new ways. The flashes of insight, lateral connections and intuitive epiphanies that come with the exercise of creativity are essential tools for discovering effective solutions to living on this planet. Art-making is fundamental to innovation and problem-solving.

L>R ‘Beats, Breaks and Skills’, Northbridge Youth Engagement project, Department of Culture and the Arts /CAN WA, photos by Lucy Ridsdale

why this work is important

Belonging and connectedness:

Transmission:

the process of making art together creates ties between people, and between people and place, that are enormously powerful, not least because the binding is at an emotional level. It comes as no surprise that sociological researchers have discovered, for example, that music is the primary medium through which young people develop their individual and social senses of identity.

the advertising industry understands better than any, just how powerful the arts can be in enhancing the effectiveness of a message.

Art-making is fundamental to wellbeing and engagement.

Art-making is fundamental to communication.

Education: educational researchers have been telling us for decades how useful creative practices can be in facilitating learning. Art-making is fundamental to learning.

Memory: our sense of the past, our primary avenue to understanding and expressing our heritage, and the stimuli that activate our own memories are, more often than not, based in acts of creativity.

Place making/animating:

Art-making is fundamental to heritage and tradition.

both the built environment and the activities within it can be artful. Everyone knows more than a couple of places where it is the art of the place that makes the place.

Ceremony:

Art-making is fundamental to the design and animation of public space.

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marking significant occasions, be they anniversaries, assemblies, openings, closings, mournings, or celebrations, always involves applying artistic imagination. Art-making is fundamental to ritual.

All of these ‘instrumental’ functions stem from art’s intrinsic values: its capacity to make inspirational connections and its power to embody awesome expressions. There’s no doubt that engaging with the results of artmaking can have profound effects (there’s many a person whose life has been changed by a book and many for whom experiencing a concert takes them to heights that are otherwise unachievable). What I have tried to demonstrate is that it is in the making that the most profound effects occur. And that in this age of specialisation and consumer frenzy, a rediscovery of DIY art is urgently needed. So what is at stake with this attempt to describe the value of art-making? I don’t think it’s too great a claim to say our humanity, both in terms of individual fulfilment and of benign social cohesion.

Collaborative creativity is at the foundation of building connectivity and purpose.

So that’s the first theme explored. Perhaps this exposition may be useful in demonstrating to the engineers and the accountants that art-making has a more important function than simply being the decoration that, if one has any time and money left, one might allow to be added after the really important issues have been dealt with.4

‘Beats, Breaks and Skills’, Northbridge Youth Engagement project, Department of Culture and the Arts /CAN WA, photo by Lucy Ridsdale

why this work is important

Independent Perspectives From Which Art-Making Can Be Usefully Viewed: Needs It’s all very well to make claims for art that arise directly from its own attributes. It would be useful if there were ways of contextualising the value of art within other independent frameworks. One of the most obvious of these is needs theory. Humans have devoted much thought to the classification of human needs. Where might art-making fit as a fulfiller of human needs? For a long time, needs theory was not a very friendly place for the arts. Up until quite recently, Maslow’s hierarchy of needs5 has been the most common reference point (despite having been developed more than 50 years ago and subject to constant criticism since). With its pyramid formation, it’s expressly based on the belief that, quite literally, the most basic needs must be met before the ‘higher order’ ones can. It clearly identifies creative needs as being the icing on the cake (one might say, the snow on the summit). This rather antiquated notion comfortably supports the ‘art-asdecoration’ notions I referred to earlier.

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Maslow and his colleagues were developing their theories in the context of the industrial/business psychology movement of the post-war period, a time in which creativity and imagination were not widely recognised as having much of a contribution to make to the dominant paradigms of efficiency and advantage. More recent models rise out of conflict resolution and development theory. More often than not, these are presented as spectrums rather than hierarchies, in recognition that we have simultaneous, complementary, interactive and fluctuating needs, and that a significant part of life is the constant negotiation of competing needs (eg, freedom/protection, identity/affection, participation/leisure).

Independent Perspectives From Which Art-Making Can Be Usefully Viewed: Rights

I am particularly attracted to the taxonomy of the Chilean economist, Manfred Max-Neef6 because of the beauty of the conceptual framework he has developed. He has refined needs into an elegant and coherent set of oneword conditions or states; he then concisely nominates the qualities, things, actions and settings required for their effective fulfilment. The result is a model that is accessible and functional.

After intensely studying the matrix of qualities, etc in his chart, I can’t help but conclude that art-making is a synergic satisfier. Perhaps, keeping in mind the instrumental qualities I outlined earlier, it can be shown to have a positive impact on ALL of the nine ‘fundamental human needs’ that Max-Neef identifies. I have been unable to imagine any other ‘satisfier’ that has as broad a ‘synergic’ influence.

He also characterises the range of needs ‘satisfiers’ as violators or destroyers, pseudosatisfiers, inhibiting satisfiers, singular satisfiers, or synergic satisfiers.

To my mind, an arts policy in need of an independent rationale could do far worse than to integrate its thinking with contemporary needs theory.

‘Yarns of the Heart’ doll making workshop, CAN WA, photo by Cecile Williams

Since the Declaration of Human Rights in 1948, we have been able to claim ‘the right freely to participate in the cultural life of the community’.7 Sixty years later, the Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights of the UN’s Economic and Social Council received a paper8 in which it was stated that ‘under international law, five human rights are generally understood as cultural rights: • The right to education; • The right to participate in cultural life; • The right to enjoy the benefits of scientific progress and its applications; • The right to benefit from the protection of the moral and material interests resulting from any scientific, literary or artistic production of which the person is the author, and

The primary focus of international cultural rights development has been in relation to those of indigenous peoples10 and to the peoples in and from developing countries.11 Nevertheless, this has not diluted the original intention to develop frameworks with universal relevance. What this body of work offers arts policy makers is another independent basis on which to build reasonable arguments for public support of art-making. This is particularly the case if one accepts that rights aren’t worth the paper they’re written on unless constituents have the opportunity to exercise them. An important aspect of governance should be focused on ensuring and facilitating these opportunities. Dolls from ‘Yarns of the Heart’ doll making project, CAN WA, photo by Nicola Davison

• The freedom for scientific research and creative activity.’ The Council of Europe Compendium website9 states that, ‘in international discourse, cultural rights are seen as part of civil rights relating to: • freedom of expression; • right to and responsibility for cultural heritage; • right to free practice of art and culture and to creative work; • right to protect the intellectual and material benefits accruing from scientific, literary and artistic production; • right to participate in cultural life and right to equally accessible and available cultural, library and information and leisure services; • right to choose one’s own culture; • right to the development and protection of culture; • respect for culture and its autonomy and for cultural identity.’

why this work is important

Approaches To Engagement

The Value Of Art-Making To Local Government Most of the value described above accumulates to individuals and the communities in which they mingle. Even though this provides more than enough reason for active public support, participatory arts also offer significant governance-enhancing opportunities. As a reminder, what I wrote before bears repeating: participatory arts describes empowered and handson community involvement in art-making. Its practice embodies the principle that we are all creative and that we all have the capacity, need, right, responsibility and desire to be actively involved in making our own culture. And that if we don’t, it is inevitable that we will become alienated, disconnected and pissed off.

But back to how this practice can improve the ways we run ourselves. There’s plenty of evidence to demonstrate that participatory arts can be useful in governance because: • The insights and experiences participants gain through art-making make it easier for them to become better and more effective citizens; • Utilising art-making in programs such as community education, community building, health promotion, cross-cultural understanding, etc, will enhance organisational responsiveness, delivery and flexibility; and • Embedding art-making in the everyday processes of governance has the capacity to improve community engagement, communications, decision-making, policy development, expression of goals and evaluation.

‘Our Secret River Performance’, Denmark Arts, photo by Nic Duncan

So, on the one hand I’m saying that it is a basic democratic right that every community have access to the resources that will allow them to make art, to exercise their creativity, to make and express their own meanings. On the other hand I’m saying that participatory artmaking is an invaluable instrumental tool: • in the development of a society of fulfilled, healthy and engaged citizens; • in the process of democratic governance; • in the development of dynamic social communications; • in the delivery of public services; and

If the foregoing has been sufficient to encourage the reader to at least entertain the notion that there are powerful reasons for actively encouraging participatory art-making, then we can now consider how to go about it. This section of the essay focuses on attitudinal and behavioural approaches that can facilitate development from way before a specific program is designed and implemented. A key area of cultural development at the local level is within the agencies responsible for facilitating that development. Without change within these agencies, their capacity to productively assist communities to develop their cultures will be inhibited.

• in the achievement of a wide range of social objectives, including, not least, the building of community.

Two fundamental challenges need to be successfully dealt with:

The sort of long term sustainable social change that is really needed (that is, universal respect, engagement, empowerment and fulfilment) can only be achieved through the widespread application of participatory arts activities.

The first challenge is unawareness, and the response should be learning and advocacy.

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Why? Because collaborative creativity is at the foundation of building connectivity and purpose. And without these, everything else is ashes.12

A society’s health and capacity to effectively respond to change is fundamentally dependent on the energetic engagement of its people. This can be encouraged, focussed and maintained by supporting local cultural development. This argument needs to be understood and promoted. The second challenge is insensitivity, and the response should be listening and self-examination. The values and behaviours that surround State interventions significantly affect their impact. Particularly in the area of local cultural development, the way that State agents choose to engage with the communities they serve will profoundly affect what happens.

Bureaucracies can’t help themselves; history shows us that these systems inevitably exhibit a range of tendencies designed to make the world more manageable, more predictable, more secure, more measurable. Perfectly understandable, but not really conducive to discovery. For art-making to flourish these tendencies need to be recognised and reined in.13 Government may be the biggest threat to local cultural development, but it is also its greatest hope. Statesupported creative approaches to facilitating local cultural development have the potential to take us many steps toward’s resolving the crisis we are in. How can this threat be transformed into hope? How can this potential be realised? How can a creative approach to local cultural development be achieved? What might ‘learning and advocacy’ and ‘listening and selfexamination’ initiatives look like? What is to be done? I believe change is necessary at two levels - in the values and behaviour of those at the senior levels of the agencies of public support for culture, and in the ways that communities go about dealing with these agencies. For now, I’ll focus on the public agencies, where, as I have said, there is a lot of learning to be done: There’s a range of creative skills that urgently need development among agency staff:

Sympathetic ears: The art of ‘really’ listening and the exploration of alternate ways of facilitating community expression.

Golden tongues: The art of saying what one means in ways that strike responsive chords with the listeners - what might be called accessible expression.

Soft hands: The art of service as opposed to control; how to ‘let go’, how to trust in the capacities of communities.

Dancing feet: The art of facilitating community initiative - how to lead without threat, how to recognise and honour emerging and half-formed visions.

Enquiring minds: The art of respectful curiosity - how to stay open to surprise, how to develop an appreciation, and capacity to express, the eternal synthesis between diverse cultures as they rub against each other.

Then there’s: • The design and application of internal procedures that enhance staff contribution to agency culture. • The design and application of internal procedures that enhance staff engagement in collaborative creativity. • The design of regular community gatherings at which communities can creatively mingle, engage in visionary discourse, celebrate their existence and be fruitfully listened to by the agencies responsible for facilitating their selfdirected development. This may appear to be a paltry contribution in the face of the problems facing the public sector, but ultimately the solutions are in the hands of the agencies - see things differently and the solutions will emerge. What I am proposing here is a different perspective.14

why this work is important

What’s Needed If one can imagine that there might be an agency exhibiting most of the characteristics described above, what might it then actually do to: • most effectively apply art-making’s attributes; • maximise the contribution of art-making to the fulfilment of human needs; and, • facilitate the exercise of cultural rights? Or, to make the task a bit more practical, how might that agency most effectively stimulate the development of independent, self-sustaining, inclusive, welcoming, regularly occurring, participatory, collaborative art-making? To my way of thinking, the answer lies not so much in the implementation of proactive interventionary programs, or in exemplary model projects, but in recognising that for communities to achieve maximum engagement in creative participation, they need widespread and easy access to a range of resources. These include:

Recognition:

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public recognition and promotion of the value of their activities and the importance of their status; confidence in their cultural function and the public support for carrying out that function.

Conclusion

of common interest and experience, of support and sharing - networks that facilitate discovery, exchange, dissemination and promotion; while these networks need to be independent, their development would benefit from, for example, the availability of training opportunities for community activists and the facilitation of co-operative resource sharing.

Information: about examples and models, guidelines to best practice, contact details, exposure to alternatives.

Equipment: the tangible materials and tools with which to make stuff.

Sites: in which to work, to practice, to mingle, to play, to experiment, to make and to show.

there are many options; for example - a shorter working week, mandatory arts elements in educational programs, paid time for cultural activities as a part of workplace agreements, a recognition that time spent in creative activity is socially productive.

Skill development: decentralised and local ownership of an ongoing skill-base; keeping in mind that the fundamental skill is CONFIDENCE and that development is the opposite of envelopment. The skills I’m thinking of are not just those of specific art-making techniques but also of group-work and cross-cultural facilitation.

Diversity: opportunities to experience and collaborate with people with different experiences, values and modes of expression.

Continuity: ‘access to continuity’ may sound strange, but it is meaningful; communities need to be able to experience ongoing cultural engagement - stop-start projects can be counter-productive.

Gentle hands: Public space:

Time:

Most communities could not hope to achieve accessibility like this on their own: public initiative is clearly needed.

Networks:

places where widespread face-to-face social interaction can be facilitated. This is a key to civic engagement and to local cultural development.

resource and service providers whose behaviour is founded on their understanding that their function is to serve rather than control.

Money: Facilitation: people who are really good at liberating the creativity of others.

although, if all of the foregoing resources were available to communities at a minimal cost to them, then perhaps money wouldn’t be an issue at all.

The challenge for agents of governance is to ensure that the distribution of these resources is achieved in ways that make them accessible, productively used and, as far as possible, locally owned and sustainable. If the tools of artistic production were to become universally accessible, the results would not simply be the universal and democratic exercise of cultural rights, but also a massive outburst of creativity.15

Taking on board the stories in this book certainly got my emotions and my mind working. I hope others will be equally stimulated. My excitement led me to try to present some coherent and persuasive reasons why: • Participatory art-making is fundamental to being human, to community health and to good governance; and, • Public support of local arts initiative is essential. It will very soon be fifty years since the first time I earnt money from art. For the ensuing half century, the question, in all sorts of different forms, about whether what I was doing was worth doing has kept coming up. The first ‘worth’ to be discarded was economic. I’ve been unable to make a decent living from my obsession. Shortly followed by health. Injuries go with the territory. Then went fame, happiness and finally vision: the presumption that I had a ‘view of the world’ that I must share with my fellows. It’s only been in the last decade or so that I’ve begun to be able respond to the question in ways that have begun to make sense. I watched Bruce Springsteen tell Elvis Costello why he wrote songs the other night on TV – ‘I’m just trying to figure it out for myself’. We’re all driven to join the dots. Since early humans imagined pictures in the night skies we’ve been impelled to make sense. And, when the chips are down, it may well be the most important thing we do make. I hope that I’ve been able to make some sense in this essay.

why this work is important

Figure 1.

Figure 2.

Endnotes: 1 Much of the content of this page is adapted from Challenges for local cultural development, my paper for the Barcelona Institute of Culture, 30/4/09, see http://community.culturaldevelopment.net.au//Challenges.html

self-actualisation

2 Small, Christopher (1998) Musicking: The Meanings of Performing and Listening, Wesleyan University Press 3 For a diagramatic view of the connections between creativity, art and culture see http://community.culturaldevelopment.net.au//CHARTConnections.html

See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maslow_hierarchy_of_needs SEE FIGURE 1. 6 Manfred Max-Neef: Fundamental Human Needs from Human Scale Development: an Option for the Future (1987)

9 See http://www.culturalpolicies.net/web/ethics-human-rights.php (accessed 6/4/11)

Doing (actions)

Interacting (settings)

subsistence

physical & mental health

food shelter work

feed clothe rest work

living environment social setting

protection

care adaptability autonomy

social security health systems work

co-operate plan take care of help

social environment dwelling

love and belonging

friendship, family, sexual intimacy

affection

security of: body, employment, resources, morality, the family, health, property

friendships family relationships with nature

share take care of make love express emotions

privacy intimate spaces of togetherness

safety

respect sense of humour generosity sensuality

understanding

critical capacity curiosity intuition

literature teachers policies educational

analyse study meditate investigate

schools families universities communities

breathing, food, water, sex, homeostasis, excretion

participation

receptiveness dedication sense of humour

responsibilities duties work rights

co-operate dissent express opinions

associations parties churches neighbourhoods

leisure

imagination tranquillity spontaneity

games parties peace of mind

day-dream remember relax have fun

landscapes intimate spaces places to be alone

creation

imagination boldness inventiveness curiosity

abilities skills work techniques

invent build design work compose interpret

spaces for expression workshops audiences

identity

sense of belonging self-esteem consistency

language religions work customs values norms

get to know oneself grow commit oneself

places one belongs to everyday settings

freedom

autonomy passion self-esteem open-mindedness

equal rights

dissent choose run risks develop awareness

anywhere

7 http://www.un.org/en/documents/udhr/index.shtml discussion/ElissavetStamatopoulou.pdf

Having (things)

self-esteem, confidence, achievement, respect of others, respect by others

SEE FIGURE 2. 8 Background paper (E/C.12/40/9) submitted by Ms. Elissavet Stamatopoulou. See http://www2.ohchr.org/english/bodies/cescr/docs/

Being (qualities)

esteem

4 Adapted from Creative democracy, my address at ‘Interacció ’06; Community Cultural Policies’ hosted by the Barcelona Provincial Council, Barcelona, 24/10/06, see http://community.culturaldevelopment.net.au//Barcelona.html 5 Abraham Maslow: hierarchy of human needs from Human Needs Theory (1954)

morality, creativity, spontaneity, problem solving, lack of prejudice, acceptance of facts

Need

physiological

10 2007 UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, see http://www.un.org/esa/socdev/unpfii/en/drip.html 11 2001 UNESCO Universal Declaration on Cultural Diversity,

growing communities

see http://portal.unesco.org/en/ev.php-URL_ID=13179&URL_DO=DO_TOPIC&URL_SECTION=201.html followed by 2005 UNESCO Convention on the Protection and Promotion of the Diversity of Cultural Expressions, see http://portal.unesco.org/en/ev.php-URL_ID=31038&URL_DO=DO_TOPIC&URL_SECTION=201.html 12 Adapted from Delivering long term sustainable social change through the arts, my speech to the ‘Social Inclusion & the Arts’ forum, Arts SA, Adelaide, 2/10/02, see http://community.culturaldevelopment.net.au//SocialInclusion.html 13 In Challenges for local cultural development; paper for the Barcelona Institute of Culture, 30/4/09, see http://community.culturaldevelopment.net.au//Challenges.html, I identify some of the negative tendencies that often infect bureaucracies. 14 Adapted from Challenges for local cultural development; paper for the Barcelona Institute of Culture, 30/4/09, see http://community.culturaldevelopment.net.au//Challenges.html 15 Adapted from Understanding Culture, my address to the National Local Government Community Development Conference. ‘Just & Vibrant Communities’ hosted by the LGCSAA, Townsville, Qld 28/7/03, see http://community.culturaldevelopment.net.au//UnderstandingCulture.html

why this work is important

01 02 SHIRE OF WAROONA

CITY OF Rockingham

03 04 Town of Port HEDland

City of PERTH

05 06 growing communities

SHIRE OF MULLEWA

CitY of MELVILLE

07 08 City of MANDURAH

community arts and ten projects cultural development in local government 01 Shire of Waroona

02 City of Rockingham

03 Town of Port Hedland

04 City of Perth

05 Shire of Mullewa

06 City of Melville

07 City of Mandurah

08 Shire of Katanning

09 City of Bunbury

10 City of Armadale

Shire of KATANNING

09 10

City of Bunbury

City of Armadale

TEN PROJECTS

shire of WAROONA

01 Drakesbrook School Memorial Footprint

growing communities

I was called by my son at 7am. When I got there I couldn’t talk to the police. I was absolutely devastated. There were three boys who had attended that school. Now they were in the fire brigade and as they were standing there I could just imagine their thoughts as my thoughts. Glenece Walmsley, President of the Waroona Historical Society

Glenece Walmsley, President of the Waroona Historical Society, remembers the fire that destroyed this hundred year old school building in July 2005. Fire is a great destroyer, but in the Australian bush, fire can renew. Drakesbrook School had gone; but out of the ashes grew a simple but remarkable arts project. The century-old wooden building ceased to function as a school in 1988. It lay neglected for a while but was still regarded affectionately in the community. The building had been leased to the Waroona Historical Society as a museum and at the time that the old school burned down, the Waroona Shire Council was in the process of having conservation works completed. Many valuable artefacts which were stored in the building were lost. And then only a year after the fire plans were afoot, quite literally, to cement the school’s place in local history. The Waroona Historical Society conducted a community survey that produced a varied response. Glenece Walmsley remembers that several residents wanted to rebuild the school as it was. But once a thing has gone it is gone. It would probably only get burned again. It didn’t matter what it was as long as it represented a memory of the school.

L>R: After the fire, photo by Maree Ellis; Waroona Historical Society, Drakesbrook School, photo by J Wrankmore

TEN PROJECTS

One survey response had suggested rebuilding the school but also putting a big fence round it so it can’t be damaged. A constructive suggestion from a local Shire Councillor lent direction as to how any ‘memory’ might look. Whatever we put there needs to be able to be used by the whole community. Gary Aitken, the Fremantle based lead artist and mentor who designed and constructed the work, extended the notion of ‘use by the whole community’. The father of small children himself, he saw that any reminder of the school should depict it as a place where children could feel at home. Young people are going to play on this. You’re going to get kids on skateboards. So let’s make it strong enough to withstand all those pressures. The physical reminder is a concrete slab, the exact size and dimensions of the original building. But it was more than just a slab and is now known as; The Drakesbrook School Memorial Footprint.

growing communities

The Footprint shows visitors the exact area, measured to size, of the original school building. And thanks to Maree and Glenece’s hours of watching the cement dry, there are no unwanted footprints on the Footprint. The new ‘school space’ represented play outdoors as much as learning indoors. A miniature school bell still rings on site but marked spaces shaped by aluminium strips offer children’s games. Hopscotch and knucklebones are there, while an array of marbles suggests other games. Children have readily taken up the offer. The Footprint is now very much a play space in Waroona’s well-used Centennial Park.

In his search for other Footprint components Gary Aitken suggested an archaeological dig on the original school site. He thought it might be a good idea to see what turned up amongst the charred remains of the old wooden building. Not much emerged, the odd marble, an old cup and a fifty cent coin. The best find was a pile of bricks from the original classroom fireplace, which were saved by Shire workers. These were salvaged and re-erected on the Footprint.

Waroona is a small rural community with a population of about 4,000. It is sandwiched between Mandurah to the north-west and Bunbury to its south. Both those cities are experiencing rapid population growth and this is beginning to impact on Waroona.

Glenece Walmsley noticed the attention the fireplace drew from former pupils.

Driving into the township, I experienced the quiet, country atmosphere that still separates Waroona from its neighbours;

Everyone had memories of the brick fireplace. In the winter kids used to come to school in the freezing cold and warm their hands at the fire. The journey from burnt timber to a concrete reminder took time. Maree Ellis recalls a lot of consultation, and a lot of meetings. We had a community reference group which would meet to make decisions. Whenever the artists came up with an idea we would all meet. Everybody was well informed all the way through. Children contributed to the steel decorative edging of the footprint that features cut-outs of people. Some were made in the classroom and others by community groups. They were put together by a community mentored artist, Jeannie Marie Hawkins. Today one of the guessing games for locals, children and adults alike is finding their own design at the footprint’s fringe. For members of the Waroona Historical Society, the Footprint opening in May 2008 was the culmination of two years’ work. Everybody made positive comments. Many said they would have loved to still have the old school but liked what we’d achieved. We were pleasantly surprised by their response because we were using very modern material to replace something that was very old and traditional. Not surprisingly many Waroona citizens had contributed as volunteers to complete the job. A Shire Councillor laid the bricks with help from the Town Planner.

The Shire of Waroona Strategic Plan 2005-2025 states that this Council values its rural identity above all else and is firmly resolved to retain it. The main aim and focus is to maintain a strong sense of rural community. The day the concrete was poured there was a real festive atmosphere at the park. Maree’s most cherished recollection of the Drakesbrook School revival is the way the opening brought people together. It brought a lot of people back to town. People sat around with their cups of tea and had a really good catch-up. It’s important to bring people together to celebrate their memories of the school but I think it’s also important to have a recollection of what happened in your grandparents or great grandparent’s days. Bringing people together can pose risks. Glenece Walmsley has a cautionary tale. Some of those memories became public on opening day and pupils stood up to tell stories ‘out of school’. We had one particular teacher sitting in the audience. They had teachers from the different eras there and my niece was a pupil from this teacher’s era. My niece said, “I can remember I went home from school and my mother said, ‘You’re quiet. What’s wrong with you?’. ‘I’m not going to school tomorrow.’ ‘Why not?’ ‘Because the teacher said if I didn’t shut up she’d tie my tongue to the table’. And the same teacher was sitting there in the audience.

But for how long? CEO Ian Curley had an answer. Here we are separated geographically. We have boundaries all around, so we set ourselves apart from some of our neighbours. Some municipalities see their way forward in getting bigger and bigger, but development means infrastructure costs and this can outweigh the benefits of extra rates coming in. We’re not anti-development, but we don’t see development as being the only key to success. That is why community development and cultural issues are so important to this Council. We do a lot of work with community groups and help them out as best we can. We undertake a number of cultural and community development activities each year. Waroona has always had a strong community development focus; it is embedded in the community.

With all our projects, the initiative comes from the community and we work with the community to achieve our goals. The Drakesbrook School Memorial Footprint is one community initiative that responds to Waroona’s rural identity. When it burned down, the old school was one of only two remaining pre-1900 weatherboard one-room school buildings in Western Australia. A larger district school had been built in a more practical location. The old building, on the original site, was highly valued as a reminder of early settlement days in a rural setting. The Council was lobbied strongly by the community who wanted the old school preserved so it remained and the surrounding land was developed into a park now known as Centennial Park. The 2005 fire left nothing of the old school but the bricks from the fireplace and a few other relics. In an effort to preserve the memory of the building for future generations the Council asked the Historical Society for a solution and gave assistance to create a memorial footprint of the school at the site. The community supported the footprint concept and the Waroona Shire Council provided financial and in-kind support. A generous local gave financial sponsorship and the project was also supported by a grant from the Fremantle Arts /Alcoa In the Community Program. Maree Ellis explained that artists, Gary Aitken and Jeanie Marie Hawkins involved the community in a mini-dig to forage for any relics from the site. Also, previous teachers and students were asked to tell of any experiences they might have had at the school and their stories directly influenced the artists’ concept.

The Drakesbrook School Memorial Footprint is just one example of the way in which the community has expressed its rural values and identity. Shire CEO Ian Curley believes that a community will be stronger and more resilient if you support their independence and build their capacity to help themselves. We could pick this community up and put it anywhere and it would succeed. However, sometimes it can be tough going and there are difficulties and challenges to overcome. We’re seen by the Wheatbelt as being almost in the city and by those in the city as being way out in the country. This sometimes makes it hard to attract grants. The Drakesbrook School Memorial Footprint and other projects have been undertaken by the Shire without government help. However Ian is philosophical. The community is used to being self-reliant when it comes to funding its own projects. The Council assists where it can to provide back-up to the community. The local community has given a clear message that it will not support wholesale development that maximises land profit at the expense of its rural lifestyle and the environment. However, with developers knocking at the door, Waroona is unlikely to be able to hold them at bay forever. Ian concedes that the threat of change is real but has a ready response. If we have to have it, we want quality development that reflects our lifestyle and values. Until then, we are happy to remain as we are. Meanwhile the Drakesbrook School Memorial Footprint stands in the centre of a community park as a symbol of days gone by and a reminder of the resolve of Waroona to preserve its history and retain its rural identity.

Oh! The perils of oral history. L>R: Drakesbrook School Memorial Footprint View, photo by Gary Aitken; Drakesbrook School Memorial Footprint View, photo by Maree Ellis TEN PROJECTS

city of ROCKINGHAM 02 Jarrah, Jetties and Journeys

A deceptively light looking sculpture, Entry Net, suggestive of canvas and spars, looks as if it wants to catch a breeze and sail away. But it’s made from sterner stuff and tethered tightly to the wall of the Gary Holland Community Centre in Rockingham. Entry Net is just one of several public art sculptures which now greet locals and visitors to the city. Sculptor Tich Dixon is co-creator of Ballast Stone Seating, another of the highly visible outcomes of Jarrah, Jetties and Journeys. I just love history and I find a good place to start an arts project is by reflecting history.

We started working with jetty timbers that had been in the ocean for sixty years. We took them apart, sliced them up and glued them together. We also came across big piles of ballast rock and used that as well.

growing communities

Fremantle sculptor, Jon Denaro

The City’s own story provided the inspiration. For a long time this once small town was an important Western Australian timber port. From its wooden jetties sail, and later steam, carried away our jarrah to Europe. Visiting ships left ballast behind in the shallow waters of Cockburn Sound. Project co-ordinator, Margy Timmermans, saw that steel rails, jetty timber and foreign rock from India, England and elsewhere provided highly relevant material with which to capture local history and create public art. Starting in December 2007, the project took a year to complete. The first step was to invite local artists to try out ideas, draw sketches on easels and tease out the potential of three dimensional art. They were helped along the way by Fremantle sculptor, Jon Denaro and Bec Juniper, curator of the final exhibition which ran for three months at the end of the following year. In his role as mentor Jon Denaro made it a pivotal part of the process to find authentic material with which to tell the story. We started working with jetty timbers that had been in the ocean for sixty years. We took them apart, sliced them up and glued them together. We also came across big piles of ballast rock and used that as well.

‘Castnet’ foyer sculpture, photo by Margy Timmermans

Irene Osborne, co-creator of an exterior artwork, Sculptured Billboard, worked closely with Jon and relished the way discarded jarrah could now take on a new texture.

TEN PROJECTS

Burning the timber was exciting. We needed the element of fire to give it a burned look and authentic character, which is in keeping with what you often hear about old burned jetties. The natural environment also played a strong role in Irene’s creation. Her colourful design for the billboard is based on the exquisite cross–section stem pattern of the xanthorrea, the grass tree, and a familiar part of the local coastal bush. For the four artists selected to finish Jarrah, Jetties and Journeys, the experience meant working long hours, and for some, experimentation with new and demanding materials; rock, steel, concrete and old timber. Safety was also an issue. At times the sculptors felt they were working on a building site, nearly tripping over lengths of railway line and heaving and shifting heavy blocks of stone and timber. Their work also meant teamwork. Under Jon Denaro’s watchful eye, the artists learned about each other’s choice of material and the skills of lifting and bracing very heavy and unwieldy structures.

growing communities

The steady process of assembly went on for months in the former Ambulance Centre, affectionately known as “Ambos” in Kent Street. They were very much in the public gaze, which Jon Denaro recalls as fruitful. One of our philosophies was to work in view of the community and we were bringing in lots of material like railway lines from the old jetty at Safety Bay. So there was a lot of dragging things around and lifting them up with winches and making a lot of noise. But it was also appropriate because people could see what was happening as they were passing by. And sometimes, as Tich Dixon recalls, these strangers offered assistance. When we were working here with the doors open a lot of people watched us work and offered help. “I’ve got a few days off, if you need a hand with that concrete”.

For several of the artists these were new ways of working and thinking. Inevitably there were compromises between intent and outcome. Mentors and advisers Bec Juniper and Jon Denaro tried not to predetermine outcomes. But because of the technical nature of the work we had to have fallback positions. So there were moments when we had to evaluate what was going on and then come up with an alternative solution. We were not trying to put our stamp on it, but that was a good professional fallback. And the outcome? Film maker Lee Kennedy covered Jarrah, Jetties and Journeys from its birth to the final exhibition in the Gary Holland Community Centre on 17 December 2008. I’m on an arts funding panel and you often see terms like “mentorship” and “development” thrown around all the time and you wonder if those are just token words. But in this process you really saw an evolution and the direct results. It probably gave invaluable experience that could not be achieved in any other way. And the artists’ reaction? Tich Dixon’s labours to create Ballast Stone Seating had taken nearly a year, often with shifts well into the night. But she felt the experience had been great for morale. We learned so much. Irene Osborne’s Sculptured Billboard had given her the novel sensation of working on a big scale. Sheryl Osborne saw her Entry Net finally hoisted into position on the wall of the Community Centre. For her its installation was a tense reward. Because the items I made were so heavy. And my heart was in my mouth as I watched them being craned up. Similarly Tich Dixon thought that her Ballast Stone Seating was going to fall apart when it was hoisted up. Because concrete has very good compressive strength but is no good when you’re lifting it up and putting it down at the other end. But it got there.

For Margy Timmermans the project achieved one distinctive goal. While the sculptures that emerged from the ‘journey’ were more abstract than literal, public acceptance suggested that when something is relevant and in place and people are stimulated by it, then preconceived ideas about Rockingham change. We have changed perceptions of public art.

I drove to Rockingham on the southern coastal fringe of the Perth Metropolitan Area to talk about Jarrah, Jetties and Journeys with City of Rockingham CEO Andrew Hammond, Gay Thornton, Director Community Services and Margy Timmermans the project co-ordinator.

An exhibition of all the drawings from the initial classes was held as part of the opening of the Community Centre. This enabled all the participants to see their work displayed. The four fabricated artworks were installed in and around the Centre.

I asked Margy to tell me about the involvement of the community in this project.

The theme is evident in the foyer where displays of sailing boat replicas, ballast stone and timbers have been installed in large circular display units in the floor. Margy got the idea from The Hague, in the Netherlands.

The project theme came to me during the development of an earlier project, the Waterfront Pioneer Rotary Walk. Below: Jon Denaro and Hilda (Tich) Dixon sanding timber set, photo by Margy Timmermans

At the same time a funding opportunity arose when the Gary Holland Community Centre was being built and a percentage of the building budget had been allocated to public art. We had 20 local emerging artists attend a series of drawing classes with the view of developing concept designs based on the Jarrah, Jetties and Journeys theme. These classes, conducted by professional artist Jon Denaro ran over five months, three days a week. The idea was for the artists’ drawings to directly influence the design of the Centre as it was being built and also for the best of the concept designs to be developed into three dimensional works for the Centre, using jarrah, ballast stone and other salvaged materials. The participants agreed not to sign any of their drawings, but to display them all together when the classes had finished and then jointly decide which of them should be developed into 3D artworks. Four of the participants had their concepts chosen, and they continued to work with Jon to fabricate these into public art. As Margy explained, this took some time. The process of developing the concept designs into artworks took a year, but it was extremely rushed. Next time we should give ourselves at least 18 months and preferably two years.

When they were digging to create an underpass under the city centre for the new tramline, they found artefacts, so they placed them in floor display units on the tramline platform which was inlaid with timber parquetry mirroring the streetscape design above. It looked great! The project has had other spin-offs, such as a subsequent Castaways Sculpture by the Sea project. Artists were invited to submit sculptures built from recycled material, such as ballast stone remnants. Council received 50 submissions and the works were exhibited along the foreshore. As Gay advised me This is all part of the process of encouraging residents to think about local identity and reflect back on aspects of our history. I commented that the Jarrah, Jetties and Journeys project appeared to link with most of the key priorities in the Council’s published Strategic Plan. However it turned out that this Strategic Plan had just that week been superseded by a new Community Plan. Andrew explained. This Community Plan mirrors the previous Strategic Plan but the main actions and strategies have come from the community. The new plan contains 16 aspirations, one of which directly relates to culture, arts and education. It was adopted by Council on Tuesday night and will be available on our web page in a few days’ time.

It was evident from Andrew’s words that the Rockingham Community Plan had pre-empted the recent call by the State Government for all Western Australian local government councils to adopt a ten year Strategic Community Plan which clearly links the community’s aspirations to the Council’s vision and long term strategy. As Gay told me, with some pride Ours is already adopted. Out of our community plan, a specific purpose plan is being developed and this will contain the various departments’ team plans, including a cultural plan. This will bring about an integrated approach, making the City of Rockingham one of the first WA Councils to introduce integrated planning. The City will have a clear line of sight all the way up to the Community Plan. In developing its Community Plan, Council invited 4,000 households to participate in five Planning for the Future workshops run by a consultant with no Council involvement. The invitation got a good response and about 220 residents participated. At the conclusion of each workshop the participants selected a spokesperson to represent the outcomes at a final workshop, which also involved elected members and senior management of Council. The result is a Community Plan that has been truly driven by the community. Andrew spoke of how Jarrah, Jetties and Journeys fed directly into the Plan. Jarrah, Jetties and Journeys and other projects before it have resulted in high level strategic ‘buy in’ for the arts. When members of the community were asked if they were interested in culture and the arts, they said ‘yes’. This overwhelming community response has resulted in local sponsors doubling their support for the next three years. It has also led to a new partnership with TAFE for placemaking to be included in its curriculum.

TEN PROJECTS

town of PORT HEDLAND

03 Krakouer! A play about Aboriginal VFL players inspires Port Hedland.

growing communities

Phil talked about the importance of getting an education. He succeeded in football in his youth, but when he retired, he had nothing to fall back on. We wanted Phil’s story to strike a chord with young kids up here, who mightn’t be very interested in going to school. Lorna Secrett, Manager of Community Development

Opposite: Phil Krakouer meets with local football players. The Swans football team, Sarah Cunningham, Sheila Cleiver, Phil Krakouer and Lorna Secrett, photo by Cecile Lucas

After a two-hour flight north from Perth, I was met by Lorna Secrett, Manager of Community Development with the Town of Port Hedland whose office was conveniently based at the airport! Port Hedland is one of the Pilbara’s two major regional centres. The port itself is one of the largest in the world in terms of iron ore tonnage exported. The local Council is responsible for managing the Town of Port Hedland, which has a population of around 20,000. Lorna told me how she came to her current position in the Pilbara and about her recent learning curve. I moved here in April last year from Busselton, where I had been Cultural Planning Officer in the Town Planning department at the Council. Here in Port Hedland my work is more focussed on cultural development, though I still work with planners and the engineering department. However I quickly found out that what works in the south doesn’t necessarily translate here! The town is very much in partnership with the mining industry and being so remote, it makes it hard to plan. There has been massive growth… we’ve got a new directorate in Community Development, so we’re now able to do lots of cross-development programs. Sport and Recreation used to sit with Engineering and Arts used to sit with Strategic Services. Now we can work all together. TEN PROJECTS

I spoke with Lorna and her cultural team about the Krakouer! Visit to Port Hedland project. Krakouer! is a play produced by Deckchair Theatre and toured by Country Arts WA and is about the trials and tribulations of the famous Aboriginal VFL players, Jimmy and Phil Krakeour. Both Jimmy and Phil had very successful careers as footballers, but when they retired in their twenties they found the going pretty tough. The play was the climax of the project, but Phil arrived three days earlier. He went to the schools and told the students about the challenges he had faced. Jimi Bani, Mayer Kelly Harlett and Phil Krakouer, photo by Cecile Lucas

Lorna emphasised the importance of this project for the Aboriginal community. The whole story of the Krakouer brothers is appropriate. Phil talked about the importance of getting an education. He succeeded in football in his youth, but when he retired, he had nothing to fall back on. We wanted Phil’s story to strike a chord with young kids up here, who mightn’t be very interested in going to school.

growing communities

Sarah Cunningham, Club Development Officer, had suggested bringing Phil to meet the South Hedland Swans Football Club and have a sausage sizzle after school and after training, for a general kick around with school kids. As Sarah explained, this proved to be a good move. The key person in getting involvement in this project was the Club and Program Development Officer for the Swans. This opened lots of doors. In return, we offered to show Swans memorabilia in the foyer during the play and this gave people the chance to have a look at it. We do have other clubs, but the South Hedland Swans have 95% Indigenous membership. Quite a few came to the show. It kicked off the pre-footy season. Some brought their kids.

The team also linked Phil up with the Kicking Goals program, which is sponsored by BHP Billiton Iron Ore to encourage kids to stay at school. Sheila Cleaver, Community Development Officer, sketched the background to this program. Kids have to attend school before they can come to Kicking Goals. They get to go on trips, such as going to Perth and sometimes to Melbourne to watch the finals. The process created community ‘buy in’, with some sports people talking with arts staff for the first time. By sending Phil out to the community and schools, people realised that Council was interested. Cecile Lucas, Events Promotion Officer, painted a very positive picture. We got fantastic feedback from the primary school. We had a double classroom filled with children. The whole talk gave you a warm, fuzzy feeling; watching the kids taking in what Phil was saying. He impressed upon them the importance of getting an education. Then, at the play later, we saw the mix of faces in the theatre. Many were first timers, but they were clearly engaged. Ah! It worked. We got lots of new people coming because of Phil’s talks to their kids - and because the play was relevant to them. The actors from the play were also involved. They ran a drama workshop at Hedland Senior High School and gave a talk to the audience after the performance. BHP Billiton Iron Ore, Fortescue Metals Group and ESS Compass also came to the party, providing free tickets to the play for Indigenous organisations. And future plans? For Nicole Roukens, Recreation Coordinator, value adding has to be a priority. We are very isolated here, so much value-adding is necessary. We plan to add all sorts of value to projects without increasing the budget and make the most of it for everyone.

Sheila agreed. She also emphasised the importance of bringing to Port Hedland projects that have appeal and relevance for the Aboriginal community. We’re hoping to present more plays which are Aboriginal focused. Next time, we’re looking at getting the actors to visit the Aboriginal communities. We want them to take a day to go where the people are, instead of expecting them to come to us. My next meeting was with CEO Paul Martin. Paul expressed his delight with the benefits to the community gained from the work being done by Council staff in the name of culture. Lorna has definitely broken down silos in this organisation. It’s exciting that Culture and Recreation are now working so closely together, and so successfully. Overall, we’re trying to build a city; a place where people are happy to live and proud to call home. We’re working to develop smaller shows, to attract some major iconic events but also to develop reconciliation and multiculturalism. For Paul, building that multicultural “pillar” is perhaps the most important. When I started one and a half years ago, I had to do a presentation, so I did one on people. I looked back over time to see what had changed. I noted that past strategic plans didn’t include Indigenous issues as the responsibility of Local Government. Twenty to thirty years on, things hadn’t changed, but there was a growing acknowledgement that they needed to change.

After my meeting with Paul, we looked in on a community forum where a well-filled room of Aboriginal people were enthusiastically discussing youth issues. My final stop was the Port Hedland Courthouse Gallery, a building with a terrific exhibition space and a wide range of quite beautiful retail stock. On the way there, we went along the coast and the water looked particularly inviting in the 35 degree heat. Why was no one swimming? Lorna put me straight. Water snakes, crocodiles and sharks keep people out of the sea. Well, at least the wildlife can’t keep the local community from enjoying the cultural experiences that the Town of Port Hedland is now providing.

Visit at the Wangka Maya Pilbara Language Centre, photo by Cecile Lucas

So now this Council runs a quarterly Aboriginal Forum and we’re supporting the Aboriginal community in developing an Aboriginal Cultural Centre. I believe that people from different cultures should integrate, but should also be supported to express their own culture.

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city of Perth

04 The Coolbaroo Club Exhibition – October 2010

My guides to the Coolbaroo Club project were City of Perth CEO, Frank Edwards and Curator, Jo Darbyshire. Jo explained how this exhibition came about. I was researching social venues in Perth for a possible exhibition when I found out that Aboriginal people had been prohibited from entering a five kilometre square area of Perth, including social venues, between 1927 and 1954.

L>R: Monica Ingram - Government House Ball. Photographer unknown; Photo of Coolbaroo Dance c.1948. Photographer unknown

None of them could even come through Perth unless they had proof that they had ‘lawful employment’ or they carried a ‘native pass’ with them.

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My Aunt Monica was invited to Government house as “Miss Coolbaroo”. She felt like a princess for the evening. In hindsight she felt that some of their comments were probably condescending; but on that night she felt spectacular. Here was a young woman who lived outside the exclusion zone in overcrowded housing, being courted and feted by high society in Perth. Michelle White, writer/director of short film, “Miss Coolbaroo”.

But the strange thing was that nobody seemed to know much about it, apart from a writer and filmmaker called Stephen Kinnane, who had produced a documentary about it, (with Lauren Marsh) in 1996. Stephen had written Shadow Lines, published by Fremantle Arts Press in 1993, which also covered the story. When Jo contacted Steve Kinnane she was convinced that she had found a basis for a worthwhile and important exhibition. I felt that here was a very important story to tell and while I realised this story had been well covered by Steve Kinnane’s work, I found that most West Australians still did not know this story. So I felt that my role was to make this information more available and even better known. I got in touch with Steve and he agreed to allow us to screen his documentary as part of an exhibition. The documentary is about a group of Aboriginal people who, in 1947, set up their own dance club in East Perth - just outside the prohibited area. They showed real resourcefulness. As Frank Edwards noted, paradoxically war offered young Aboriginal men the equality denied them in peacetime.

The second World War allowed the experience of servicemen, both Indigenous and non-Indigenous, to fight side by side, drink together and become mates. However, when they came home to Perth, they were ordered not to fraternise with each other again, and this led non-Aboriginal servicemen to question whether things were right. TEN PROJECTS

Jo pointed out that servicemen were the founders of the dance club. Two Aboriginal servicemen, the Poland Brothers, joined by a white serviceman Geoff Harcus and a young woman Helena Clarke, became the founders of the dance club, calling themselves the Coolbaroo League. They named the club ‘Coolbaroo’ – a Yamatji word for Magpie, because it can, among other connotations, suggest a union of black and white. I learned from Jo and Frank that the Coolbaroo Club had held popular dances every Friday night until 1960 and that various national and international musicians, such as Harold Blair and the Harlem Blackbirds made a point of going there. The Coolbaroo League also welcomed Nat King Cole and artist Albert Namatjira to Perth. The organisers took the dances to country areas where racism was rife and became activists for other Indigenous issues. The Coolbaroo League also published its own newspaper, the Westralian Aborigine from 1952 to 1957.

growing communities

An exhibition about the Coolbaroo Club, covering the historical facts that led to its creation, was developed and presented in the Town Hall by the City of Perth in October/November 2010. Along with Stephen Kinnane’s documentary, it became a springboard for the much wider dissemination of Perth’s ‘prohibited areas’ story, as Jo outlined. Copies of the exhibition’s interpretive panels have been given to the Aboriginal section of the Education Department and the “Coolbaroo” Neighbourhood Centre in Thornlie. The exhibition established a strong and positive response from Aboriginal Elders, particularly those who had frequented the Coolbaroo Club. Some had even met their partners there. Jo recalled that on the night of the opening, there was a great feeling among Aboriginal people – a terrific sense of pride and respect. It was a very emotional event for relatives of Coolbaroo Club members; seeing their grandparents in some of the photos made them proud. We received lots of comments in the Visitors’ Book.

The exhibition was a big educational leap forward for a lot of people and was considered ‘a long time coming’. This project marks the first work of this nature about Aboriginal issues undertaken by the City of Perth, and Council is very keen to continue this work.

I don’t think much is known about the Coolbaroo Club nowadays. The exhibition definitely raised its profile but I am still surprised by the number of young Aboriginal people who don’t know this story. Some didn’t know there was a prohibition zone. What’s wrong if we don’t know this history?

The Prohibited Areas provisions were finally rescinded in 1954. Only then was the Coolbaroo Club at last given permission to hold a Ball in the Perth Town Hall.

This was the view of Michelle White, writer/director of short film, Miss Coolbaroo, former broadcaster, and now CAN WA Aboriginal Arts and Culture Development Manager.

As Jo explained the exhibition rekindled a desire to have reunion Coolbaroo Balls in the Perth Town Hall.

For City of Perth Curator Jo Darbyshire

We’ve had the first one in June, hopefully they will continue after that.

One of the good things about this exhibition was that it was an eye-opener for the City of Perth Council staff. It made them look at Aboriginal people in a different light.

Frank added We were lucky to bring one of the original founding members of the Coolbaroo League, Helena Murphy (nee) Clarke, to the launch from Darwin. This was the first time Helena had been honoured publicly for the work she had done.

On 18th March 1927, the Government of Western Australia had relied on the Western Australian Aborigines Act 1905 to declare the City of Perth a ‘prohibited area’ for Aboriginal people. But in the testing conditions of war young Aboriginal men had earned the respect and friendship of their fellow white servicemen; a friendship many wanted to continue, but sharing a social evening together proved difficult in post-war Perth. The Coolbaroo Club, or Coolbaroo League as it was also known, was a clever response to this predicament.

An interview recorded with Helena Murphy was the first Indigenous oral history recorded by the City of Perth Library. Since then, the local studies librarian has recorded oral histories with other Aboriginal Elders. Frank’s commitment as CEO to the city’s connections with community through history and the arts is evident. This project is about the City’s interface with its diverse communities. It links with our desire to encourage tolerance and understanding. To understand where we are now, we need to understand how we got there. During the War, Italian and German communities were incarcerated in camps; detained. So they were also penalised at that time.

As Michelle White told me

The Coolbaroo Club exhibition marked the ‘beginning steps’. We are not asking people to ‘do’ something, but simply try to understand what happened. The project also served to educate our staff. Now they know.

But there were also tense occasions. Police frequently hovered outside the dance hall to see if there was ‘grog’ on the premises and survey which ‘whitefellers’ were consorting with Noongars.

It was quite revolutionary in bringing blacks and whites together; one of a few mixed Clubs in Australia at that time. People were coming in from everywhere - from the Wheatbelt, and would all congregate wherever the dances were held on Friday night.

Clockwise from top: Coolbaroo Club welcomes Albert Namitjira 1957; City of Perth CEO Frank Edwards and Mrs Helena Murphy; Prohibited area map based on original map in state records office; Mrs Helena Murphy, photos by (and courtesy of) the City of Perth

When the Prohibited Areas Act was repealed in 1954 this was largely because of the Coolbaroo League; the black and white Australians who had made the Coolbaroo Club a visible expression of defiance of racism. Aboriginal girls weren’t allowed to enter beauty contests at the time so the Coolbaroo dances decided to have their own bathing beauty competitions. The young Aboriginal contestants were able to present themselves as competent, beautiful young women. Michelle White, who helped research material for the 2010 Exhibition, was also able to contribute from family experience. Her aunt, Monica Ingram, (later Monica Jones) had regularly attended Coolbaroo Club dances and in 1954 was the first ‘native girl’ to attend a Ball. My Aunt Monica was invited to Government House as ‘Miss Coolbaroo’. She was almost presented as a curio for upper class whites but spoke fondly of it as the best of day of her life. She felt like a princess for the evening. In hindsight she felt that some of their comments were probably condescending; but on that night she felt spectacular. Here was a young woman who lived outside the exclusion zone in overcrowded housing, being courted and feted by high society in Perth. The exhibition attracted curiosity. Jo Darbyshire counted four thousand people coming through the exhibition over three weeks. We had a visitors’ book and the comments suggested that most people were astounded. They’d lived here all their life and they didn’t know this story and I think that points to a certain blindness; a ‘looking away’ which I think the Perth community is now ready to confront. Jo also found an unexpectedly large demand for catalogues from organisations that wanted to inform and educate their own staff, students and Aboriginal community groups. We ran out of catalogues, we realised these would be valuable but didn’t realise how crucial they were. We had to print another 1,000 copies.

They went to all kinds of institutions and people such as the WA Education Department and the Department of Housing. People wanted to educate their own staff. Banksia Hill Detention Centre took copies to give out to young kids in detention. At the opening of the exhibition, Jo found Reverend Sealin Garletts ‘Welcome to Country’, a short speech in Noongar language particularly memorable. He spoke for five minutes and that was a very powerful experience because it made people remember that we were occupying a country where other languages had been spoken. It was the first time we’d had a proper Welcome to Country spoken in the Town Hall in connection with a City of Perth event. And hopefully we’ll make that a matter of course. Jo also felt that this contemporary history was important. The value of this story for Aboriginal people is proof that they didn’t just sit back and accept discrimination. They fought back in a very creative way. They fought back through dances and social networking and that was the way they were successful. In preparing the exhibition we’d interviewed people who’d been to the Coolbaroo dances. Even though this is such a sad story of discrimination, the Coolbaroo League dances are a source of joy in the Aboriginal community. And so many Aboriginal people have parents who met at the Coolbaroo dances and it’s an integral part of their history. And for a non-Aboriginal audience? Every generation needs to know this history! This has been a very powerful tool of education but people have also been shocked out of complacency and perhaps that knowledge will go out into the community and we will look at how Aboriginal people have been treated and with a bit more empathy for the past. Lisa Scaffidi, Lord Mayor of Perth, felt that the Exhibition showed that while we can’t change history, we should acknowledge it and talk about it.

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shire of MULLEWA

05 Made by Hand, Inspired by Nature

Mullewa is a small municipality located 482 kilometres, and at least five hours by road, from Perth. Geraldton, 100 kilometres to the west, is the nearest regional centre. I spoke with the Shire of Mullewa CEO, Tom Hartman and Community Project Officer, Rachel McKenzie about Made by Hand; Inspired by Nature. As Tom Hartman put it Distance is a significant problem for the Shire. The cost of bringing artists to Mullewa is also an issue. We’re so far from Perth, there’s no option but for artists to stay here for their whole project. Travel and accommodation end up costing more than the rest of the project put together.

growing communities

…to bring people together, develop skills, build new relationships, reduce social isolation and develop local pride and identity. Both Indigenous and non-Indigenous residents were invited to come along and it didn’t matter whether you were a beginner or experienced in jewellery making. Everyone was welcome. Rachel McKenzie, Community Project Officer, the Shire of Mullewa.

The Shire of Mullewa Council, in conjunction with the Mullewa Arts Development Group, engaged jewellery artist Pam Annesley for a three week residency to run jewellery making workshops with members of the local Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal community. For Rachel, an important consideration was what would remain with the community after the artist left. It costs a lot to bring artists into the community and while they are here it’s great but we wanted to find a way that locals could continue to develop their skills after the project finished. We did this by incorporating certification training for four local women in these jewellery making techniques, into the overall project. The artist was resident in the community for three weeks, which was a real treat as usually we only have artists for two weeks, because of the expense. After the residency four local women went on to do a series of training that gave them additional skills while qualifying them to teach polymer and silver clay techniques. These women then returned to Mullewa and conducted a series of workshops for local youth.

Since the completion of this project the Shire of Mullewa has amalgamated with the City of Geraldton to become part of the City of Greater Geraldton.

Jewellery from ‘Made by Hand, Inspired by Nature’, photo by Rachel McKenzie and Eliza Thomas

The workshops attracted about 50 young people and 28 women. For Rachel, the aim was to bring people together, develop skills, build new relationships, reduce social isolation and develop local pride and identity. Both Indigenous and non-Indigenous residents were invited to come along and it didn’t matter whether you were a beginner or experienced in jewellery making. Everyone was welcome. Workshop participants learned the techniques of using polymer clay and silver metal clay to create their own jewellery. The results were startling! I asked Rachel if she was surprised at the extraordinarily high standard of the pieces created by the participants. I’m not surprised, because the arts have been building in Mullewa over the past four years, but I am impressed. Some of the jewellery created during the residency was documented in a glossy catalogue to acknowledge the significant achievements of the participants. As Rachel remarked

growing communities

We felt that making the catalogue for the project was important, it was a nice way to bring the results of the project together and proved to be a treasured keep sake, so much so that we had to print more as participants wanted to send them to family and friends. Now we have it to show our funding bodies as proof of the high quality results achievable in our rural community. In this type of development work, it is not important what the medium is – as long as it attracts people to participate. We had a project involving people painting power poles in the town to improve the main street. The community got involved and when they’d finished they were really proud. As a result of this community ownership the poles have not been touched by graffiti.

While funding bodies contribute towards professional artists’ fees, travel and materials, the planning and coordination involved can be onerous on an already busy council staff. Tom commented on additional challenges that smaller, more remote communities face.

You only have to glance at the exquisite patterns of leaves, animal shapes, berries, flowers and plant structures that make up an exhibition of jewellery; to appreciate that the title: Made by Hand, Inspired by Nature - and made in Mullewa is no idle boast.

Take Pam’s residency, for example. Her workshops needed to be crammed into the time she was here; instead of being spread into weekly sessions, which usually suit communities better.

Involving women and youth from many sectors of the community, their efforts culminated in both an exhibition, and an expansion of the Made by Hand project to other rural communities.

This put additional strain on Rachel, who had to ensure that Pam’s time was fully utilised, while also doing all her other work. Our biggest difficulty is that Rachel does most of this stuff on her own.

For project co-ordinator Rachel McKenzie, the idea came from attending a TAFE Class in Geraldton where participants worked with polymer clay.

We’ve applied for funding for labour and wages in the past, but it is very hard to get. We’re sick and tired of trying to explain it. You would think by now funding bodies would understand the need for this, but we have to prove it all the time. However, we’re on the right track as far as I’m concerned. Council will continue to fund this sort of thing because the Councillors and the community can see the results. This project has been so successful that it has had many flow-on outcomes, in particular the development of the Made by Hand, Inspired by Nature enterprise project. This project has seen a group of Indigenous and nonIndigenous women come together to create a series of jewellery that focuses on local flora that is aimed at the wildflower tourist market.

And when we came back and showed our work to the women here, they were very excited. So we set up a project where we could share that excitement with the Mullewa community. But along with that excitement, Rachel had another aim in mind. An arts project is what I present to the community but my ‘secret’ agenda is also about trying to get some social outcomes for the community. Mullewa has its share of social issues and has a lot of social divides. We have a farming community and a town community, the non-Indigenous community and the Indigenous community. In the past they didn’t come together very often and through these types projects we have consistently tried to bridge that divide. So with this project we aimed to have non-Indigenous and Indigenous people all working together, sitting in the same room. That’s something that doesn’t happen very often.

I know in community arts there’s always that argument about process versus product but I like to work on both. I think that process is essential for a community development outcome. But the product itself and how we present it, is equally important for the participants’ pride and self-esteem and for the community in general. With support from the Shire of Mullewa Council and local community members the jewellery making workshops got going. But this was only after a lot of groundwork by Rachel. I’m very careful that we don’t just blaze ahead and come up with an idea. I want to make sure that there is community support before we begin. Four or five of us might be excited but that isn’t enough to build a sustainable and successful project. It is important that people understand what the project is about, how we can make it work and that there is enough community support and interest. The initial task was to find a theme that would appeal to a broad range of community members. The answer lay in the rich diversity of flora in the surrounding country. Nature’s own local designs seemed to unite and motivate everybody. Everyone has a connection somewhere or other to the place where they live and to the environment around them. Workshops were held in different venues. Farm women traditionally meet at the Art & Craft Station. Aboriginal women generally worked at the Moorehead Building.

However Rachel found that people wanted to be involved in the project. So whether or not they were comfortable in these different spaces, they would still turn up and, after a couple of days people felt more at ease. In previous projects, when we first started using the arts to address local social issues there were some whose families had been involved in recent feuding. They’d both be in the same room but not necessarily talking to each other or even sitting at the same table. But at day’s end they’d all be sitting round the same table asking each other “Can you pass me that tool?” or sharing their experience of how a piece is working out. People began to leave those social problems at the door. Made by Hand appears to have made Rachel’s ‘secret’ agenda work too. A lot of non-Indigenous people came into the space where Indigenous women used to paint and that really opened that door. Now we’re holding more workshops there and the non-Indigenous women realise that it’s OK for them to also come in here and do things. And there were other very practical flow-on effects from both the workshops and the exhibition. The four women who went on to qualify as Contemporary Clay Instructors are now running courses in communities beyond Mullewa. Not only have skills remained in the community but the successful instructors are now doing paid work. They have also been able to contribute to the further development of local talent by running youth workshops in Mullewa itself.

In addition, as Rachel explained, the catalogue that accompanied the Made by Hand exhibition went all over the State and received a lot of good feedback. It’s very easy when you live in a small town to think that all the things of value come from the city or larger regional centres and that the stuff we do out here doesn’t stack up. So to have feedback from other towns saying “We want you to come and do that with us” has been incredible for the local community; that others recognise the skills they have gained and people view them as having something they want themselves. Jewellery made in the workshops is now selling at Mullewa’s Tourist Bureau along with cards naming the individual artists. And I guess the flow-on from that has been the enterprise project that we’re setting up rather than just making it an Indigenous or a non-Indigenous activity. We’re developing a brand that is just ‘Mullewa’. And both groups are going to sell their work together under this label. Rachel confesses that her personal highlight from Made by Hand was an addiction to polymer clay, but her most cherished moment was When the Indigenous ladies had some pieces and they thought they were a little bit rough. They felt they couldn’t quite do what they wanted to do. And then we strung them together and made them into a complete piece and people coming through the centre were just blown away by the work. And just that sense of pride and accomplishment that gave them was really beautiful to see.

Was there a potential for conflict between community good and community art?

Right: Jewellery from ‘Made by Hand, Inspired by Nature’, photos by Rachel McKenzie and Eliza Thomas

TEN PROJECTS

city of MELVILLE 06 A Cultural Vitality Plan

We found out that neighbourhoods wanted the films to be provided locally, so now we provide smaller individual events in each of the four neighbourhoods; and the films are well attended making this event an economically sustainable venture for Council.

growing communities

Christine Young, Director of Community Development, City of Melville.

I visited Melville, a local government area that borders the Swan River south of Perth. Christine Young, Director of Community Development, Hannah Katarski, Community Development Officer and Marcia Coelho, Neighbourhood Support Co-ordinator talked me through the process of developing the Melville Cultural Vitality Plan. Their first step had been to find out how residents thought that Council could enhance the cultural vibrancy of their city. Consultation mechanisms included: • an online forum, • a Photovoice competition, • a school art project, and • meetings with cultural creative residents, aged 2535, culturally diverse groups and arts organisations. For Photovoice, participants were invited to email or post photographs they had taken of their favourite place or experience in Melville. The resulting photographs and comments were then assembled into a display from which Council gained valuable feedback on residents’ appreciation of the city’s cultural assets. For the art project, one school in each of Melville’s four neighbourhoods was invited to participate. Community artist Louise Snook worked with students to create a composite painting which captured their vision for Melville. Student canvas - Caralee Community School, photo by Louise Snook

TEN PROJECTS

The four paintings, now exhibited in the City’s two community centres, depict a place that is colourful and exciting. The people in the pictures wear multi-coloured clothes. Dogs, butterflies, flowers, trees, ducks and birds are also brightly coloured with spots and stripes. Melville is shown as a place where there is plenty of room for children to play, for dogs to run around and families to picnic. People are swimming, sailing and canoeing, while some are in a cinema watching movies and eating popcorn and ice creams. These are references to the Swan River and the local cinema within Melville areas. There are plenty of choc tops for everyone! The general feeling from the children’s paintings is one of sharing, enjoyment and harmony. In a park there is an orange tree that is ripe with fruit for people to pick. While the young people were being consulted, Council was also finding out about the expectations of the wider Melville community via face-to-face meetings and piloting an online consultation forum and poll.

growing communities

Extensive internal consultation also took place with officers currently responsible for other plans asked to identify areas of overlap. The Cultural Vitality Plan has allowed an opportunity for the documentation of synergies across the organisation and across existing Council documents. One of the mechanisms used included the Council’s Community Wellbeing Scorecard. Responses provide valuable information which can be used to assist with planning for stronger communities. The Council has also recently issued a Customer Perception Survey for community feedback. Community input to all these surveys and consultations permeates the various departments and feeds up to the central planning processes of Council through a sophisticated online reporting tool called Interplan. Staff from across Council’s different departments use Interplan to report on their activities in a consistent fashion. Christine explained the rationale for this arrangement and its importance for Council decision-making.

The City of Melville is serious about implementation, so need is to ensure staff are accountable for managing various projects and report on a regular basis.

Melville’s integrated planning processes also provide an effective means by which actions included in the Cultural Vitality Plan can be implemented across different departments of Council.

Reporting needs to be easy for everyone to understand. This enables all our projects to be clear in the budget and for staff to clearly see the links to the Corporate Plan. Our top level goal is A City for People.

A seamless integrated planning process requires a willingness to collaborate across Council’s different departments. Projects most likely to benefit from an inter-departmental approach are those aimed at providing the community with broad-ranging, cultural, social, environmental and economic gains.

The Cultural Vitality Plan will inform how we achieve that goal through other set strategies, including ‘Enable a vibrant and connected community’. It will provide clear direction to guide a range of actions. Once completed and endorsed by Council, the Cultural Vitality Plan will form part of the City’s suite of plans. Thus it is important to understand how a Cultural Vitality Plan fits within a local council’s comprehensive planning processes. Christine explained The development of an Arts and Culture Strategy was an action contained in Melville’s Community Plan 2007-2017 People Places and Participation. It was prepared using a state planning process called Network City and included extensive dialogue with the City of Melville’s community and stakeholders. The Community Plan identified high-level aspirations that informed the City’s current Corporate Plan: Plan for the Future 2008 – 2012. The Corporate Plan contains several key goals including A City for People. Christine emphasised the importance of ensuring that the community understands the value of planning and the fact that Council cannot support projects and programs that don’t fit within the intent set out in its overall plans.

An integrated cultural plan will also assist the development of robust indicators and would also enable the Council to determine a fair way of unit costing. For example, this could be the cost per person attending a community event. The unit cost would fall as the number of attendees increased. Even before the Cultural Vitality Plan has been completed by Council staff have successfully taken into account social, economic, environmental and cultural factors in reinvigorating the Melville International Film Festival where, as Hannah Katarski explained Numbers were falling. We found out that neighbourhoods wanted the films to be provided locally, so now we provide smaller, individual events in each of the four neighbourhoods; and the films are well attended making this event an economically sustainable venture for Council. I left Melville impressed by their integrated approach to community projects. The future of cultural development would seem to be in good hands.

It’s important that people recognise that there is planning and that it’s very transparent so that our actions can always be tracked back. Going forward, we can’t do a project just because it feels good. We have to compete for resources across Council and we have to demonstrate clear and transparent processes to our Councillors and our community.

Brentwood Primary School work on their ‘Cultural Vitality Canvas’, photo by Louise Snook

TEN PROJECTS

city of MANDURAH

07 Mall Memories Project Stretch Festival Mandurah: Getting Smart with Smart Street

growing communities

Mandurah isn’t Fremantle. There are not many historic buildings. Many are from much more recent times but there is a wealth of stories not evident from the physical structures but rather from the people who occupy them. Art projects give us an opportunity to tease these histories out and make them very tangible, not just stories on paper but stories to touch or hear. Jane Tillson, Arts and Cultural Development Officer, City of Mandurah.

It opened my eyes. I thought I knew all about museums and history being used to colour arts projects but I realised I really didn’t until we went through with this Smart Street Project. This enthusiastic response came from Community Museum Officer, Nicholas Reynolds. Contemporary history is perhaps the easiest history to lose because it happens all around us and it is quite possible to look up and find it’s gone. And because it is contemporary we don’t appreciate its potential value. That’s particularly true of built heritage. In earlier times a fish-processing plant, Smart’s Cannery on the sea-front, gave the street its name and since then Smart Street has become in succession, a site of barracks for Japanese workers and a residential street. Later, as Mandurah became more of a holiday resort, flats and tourist accommodation sprouted. Smart Street’s most recent face is as a commercial and retail centre. It became a shopping mall in the 1970s. Jane Tillson, Arts and Cultural Development Officer for the City of Mandurah, sensed that art and history seemed to talk to each other along this street. Mandurah isn’t Fremantle. There are not many historic buildings. Many are from much more recent times but there is a wealth of stories not evident from the physical structures but rather from the people who occupy them. Art projects give us an opportunity to tease these histories out and make them very tangible, not just stories on paper but stories to touch or hear. Jane’s idea for the Mall Memories project gained urgency as Mandurah was gearing up for yet more urban development. Shopkeepers who leased premises in the mall were becoming aware that there was a risk that the buildings they worked in might be knocked down and that they would have to re-locate or close up. As a self-confessed retail therapist, Jane knew, from overheard conversations, that many Smart Street shopkeepers had been around for a long time and had become de facto custodians of social change.

Writing on pavement, photo by Carolyn Marks

Some of the ladies running the shops in Smart Street Mall have been there forever. So if shopkeepers have to move on, this area of social history might be lost. In their time they’ve seen fashion changes, technical changes in tills, credit cards and so on. And during my time with the Mandurah City Council I became aware of their concerns about losing their premises. The arts allow for social commentary on issues like these through community art projects. As Stretch Festival co-ordinator, Carolyn Marks had the task of making that happen in the autumn of 2010, describing herself as the spider in the middle. I threw out the webs to the community to turn Jane’s seed of a concept into visual, sound and literary histories. The theme for Stretch in 2010 was Senses, Taste, Touch, Sound and Sight. So we wanted to connect with people regardless of what physical or intellectual impairment they might have. For people without sight there were sound installations and oral histories to listen to, and those with hearing loss could see the artwork and sculptures.

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We started by capturing social histories and the visual artwork, sculptures and sound installations that we set up in Smart Street, all developed from those oral histories. A writers’ group used the oral material recorded by Jan Baker to write about the history of the mall. Two project co-ordinators, Carol Nicolson and Linda Jones, studied the histories and worked with artists to pull the fabric of the project together. Words, sound and vision eventually came together as a large installation in the mall. Carolyn recalled some good outcomes We had a wonderful chalk artist, Deb Hiller, who chalked the writers’ words down on the paving. The words on the ground acted as placemaking tools where people would come and discuss what they read and relate them to the connected sculptures in the middle of the mall. People walking down the mall got great pleasure from seeing all the artworks

flowing down the length of the paving surrounded by the chalked text.

Jane Tillson recalls one evening when a borrowed ladder had been left in the mall.

The sound installations were under the sculptures so you could hear what our sound artist, Fish Gill, had pulled together from reading the extracts from the oral history transcripts that the artists had chosen.

I didn’t want our reputation lost by not returning borrowed equipment. So that night I walked down the mall, grabbed the huge ladder, struggled with it down to the foreshore, parked it against a tree and secured it with a chain and padlock so that Works & Services could get it next morning as they went through on their morning check.

Visual displays in sculptural shapes recaptured former memories. The Santoy Ballroom that backed onto the mall (now the site of a surf shop) was re-created by children and their teachers from the Frederick Irwin Anglican School. Visitors could peek in through the windows and see figurines of people dancing around the ballroom accompanied by music of the period. Children could envisage the life their grandparents and parents had lived. Was sculpture stretched? Was it accessible? One powerful visual feature was a sculpture of two fish made entirely from tin lids and wire. The ‘stretchers’ hoped it would allow the audience to use their imagination. There were challenges which also stretched the organisers. Sound installations and some sculptures needed to tap into the power supply in the light poles which was only available at night. Some nifty negotiation overcame this challenge. Even with power assured, Carolyn Marks and her team had to order special sound cords and these had to be set above human reach. People coming out of the nearby nightclubs might jump up and swing on the electrical fittings. These cords came late and had to be installed at the very last moment. We wondered if we were going to have a sound installation at all, wasting all of that effort and missing the opportunity to listen to the stories. Another problem was that we had to store the sculptures away each night in case somebody pinched or damaged them and then we had to reinstall them the next day. We were dependent on our volunteers to do that, many of whom had jobs to go to besides helping us. Goodwill was needed from all quarters. Council staff often provided equipment to help with technical set-ups.

And the legacy of Stretch 2010? For Nicholas Reynolds the project had a special bonus. We had already interviewed some of the oral history participants well before the festival but then we’d asked general questions about the town. Now we reinterviewed them with much more specific questions about the mall. And the floodgates opened and wonderful stories came out. Carolyn Marks recalled a very positive reaction to the displays. The number of people who went though the mall was huge because at least three schools were involved and that meant that a lot of people contributed to the project. Parents and grandparents came down. They wandered through the mall stopping to read, stopping to listen and taking their time wandering around, being curious and interacting. And like a stone thrown into a pond there are always ripples. Carolyn hopes that now with any redevelopment of the Smart Street Mall, pieces of text from this project could be incorporated into the urban design to act as placemaking tools so that people could read and be aware of the Smart Street history. That would be a lovely ripple effect from this project.

Smart Street has been a feature of Mandurah for over 100 years. The mall was built in the 1970s and its proposed redevelopment is part of the City’s revitalisation plan. This project aimed to preserve social and cultural history, before redevelopment takes place. As Mayor Paddy Creevey described it The Smart Street Mall has always been considered important. It almost became a symbol of Council’s attempts to revitalise the town. There was nothing special about the mall, but it started to take on a new life, with the project being the catalyst. It evoked a lot of interest. John Hughes, Manager of Libraries, Learning, Arts and Culture, took up the story. The starting point for the project was a brainstorming session between officers to develop ideas for the 2010 Stretch Festival. The issue of the proposed redevelopment of the mall emerged and we started talking about ways in which its history might be captured. The project developed from there. The Stretch Festival is an annual event. In 2010 the Festival Co-ordinator asked the Community Museum to collaborate on a project about the mall that involved local artists using various media, a sound artist, local painters, three primary school teachers, an art specialist and members of the local writing group. An oral historian and scribe were also part of the ‘delivery team’. The historian and the scribe talked with retailers and shoppers about their memories, experiences, stories and opinions of Smart Street. This information was then processed by the artists and writers to create sculptures, paintings, text, mixed media and oral recordings. In John’s view the process transformed the community’s information into lots of artistic works, which greatly enhanced the atmosphere of the mall. It also pinpointed significant events over the course of the street’s history. For instance, one of the exhibits was a flickering black and white screen

representing the first TV set in Mandurah. When television first came here, it was displayed in a shop window in Smart Street and people would gather outside and peer at the test card in disbelief. The project brought schools, artists, writers and heritage groups together with two departments of Council, along with retailers and shoppers. It has become a symbol of what can be achieved through strong partnerships across the community. For Nicholas Reynolds the community connection with the museum was a vital ingredient. People in Mandurah are engaged in heritage and they really do care about preserving the city’s history. The Mandurah Community Museum has 27 volunteers, but only one and a half paid staff. The oral history component was developed by the volunteers. We couldn’t have done without them.

Man with Sausages; Tin Fish, photos by Carolyn Marks

We’re finding good examples of partnerships and tolerance in the past through projects like the Smart Street Mall. A model of a dance theatre that was once in the street had American soldiers dancing inside and Indigenous youth swimming across to join them. It showed how well Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal youth got on with each other in those days. Following the Festival, the art works were relocated to the Falcon eLibrary in a nearby suburb for two weeks and then added to the Mandurah Museum’s Oral History Collection for future exhibition and touring. John has no doubts that the Smart Street Mall project has also provided some important spin-offs. We’ve also identified ways that elements of the project can continue, such as for consultations about the Old Traffic Bridge, the possible redevelopment of a caravan park and projects about the natural environment. The Mayor had the final word. We could certainly use some elements of the Smart Street Mall project for the Old Traffic Bridge. Discussion needs to take place with the community. That’s the way to go! TEN PROJECTS

shire of KATANNING 08 Malay Youth Sewing Project

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We are very proud of the multicultural community and its relationship with Council. The Harmony Festival now has a state-wide profile. Lotterywest is saying they want to fund it. The Harmony Festival had about 50 cultures participating and running their own component. Council just provided a free venue, the official welcome and promoted the event on the web. Carl Beck, Acting CEO and Manager of Community Services, Shire of Katanning

Carl Beck, Acting CEO and Manager of Community Services and Community/Youth Development Co-ordinator, Juaini Taylor were my guides to the Malay Youth Sewing Project. Significant numbers of Aboriginal, Cocos and Christmas Islander, Afghani, South African, Chinese and Burmese people live in Katanning and a Mosque caters for the approximately 400 Muslims in that mix. The wide main streets of the town had a typical Australian country town look about them, housing prominent pubs, an old flour mill, a heritage park and a railway line dividing the business district. I had been hoping to find a multicultural cafe or two. I met Juaini at the Katanning Recreation and Leisure Centre and all was revealed. The Centre was packed! We found Carl busy behind a counter looking after a line of people, as the usual receptionist was off sick. He was wearing a Recreation and Leisure Centre t-shirt and certainly didnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t look like a typical CEO. While we were waiting for Carl to finish serving his customers, Juaini told me how she first became involved in the Malay Youth Sewing Project.

Opposite: Showcasing outfits at the 2010 YACWA Fairground Conference, photo by James Campbell

I came to Katanning seven years ago from Bunbury. When I was 18, I got a job in the Health Department, which is how I discovered youth development. I noticed there were no youth programs happening.

Four Malay girls wanted to learn how to sew traditional Malay outfits. These are in high demand for community events, but they can’t be bought off the shelf anywhere in Australia. There was no one in Katanning to teach them but my Mum and her sister in Bunbury are professional seamstresses. They agreed to run a workshop. We ended up with twelve girls aged between 14 and 24. The girls learned basic sewing techniques and to design and create their own outfits. And then Juaini helped to organise a modelling class. When the outfits were finished, we asked a lady to run a modelling class in my lounge room. Within a few hours, she’d taught the girls how to parade, so we organised a fashion show here at the recreation centre and invited friends and family along.

growing communities

Later, we ran another workshop and two more girls joined in. We then paraded the outfits at the Harmony Festival in 2009. All our programs, including the parading of the outfits from the Sewing Project, feed into this annual festival. The events are all made up by the community, for example, a multicultural fashion parade involving local Chinese, Filipino, Thai, Fijian, African, Afghan, Indian, Scottish, Malay and Dutch people.

A rural council’s primary focus is usually on economic development because their councillors tend to be farmers and business people. This council is no different, so we have to demonstrate how the arts can benefit the community. We’ve found that the key is to make sure we pitch our messages and the benefits in a positive way. The Malay Youth Sewing Project has been one of the cornerstones for getting community cultural development to happen here. We are very proud of the multicultural community and its relationship with Council. The Harmony Festival now has a state-wide profile. Lotterywest is saying they want to fund it. The Harmony Festival had about 50 cultures participating and running their own component. Council just provided a free venue, the official welcome and promoted the event on the web. The Malay Youth Sewing Project is not only consistent with the Shire’s mission, which is, Progressing the community through the celebration of diversity and achievements. It has also paved the way to delivering both cultural and economic outcomes for Katanning residents. Ira Taylor was one of the participants in the Malay Sewing Project

This year we included a Harmony Art Exhibition at the Katanning Art Gallery for the first time. This will become an annual event too and the girls can exhibit their outfits if they don’t want to parade next year.

Before the workshop I didn’t know what I wanted to do or be career-wise, but the experience of doing the sewing workshop gave me the motivation to pursue work in the industry.

When Carl Beck joined us I asked him to tell me more about the Council’s cultural development programs.

One could say, ‘As you sew, so shall you reap.’ That was certainly true for more than one young woman from Katanning’s Malay community after taking part in the Sewing Workshop Project in 2009. Ummira Aeson helped kick start the idea. One of my cousins and her friend went to a Career Expo in Katanning. They came back and spoke to Juaini Taylor, who is the Youth Officer here with the Katanning Shire. Wouldn’t it be a good idea to start a sewing project?

But not any old sewing project. When Juaini arranged for me to meet the sewing group on a cold winter’s day in Katanning she introduced me to several of the young women who had taken part in the workshop and also to their mentors, her mother and aunt, Jenita Taylor and Elok Enjia. Ummira drew my attention to Elok’s beautiful full length silk dress in rich yellow with striking patterns. It was a colourful reminder of a distinctive Malay dress tradition; a tradition that Ummira wanted to make sure continued. Most of the elders here are getting on so we want them to pass down their skills to the younger generations. The Malay elders had come to Katanning in the mid 1970s when the Katanning Abattoir opted for a Halal slaughtering practice to make it easier to export sheep to Islamic countries. Malay slaughtermen and meat-workers from the Cocos Islands and from mainland Malaysia were offered jobs in this rural Great Southern community. They brought their families.

The project received a $5,000 grant from Y-Culture run by Country Arts WA, $500 from the Islamic Association as well as in-kind support from the Katanning Shire Council. TAFE Katanning also came back into the picture. We were thankful that TAFE had sewing machines left over from a previous project and they were quite interested in starting up a sewing workshop. They also allowed us to use their art room. I think they were quite happy that both the room and the sewing machines were being used again because most of their courses were in horticulture or farming. The next step was to set up a five-day workshop. And one of the easiest things for me was that the girls took ownership of their project. They got themselves there, they came on time and they brought and shared their food. That made it an easy project for the shire to run. And when I got there on the fifth day they were learning to do other projects because they’d completed their work in four days. There were perhaps unexpected benefits from the five days’ work.

Their children attended the local schools and they are now a distinctive but integral part of Katanning life. The request for help with a Malay-focused sewing workshop was no surprise to the Shire Council. The town has a strong tradition of inclusiveness having also welcomed Karen people from Burma, refugees from Afghanistan and the Congo as well as Chinese workers.

Nurbayti Taylor had never sewn before.

Juaini took up the young women’s request. They had already approached TAFE Katanning to see if they would run a sewing course but the cost proved beyond their means.

Another participant, Ainatul Aeson, gained a casual job at the library at the end of the course. At the public fashion parade which rounded off the workshop, Ainatul mentioned to CEO Carl Beck that she was interested in library work. He offered her a volunteer opportunity that later led to casual employment.

So I approached the Shire. At this time, I was a panellist for Y-Culture, which is a program that funds arts projects for young people aged 12 to 18 years old living in regional areas. I spoke to the girls about this, and two of them volunteered to help put the application together.

And I just thought it might be something to do during the holidays but I learned how to sew Malay clothing and also how to sew a dress and the special occasions when we wear it, like Ramadan and weddings.

There were benefits too for the course mentors. Art worker Jenita Taylor came to Australia in 1976 from the Cocos Islands and was glad to pass on her skills. It is a good idea for us to teach the young ones because it’s much easier for them in the future if they

know how to do it. And the tradition of wearing the right clothes is very important. Siti Mariam Normateen had only recently arrived in Australia. Already an experienced seamstress, her course work was soon rewarded when a local Shire Councillor asked her to sew a Malay outfit. But for Siti the five-day workshop offered an additional bonus. I have been sewing since I was eleven but being very new to Australia I also learned how to talk in English as well. For Ira Taylor a career now beckoned. I’m now designing clothes and I’ve gained more skills from the workshop. Ira also designed a Facebook page, which put her in business as a dress designer. She showed me a portfolio of her recent work, dresses which she has designed and illustrated from a photo-shoot set in the Great Southern landscape. Mottled wandoo trees form a warm, but not intrusive, background for the models who displayed Ira’s vivid, striking and distinctively Malay-inspired outfits. If fusion cooking has taken hold in Australia then fusion dressing has also arrived. In her role as course organiser, Juaini Taylor also came to appreciate the value of the source culture. It was only at the workshop that most of the girls realised how important it is to have these traditional clothes because we have so many Malay weddings and other special occasions when we wear these clothes. We thought what would happen if we couldn’t source these; if we didn’t have our elders to sew these for us. What would we wear to these events where traditional outfits were compulsory? And these were soon on display, as Ira Taylor recalls. At the end of the workshop we set up a fashion parade and invited people from the Shire. We showed them what we actually did. Then in Perth we were invited to a youth conference where we paraded the dresses we had made and made a little speech on what we got out of it, what we’d learned and why it was important to us. TEN PROJECTS

city of BUNBURY

09 Bridging the Gap: Circus Train – Slow Down

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David Smith, Mayor of The City of Bunbury.

To witness the delight on the faces of participants and especially the man with disability whose hand was used as the model for the sculpture was just a delight. He was tremendously proud and I was proud that we had made him proud. David Smith, Mayor of the City of Bunbury, recalling the ‘Bridging the Gap’ sculpture, Circus Train-Slow Down installation on the Leschenault Inlet foreshore. ‘Bridging the Gap’ if it was to do just that, meant forging a link between two groups of people who looked as if they had little in common. Former railway workers in the Bunbury region felt that with the passing of steam and the diminished role of rail, their role in the community had been forgotten. The railway had been a major local employer and the Bunbury Railway Institute, now sadly burned down, was a vital part of the city’s life; a centre for dances and social gatherings. The workers now wanted a public memorial of their contribution to the community.

Bradley Iseppi and Dave (Jock) Lindsay in front of ‘Circus Train-Slow Down’, photo by Matt Scurfield

At almost the same time, DADAA (Disability In the Arts, Disadvantage in the Arts), a community arts organisation based in Fremantle, was also seeking council funding to help Bunbury men and women with disability create a public artwork in a prominent public space. When both groups sought space and funds, Sonya Dye, then Cultural Development Officer for the City of Bunbury, was faced with a dilemma. Public sites were on expensive land and funds could probably only support one project. Her solution? Put them together. We pursued the idea of creating a genuine community cultural development project rather than a purely public art project, and linking the two. We thought the aspirations of the two groups weren’t that dissimilar. Both were looking to have their story told. Story was integral to the project. In an initial bid to find out what should be said and also depicted, artist and historian Helen Seiver ran workshops where railway workers freely told their stories. To cite just one

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One woman who lived alongside the railway regularly lined up bottles on her fence line. Passing engine crews took delight in knocking them off with lumps of coal. They had no idea that it was the coal that she was collecting. To help those with disability to work as artists, DADAA recruited Nicole and Alex Mickle, an experienced artist and sculptor team. At the first workshop they thought their well laid plans for drawing and sketching out ideas would get them started. But within fifteen minutes of being in the room we had to re-think everything; holding a pencil for example. Some found that hard. Others had difficulty in communicating what they wanted to do. We also had to find materials they could work with. We spent time switching between wire and clay.

And this guy was standing there with only one arm. As Sonya Dye had predicted, the two groups had a lot in common. Some railwaymen had suffered injuries in the course of their work and both groups could claim to feel marginalised. For the project to succeed the key was to find sensory and visual elements that would appeal to everyone.

The clear favourite was an inter-twining of steel; a glowing criss-crossing of rail lines. This picture could represent a number of ideas including a suggestion of unity or possibly confusion; a condition which those with disabilities frequently faced in their daily lives. It was perhaps also a recognition that the artists, like the rail workers, identified with railway culture.

The wheel looked promising. For some with disability a wheelchair suggested difference from other people, but it also offered mobility. The spoked wheel was also iconic for men who had worked with steam engines.

For their part, the rail men spoke not only of the mechanical side of their work but passionately recalled the noise and the steam and the rush of wind when you stood by the track.

Two other inspirations came from the story of the circus train; at one time an important event in the life of Bunbury. Families turned out en masse to see the Worth’s Circus train unloaded, with the elephants taking on the task of pulling the wagons full of other animals off the train and onto the platform. It was a wonderful spectacle in itself, let alone the circus that followed.

Sonya Dye had noticed almost immediately that a sense of the elemental and of freedom also pervaded their project partners. The artists with disability worked without any inhibition.

At one of the early workshops Helen Seiver read a short story by Ray Repacholi about this regular event. The response was joyous and immediate. Both those with disability and those who had worked on the railway could remember when the circus came to town. A bond had been forged.

Mutual recognition of these elemental memories drew debate about how a sculpture would embody memory by moving away from the purely representational towards a stylised concept of power and inclusion. Initially the railway workers had envisaged a realistic mural of a stream train but increasingly they came to support an abstract approach.

The circus was also a reminder of a slower, more relaxed era before television and organised mass entertainment. ‘Slowing down’ and the ‘circus train’ became key elements in the final choice of sculptural design. As Nicole Mickle commented, the ‘circus train’ also became a metaphor for ‘life as a circus’, the hectic pace of our everyday lives and the yearning to just slow things down. Another visual breakthrough came when the would-be artists had been shown two hundred or so photographs and were asked to name those which appealed to them.

There was no “What shall I draw?” syndrome. They drew freely and that freed up everyone else to explore imaginatively.

A union of disability and railway history in the final sculpture was recognised in the form of the joined casts of two hands. One was Dave (Jock) Lindsay’s; a railway man who had led the push for rail workers’ recognition. The other was the hand of Bradley Iseppi. Iseppi is a man in his mid-forties with an intellectual disability. Bradley lives in Australind in a group home, and works at Activ Foundation’s business services making Visy board packaging and labels for wine. He also volunteers in the community for organisations including St. John Ambulance. Bradley enjoys anything to do with cars, including going to the speedway.

Much earlier in Bridging The Gap, one of Bradley’s charcoal drawings had inspired Alex Mickle and helped create the basis for the Circus Train sculpture. Jock and Bradley shook hands once again on the day of the launch. Friendships had grown during the five year project. Helen Seiver remembers an artist with disability who told a rail man that her father had worked on the Trans Australia rail line. It formed a bond. Next day he came in with a replica small steam engine. They were friends. It was a very rewarding project for Helen herself.

Mayor David Smith launched Circus Train-Slow Down on September 11, 2010. He remembers that moment as one that acknowledged a learning curve for both parties; a process of trial and error, requiring patience and education for people making the effort to do something. There was growth on both sides; a warm feeling for those who’d helped and pride for those who’d tried. It is too easy to say something is too hard. It is hard, but their perseverance lifts the whole spirit of the community.

I think it changed all of our lives starting with those workshops through to the end. Abilities, courage and perseverance; that was the spin off for us. For me it was connections that were made – right from the beginning with people who didn’t think they could work together to find that there were so many things in common, just seeing them sitting at tables, talking, drawing, sketching. For Alex, Bridging the Gap was an eye opener At the start of the workshops I thought, “This is something I’ve got to go to on Friday and in a few weeks I’ll get through it, whatever comes of it.” But pretty quickly I started to look forward to Fridays more than the rest of the week. I saw the value of community arts projects for the first time because I was totally uninterested. I was interested in producing my own art. ‘The Gap’ was finally bridged at a celebration at the edge of the Leschenault Inlet, not far from the site of the old railway bridge and rail yards.

Reconciling the hopes of those with disability with those of the railway men took time. Alex recalls one rail retiree asking what railways had to do with disability.

TEN PROJECTS

city of ARMADALE

10 The Champion Centre Holiday Mosaic Project

When I walked into the Champion Centre I was greeted by two impressive displays. One is a mosaic of the Six Seasons; the Noongar reading of our annual weather. Subtle changes in hue in this colourful masterpiece suggest more effectively than any words the way in which the Western Australian nature calendar works. Sticks and nuts gathered from the surrounding bushland give the design a distinctive warm texture. The other mosaic, The Snake, is a glistening serpent that winds around the walls of the children’s crèche. Both mosaics were made by local children.

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There were so many sticks and nuts lying around and that gave me an idea. This project was about the seasons, about nature, about the world around us. It helped us to design the project in an abstract way. We didn’t want to be literal, just use colours, shapes and textures.

I talked about this project with Jodie Clarke, Indigenous Development Co-ordinator, artist, Danka Scholtz and Indigenous Centre Development Officer, Nicole Hayward. Jodie always gives visitors a tour of the centre. Comments on the artwork are always positive. And when you tell them the ages of the kids (who made it) they always think it is the work of adults. Armadale’s Champion Centre focuses on projects that encourage creative activity with something to show for it at the end.

Community artist, Danka Scholtz

For Nicole and Jodie “creative activity” for the annual January Intensive School Holiday Program meant more than sport. While many local Aboriginal parents were pushing for sports activities at the Centre, both women wanted to open their eyes to other possibilities.

L>R: Starting the mosaic; Completed Snake ready for mounting; Starting the Snake Holiday Mosaic Project participants, photos by City of Armadale staff

Jodie’s aim was to turn the Centre into a place where Aboriginal children could have their art up on the wall for all to see. It was a strenuous project for the kids, very ‘in depth’, but we wanted to be ‘outside the box’. They engaged Danka Scholtz, an experienced artist in working in multicultural settings. But she soon presented a problem. We had to kick Danka out a couple of times because she wanted to stay longer. Danka herself was swiftly taken aback. Mosaic at the Champion Centre, photo by City of Armadale staff

I was surprised by how quickly the children picked up what was needed and, from an artistic perspective, it was amazing, right down to the tiniest one. The enthusiasm was fantastic.

The girls were all sitting around on the floor and Danka had pieces of the snake out on the floor and there were all these coloured beads and I said to Danka,

The City of Armadale is 28 kilometres south east of Perth, at the foot of the Darling Ranges. Aboriginal people make up about four per cent of the City’s population, nearly twice the State average.

I don’t think they got tired. I couldn’t keep up with them. I got tired but I also got so much help. Everybody got involved, staff, friends and families. I didn’t have to ask for help with problems. Everyone seemed to know when to step in and how to help.

“Do you think we should take the coloured beads off them?”

The Champion Centre has given Armadale a focus for services to Aboriginal residents. As soon as the doors opened, the Centre received funding from the Commonwealth Department of Families, Housing, Community Services and Indigenous Affairs (FaHCSIA). It has now become a one-stop shop and home to a range of other organisations, all supporting Aboriginal children and families.

Danka’s first task was to discuss what the children could do within the limited time provided (a fortnight) and how every child could be involved. The surrounding bush helped out. There were so many sticks and nuts lying around and that gave me an idea. This project was about the seasons, about nature, about the world around us. It helped us to design the project in an abstract way. We didn’t want to be literal, just use colours, shapes and textures. Almost from the beginning, the project was as much about self-organisation as about art. A core group of children asked Danka to write down a list of materials that their parents would need to buy for them to complete the art work. The fortnight stretched on for seven weeks. School had started but many children still came back to the Centre in the afternoon. However, as Danka remembers, it didn’t start that way. I had my doubts because the program was quite ambitious. It was a huge project. There were two big groups and little time and one group didn’t turn up on the first day. But the word spread around and in the next two days we got a big group that kept coming. And kept on coming… Top>Bottom: Local youngsters display Mosaic Talent, photo by Marcelo Palacios; Head of the Snake, photo by City of Armadale staff

Each time she takes visitors into the children’s crèche to see the Big Snake, Jodie tells a story against herself.

Because I thought it was too much, a bit over the top, but now when we see the snake mosaic, all grouted and mounted, all those glass pebbles glisten and that’s the first thing visitors talk about when they walk in. And I always remember that, because this is a piece of art that some very little children did. And there was I saying, “Take those things away because it looks horrible”. For staff and the child artists alike, the launch of the Holiday Mosaic Project on 25 March 2010 was reward enough for the five additional weeks of work. But a lot more action had gone on behind the scenes. The extra weeks of child artistic labour also put demands on supervising staff. It was January. Most afternoons were hot and children were working with potentially dangerous cutting tools. But under Danka’s firm instructions and supervision, no mishaps occurred. Jodie felt that the launch justified their efforts. These children don’t often have an event where they are given a certificate, asked to come up on stage, get a handshake from the Mayor. But perhaps the important thing is that these kids feel good about themselves. Danka summed up the project. I very much enjoyed the whole experience. It was hard work. I hate hot weather but I didn’t notice how hot it was because the work was so interesting. And the kids most of all, cheeky, witty, funny, very positive, full of life and yet co-operating like little cells in one big brain. They always somehow got together.

CEO Ray Tame set the scene. The City of Armadale has had an unwavering commitment to the Indigenous sector for the past 14 years, a commitment in our hearts from the Mayor down. However it hasn’t been easy to manifest. The challenge has been to find ways of developing a closer relationship with Aboriginal residents. The opportunity arose with the birth of the Champion Centre. The Centre is based in a Council building previously leased to the Police and Citizens Youth Club. When the club relocated, the Council decided to make the centre available for use by the local Aboriginal community. But Council did not immediately envisage the benefits to the community and the City. Members of the local Aboriginal community give leadership, which ensures that the centre operates in ways that accord with Aboriginal needs and customs. But equally the Champion Centre welcomes everyone. The six staff are all Aboriginal. They have proved to be a crucial asset in helping the Council meet its commitment to the Aboriginal community. Early on, the staff consulted with the local Aboriginal community and this led to a school holiday program with a difference. The theme is always arts based. Neil Kegie, Executive Manager of Community Services for the City of Armadale thinks this model may be unique to Armadale.

We’re yet to find another council doing what we do. During the school holidays children create artworks which are hung up in the centre for display. This is gradually changing the atmosphere of the building from sport to a gathering place for Aboriginal people. For Ray Tame, the importance of all children gaining an education has long been a priority. Jodie Clarke explained that when the centre commissioned artist Danka Sholtz to work on the school holiday program, the project focus was motor skill development and civic mindedness; to be a member of a team and then to open up to the broader community.

While six panels, representing Noongar seasons were created by the artist with contributions from the older children, the younger children worked on the mosaic snake. They created the 120 pieces. As Jodie recalled putting it together took ages, but nobody minded. They didn’t know how long the snake was going to be. It just grew and grew. Now that the snake occupies pride of place in the children’s crèche, Jodie finds that some of the kids come in from time to time, just to look at the snake and point out which bits they did. Neil was interested in the final outcome.

The underlying aim for Danka was to provide new experiences and to teach new skills, because some of the children were normally disengaged. Most of them didn’t go to school, so they didn’t have much to keep their minds occupied.

Danka has been instrumental in ensuring the quality of the work. We’re planning to bring her back to do more. It was clear that she was not only an accomplished artist, but she also had a natural ability to work with children, to keep them engaged and to get the desired results.

Danka is a well-known artist and experienced in working with community groups, but this was the first time she had worked with children. Danka started with the basics, by taking the children through an intensive study in mosaics and sand casting.

We’re also planning to extend the work to other sectors of the Indigenous community, for example, we’ve just applied for funds to bring young women in, to bring the old sewing circles back.

Danka told them they had to complete their training before she would permit them to contribute to the artwork. The kids were having lots of fun with Danka, so they willingly completed their training. I asked Jodie whether any of the kids caused any trouble during the project. No, we don’t have tagging anymore. At first we had a kid tagging the centre. He and his mates turned up to the school holiday program and he was overheard talking about it. So he was pulled aside and talked to about ownership. At the end, he brought his Dad down and was so proud about what he had done here.

The City of Armadale Strategic Plan emphasises community wellbeing. The community has definitely gained from the opening of the Champion Centre and in particular, from the many and diverse outcomes of the Holiday Mosaic Project. Neil wraps up We couldn’t list the names of the participants in the artwork as some of them are under child protection. But we wanted to acknowledge them so we ended up having a discreet launch, with the Mayor giving each child a certificate and a handshake. On the day of the launch, we watched the kids bursting through the doors, dragging their parents and grandparents along. They were all very proud.

TEN PROJECTS

communityhow arts andtocultural development in local government This section provides tips for local council officers who are involved in community arts and cultural development projects.

01 Preamble 02 Get to know your Council’s Strategic Plans 03 Get to know what other departments are planning

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04 Develop internal partnerships

01 Preamble Experienced practitioners have compiled these tips to help you generate support for community arts and cultural development within your local government. Of course, given the diversity of local government across Australia, not every idea here will apply to every circumstance. However, we hope the principles will prove helpful to you as you go about your work and advocacy.

02 Get to know your council’s strategic plans

03 Get to know what other departments are planning

The most important thing to do is to become familiar with the key planning documents at your council. These vary but will probably include one or more of the following:

Sometimes arts and cultural officers complain that their work is not well understood by other departments or that other staff don’t know anything about what the arts unit is doing. This may be true, but have you checked whether arts and cultural officers know much about what other departments are doing?

• strategic plan • corporate plan • community plan

05 Take advantage of networking with other Councils 06 Get to know the community 07 Engage in strategic long term planning 08 Use the end of the financial year 09 Use the beginning of the calendar year 10 Familiarise yourself with State and Commonwealth Government priorities 11 Use your manager to open doors and disseminate information

The annual report is also a useful source of information about council’s latest strategic priorities and concerns. Study the key performance areas, aspirations, priorities, strategies or goals (or whatever words have been chosen to articulate the main directions of the council). Make sure that your work responds to as many as possible and that you can talk about your projects and programs in terms of these priorities.

Do as much as you can to understand the work of others. A good start is to familiarise yourself with the major plans or documents that have been produced by each of the departments across council. This might include a recreational plan, a social plan, an environmental or sustainability plan or an economic development plan. You will probably discover that there are many opportunities for your people to collaborate with other staff to jointly address one or more of the main goals of your council.

Next, take a look at your council’s cultural plan (if you have one) and make sure that it directly reflects the directions in the strategic and corporate plans. If not, start working towards its revision (or maybe the strategic plan needs to be revised!) to ensure that your planning and work is aligned to the broader goals of your council. how to

04 Develop internal partnerships Even if you can’t identify a project with another department, remember what an important resource your council colleagues can be. (i)

Utilise the skills of: • social planners to keep abreast of population trends and changes so that your projects are in line with the makeup of the community. • environmental planners to gain support for any proposed arts projects that address environmental issues.

(iii)

• economic planners to obtain information about economic development opportunities, such as tourism proposals that could include an arts component. (ii)

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Meet with each of the above departments to discuss ways in which you might collaborate in the future. For example, sometimes other departments include an arts component in their projects without informing the arts unit – and vice versa. This can result in the project having a weak link, such as an artist being commissioned by the environmental planning team (for instance) without a watertight contract, maintenance plan or copyright agreement being in place. On the flip side, the arts team might undertake a public art project without understanding the environmental context of its placement. In each of these cases, collaboration between the arts and environmental planning teams would ensure a successful outcome for both projects.

(iv)

A formal agreement between all departments of council to pursue a collaborative approach to cross-disciplinary projects would result in a greater success rate of projects and an integrated approach to service provision. This could involve the establishment of a cross-functional committee, comprising one representative from each department, whose role could be to coordinate input from each department affected by the project. Arts and cultural development is often seen as a lesser priority in councils because of its (often) intangible outcomes. It can be difficult to justify the cost of some cultural activities, especially those that don’t result in a visible product, when the same money can be spent on a new pavement that everyone can see. So how can we make the arts and culture more visible? One opportunity is to talk to the staff responsible for your council’s Geographic Information Systems (GIS) and request a cultural layer be included in the system. Not only could this layer map all the heritage sites in the area, it could also identify creative industries or the places where people gather for cultural activities. Another way to improve the visibility of your work is through partnerships with other departments, providing a cultural component to broader projects that do have an immediate visible outcome. Arts and cultural development often have a natural link to your council’s marketing because much of what you do generates ‘good news’ for your council. Develop a good relationship with the marketing staff and enlist their help to get your events calendars and other promotion circulated more widely for little, if any, cost to your unit. Ask them to alert you if any department is promoting an event that could include a cultural add-on.

(v)

The staff managing your council’s consultation processes are also valuable allies and you may have much to offer them. Maintain a dialogue with them about council’s approach to consultation and keep in touch with the consultation processes underway. Encourage an integrated approach where different departments can join in one process to achieve community feedback or, at least, where feedback is shared across the organisation. This could avoid the problem of community members being overconsulted and thinking that council officers don’t actually know what each other is doing (which is, sadly, often the case!)

Consider whether your activities and events offer opportunities for some innovative consultation processes. Can you involve your community artists in consultation processes? Or can your projects and processes help to engage those difficult to get to members of the community?

(vi)

The planning department is a particularly important partner even though it may take persistence to engage them. Your cultural planning should be informed by their work and vice versa. Depending on the size and sophistication of your council, the cultural unit may be able to contribute its expertise to planning new residential developments, ensuring that planners consider how to enhance opportunities for community gatherings and connection or what facilities are needed to encourage arts and cultural development.

(vii)

If a community facility is being developed ensure access to early discussions with developers and architects. This will give you the opportunity to ensure that the design takes into account the ‘personality’ of the community expecting to use it, and to suggest that artists be brought in to develop design themes that respond to community values and tastes. If the building is to be used as a multi-purpose community centre or an arts centre, then you need to ensure that the builders get it right. One council built a performing arts venue but failed to plan sound-proofing between the two theatres inside. This resulted in the smaller theatre having to remain dark whenever the larger theatre was in use. Another built a hall that needed to accommodate school and community productions but there was no loading dock, no 3-phase power, no wings, no room for a lighting grid and no dressing rooms. Furthermore, the door leading to the performance area was too low and narrow to allow pianos and large sets to be brought in and out. Sounds improbable, but it happens! Find out which community groups meet with council departments and ask the hosting departments if you could come along to one of their meetings to suggest a get together with one or more of the groups the arts team works with. For example, a cross-cultural cooking group might be interested in catering for a cross-cultural traditional dance night; a walking group might want to link with a drawing group to jointly propose illustrated interpretation along a walking track; a heritage group might want to link with a literary group for a night of stories about early life in a local historic house, etc.

05 Take advantage of networking with other councils (i)

Look for opportunities to meet with officers from other councils, as joint projects involving more than one council can attract significant funding from state and federal governments.

(ii)

Networking with other arts officers can also lead to other opportunities, such as swapping exhibitions or projects; sharing resources, such as artists’ registers, portable stages, events trailers; or even swapping jobs for a period.

(iii)

It is also useful to consider benchmarking with other councils – not just on your projects and work but also on your budget allocations, pay and conditions. Providing tangible comparisons to support your application for more resources or for improved conditions can be very effective.

06 Get to know the community (i)

Consider seeking new initiative funding from council to undertake a skills, assets and interests audit of the community and use the council’s mail outs (such as rates notices, welcome packs for new residents, annual calendars for rubbish collection, etc.) to distribute a survey to all households at no cost to your unit. Also canvas people in shopping centres, public thoroughfares and tertiary institutions to reach non-ratepayers.

The idea is to identify any residents who have skills or an interest in a particular artform (or cultural pursuit) so that you can build up a database of both professional and recreational arts/cultural enthusiasts. Respondents could be asked to provide their contact details if they wish to be informed of, or involved in, future opportunities, such as paid work, voluntary work, events, festivals, workshops, forums, etc.

This information could feed into more artists on your artists’ register, more volunteers for cultural events, the involvement of new blood, the opportunity to bring people with a shared interest together, a clearer idea of the current makeup of the community and its span of interests, a more targeted resident mailing list, better opportunities to utilise local people’s skills and respond to their interests.

(ii)

If you are undertaking a cultural planning process, use the above mailing list and those generated by other departments to identify residents who may be interested in joining a cultural planning group, either on a neighbourhood or municipality-wide basis. Propose regular meetings with the group to discuss issues, opportunities and ideas to inform the cultural plan. Preferably the meetings should be chaired by unit staff but take place outside council and at a ‘neutral’ venue. Not only could this group provide valuable information to feed into the cultural plan (and other council planning documents), but it could also become a very useful conduit between council and the community.

how to

07 Engage in strategic long term planning It is often the case that arts and cultural officers in councils work long hours and can have months of overtime clocked up, with little time to take it. This is particularly the case for those staff locked into delivering a range of annual events that the community and the council have come to expect. This doesn’t stop new ideas and projects emerging to cater for the changing or growing interests of the community. The only way to deal with this (apart from burning out and retiring to the Bahamas!) is to take advantage of the council’s long term strategic plan or similar. By aligning the cultural plan and your work plan to this key document, the arts unit will be able to gradually phase out some activities in order to make room for new initiatives. Each year leading up to a shift in priorities or activities, the plan could include steps that reduce involvement in one area and build incrementally towards the new activity. This approach should mean that by the time the change is fully enacted, the community and councillors are ready to accept something new.

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08 Use the end of the financial year Quite often towards the end of the financial year, councils have unexpended funds in budgets across the organisation. This can happen when staff have been a bit too ambitious with their planning or when events beyond their control have prevented them from completing their commitments. Connecting with colleagues in other departments at the beginning of June may open up ways for the arts unit to produce projects using these unexpended funds. The downside to this is that ‘on paper’, the other department is still seen to spend the money (through the arts unit), so if your council allocates each department a percentage increase in their budget for the next year, that amount boosts the other department’s budget – not the arts unit’s. However, with the emphasis now on integrated planning, and the state government requiring all WA councils to develop integrated plans, a new funding arrangement that takes into account these adjustments could be possible.

09 Use the beginning of the calendar year The first quarter of the calendar year is when staff become involved in the budget process and each department competes with the others for a larger slice of the pie. Usually, each department is given a small increase based on CPI, plus additional funds for new initiatives that address council’s priorities. This is the time when you can benefit from all that work you have been doing building relationships with other officers and departments across council. Being the first to develop cross-functional initiatives means that the funding for them will rest with your unit and other departments will support them. This will improve your project’s chance of surviving the final cuts that are determined by the senior management team.

10 Familiarise yourself with state and federal government priorities (i)

Keep up to date with the priorities of the state and federal governments and the relevant government agencies so that you are alert to funding possibilities for various projects. The more your project responds to those priorities, the more likely it is that you’ll be successful.

(ii)

Keep in mind that state and federal governments have limited capacity to develop direct links with the community and therefore local government is an important conduit for them to achieve goals that rely on community partnerships. This is especially so with matters of regional development. It is also clear that the more partners you can bring to the table on projects (especially across the region), the more likely the project is to be funded. Also take advantage of relevant priorities of state and federal governments to support the actions you propose in the cultural plan or the projects you develop. For example, the current requirement for WA Councils to develop integrated plans would support your proposal to integrate your program across council.

11 Use your manager to open doors and disseminate information (two way) (i)

Request that your manager keeps you well informed of relevant discussions or outcomes from any meetings that you have not had access to, such as directors’ or managers’ meetings and interagency meetings.

(ii)

Ask for your manager’s support in building your understanding of the broad operations and priorities of council. Make the most of your manager’s relationships across council, particularly in creating partnerships with other departments.

(iii)

Use your team meetings to greatest advantage. This might involve requesting an agenda beforehand, so that you can add items you want to discuss or find out more about.

(iv)

Keep your manager informed of all ‘good news’ stories from your team so the information can move up through the organisation. Your success is their success.

how to

Lewis, A & Doyle, D eds. 2008. Proving the Practice: Disability in the Arts Disadvantage in the Arts Australia (DADAA). Mills D & Brown P, 2004, Art and Wellbeing: A Guide to the Connections Between Community Cultural Development and Health, Ecologically Sustainable Development, Public Housing and Place, Rural Revitalisation, community Strengthening, Active Citizenship, Social Inclusion and Cultural Diversity, Australia Council for the Arts, NSW, Australia. Regional Arts Australia, 2008, Big Story Country: Great Arts Stories From Regional Australia, Australia. Sonn, C, Drew, N & Kasat, P, 2002, Conceptualising Community Cultural Development, Perth, Australia. United Nations Educational Scientific and Cultural Organisational UNESCO, 1996, Our Creative Diversity.

recommended recommended resources resources

Cultural planning and place making Anderson, K, Ang, I and Lally, E, 2011The Art of Engagement: Culture, Collaboration & Innovation. University of Western Australia Press. Authenticity, 2008, Creative City Planning Framework. A Supporting Document to the Agenda for Prosperity: Prospectus for a Great City, Toronto, Canada. Available from: http://www.toronto.ca/culture/pdf/ creative-city-planning-framework-feb08.pdf Burges, R 2004, ‘Creative Partnerships and Collaborations Forum’ in Cultural Planning Bulletin. Community Arts Network WA, Perth, pp. 7 – 10. Effective Change, 2002, Evaluating Community Arts and Community Well Being: An Evaluation Guide for the Community Arts Practitioners, Victoria, Australia. Grogan, D and Mercer, C & Engwicht, D 1995, The Cultural Planning Handbook: An Essential Australian Guide, Allen & Unwin, Australia.

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Advocacy

Jackson, C 2007, ‘Cultural Planning, Core of Strategic Planning in the Shire of Lake Grace’, Cultural Planning Bulletin, Summer 2006/2007 Edition, Community Arts Network WA, Perth.

Hawkes, J, 2001, The Fourth Pillar of Sustainability: Culture’s Essential Role in Public Planning. Common Ground Publishing in association with the Cultural Development Network, Victoria, Australia.

Matarasso F and Landry, C 2006, Balancing Act: Strategic Dilemmas in Cultural Policy, CoMedia, United Kingdom.

Holden, John J, 2004, Capturing Cultural Value; how culture had become a tool of government policy. Demos, London.

Mills, D 2003, ‘Cultural Planning - Policy Task, Not Tool’ in Artwork, Community Arts Network SA Inc, Adelaide, Issue 55, May 2003 www.ccd.net/pdf/art55_cultural_planning.pdf

Matarasso, Francois 1997, Use or Ornament? The social impact of participation in the arts. Comedia. Palmer, D & Sonn, C, 2010, Naked Practice: Outcomes of Two Community Arts Projects in Regional Western Australia. Perth: Community Arts Network WA, Australia.

Newman, N 2003, ‘Cultural and Urban Planning: Should The Two Meet and Why?’ in Cultural Planning Bulletin: Cultural and Urban Planning: Should the Two Meet and Why? Community Arts Network WA, Perth, pp. 4 – 7.

Seares, M Prof. with assistance from Gardiner-Garden, J Dr, 2010 Cultural policies in Australia. Australia Council, Australia.

NSW Ministry for the Arts, 2004, Cultural Planning Guidelines for Local Government, New South Wales, Australia.

Sonn, C & Green, M, Drawing Out Community Empowerment Through Arts and Cultural Practice. Community Arts Network WA, Australia.

Pamille Berg Consulting, 2005, Toward a New Cultural Plan: The Arts and Cultural Strategy Consultancy Report, Coffs Harbour City Council, New South Wales, Australia.

The United Nations, Declaration of Human Rights. Available from: http://www.un.org/en/documents/udhr/

Sandercock, L. 2003, ‘Out of the Closet: The Importance of Stories and Storytelling in Planning Practice.’ Planning, Theory and Practice 4 (1):11-28.

Kins, A and Peddie B, 1996, Planning a Complete Community; A Cultural Planning Guide for Local Government. Community Arts Network WA, Australia

Sandercock, L 1998, Towards Cosmopolis. Chichester: John Wiley & Sons Ltd.

Community arts and cultural development Adams, D & Goldbard A, eds. 2002, Community, Culture and Globalisation. The Rockefeller Foundation.

Local government and community engagement

Adams, D & Goldbard A, 2001, ‘Theory from Practice: Elements of a Theory of Community Cultural Development’, Creative Community: The Art of Cultural Development, The Rockefeller Foundation, New York, Chapter Five, pp. 58 – 69.

Ajuntament de Barcelona, Institut de Cultura, 2008, Local Agenda 21. Available from: http://agenda21culture.net/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=44&Itemid=58&lang=en

Australia Council, 2011, Australian Arts Organisations Directory, NSW, Australia. Available from: http://www.australiacouncil.gov.au/resources/reports_and_publications/subjects/arts_sector/australian_arts_ organisations_directory_2011-12

Chapell, B author, 2008, Community Engagement Handbook: A Model Framework for leading practice In Local Government in South Australia, South Australia, Local Government Association of South Australia and Government of South Australia. Available from: http://www.lga.sa.gov.au/webdata/resources/files/Community_Engagement_Handbook_March_2008_-_PDF.pdf

Community Arts Network WA, 2012, Dream. Plan. Do. A Resource Guide to Community Arts and Cultural Development. Community Arts Network WA, Australia.

Mulligan, M and Smith, P, 2010, Art, Governance and the Turn to Community. Putting Art at the Heart of Local Government. Globalism Research Centre, RMIT University. Available from: http://mams.rmit.edu.au/fc1d0uu0zhpm1.pdf

Creative City Network of Canada, 2005, Arts and Positive Change in Communities, Creative City Network of Canada, Vancouver.

Australian Local Government Association (ALGA) 1997, Declaration on the role of Australian local government, Available from: http://www.alga.asn.au/?ID=55

Goldbard, A, 2006, New Creative Community: the Art of Cultural Development, New Village Press. Hawkins, G, 1993, From Nimbin to Mardi Gras: Constructing Community Arts, Allen and Unwin, Sydney.

recommended resources

Relevant websites

growing communities

Agenda 21 for Culture http://www.agenda21culture.net

Department for Culture Media and Sport

Artsource http://www.artsource.net.au

Division of Local Government http://www.dlg.nsw.gov.au

Australia Council for the Arts http://www.australiacouncil.gov.au

East Perth Revitalisation Authority EPRA http://www.epra.wa.gov.au

Centre for Cultural Partnerships, Victorian College for the Arts http://www.vca.unimelb.edu.au/ccp

International Association of Public Participation Australasia http://www.iap2.org.au

Charles Landry http://www.charleslandry.com

International Federation of Arts Councils and Culture Agencies http://www.ifacca.org

CoMedia http://www.comedia.org.uk

Jon Hawkes http://www.community.culturaldevelopment.net.au/index.html

Community Arts Network WA (CAN WA) http://www.canwa.com.au

Museums Australia http://www.museumsaustralia.org.au

Country Arts WA http://www.countryartswa.asn.au

Office for the Arts http://www.arts.gov.au

Creative City Network of Canada http://www.creativecity.ca

The Place Leaders Association http://www.placeleaders.com.au

Cultural data online (Australia) http://www.culturaldata.gov.au

Villagewell http://www.villagewell.org

Cultural Development Network http://www.culturaldevelopment.net.au

WA Local Government Association (WALGA) http://www.walga.asn.au

Demos http://www.demos.co.uk/publications

For relevant arts and funding bodies go to:

Department of Culture and the Arts (DCA) http://www.dca.wa.gov.au

The CAN WA links page http://www.canwa.com.au/canwa-resources/links

http://www.culture.gov.uk/culture/index.aspx

definitionsdefinitions Arts

Culture

Cultural mapping

The arts consist of many creative endeavors and disciplines including visual arts, literary arts, the performing arts, multi media and film, among other forms and fusions of these forms.

A society’s values are the basis upon which all else is built. These values and the ways they are expressed are a society’s culture. The way a society governs itself cannot be fully democratic without there being clear avenues for the expression of community values, and unless these expressions directly affect the directions society takes. These processes are culture at work.1

Cultural mapping involves a community identifying and documenting local cultural resources. Through this research cultural elements are recorded – the tangibles like galleries, craft industries, distinctive landmarks, local events and industries, as well as the intangibles like memories, personal histories attitudes and values. Cultural planning is the process of working with a community to create a strategic plan for it’s future cultural development.2

1 J, Hawkes, 2001, Fourth Pillar, Cultural Development Network, Vic. Australia

2 The Commonwealth Department of Communications and the Arts, 1995, Mapping Culture, ACT, Australia 3 Community Arts Council of Vancouver, 2010 and Adams and Goldbard, 2002 quoted in P Kasat,

Community Arts – A Transformative Practice (working title) thesis (forthcoming), Australia, 2012

4 Community Arts Network WA, 2012, Dream. Plan. Do. A Resource Guide to Community Arts and Cultural Development.

Community Arts Network WA (CAN WA), Australia

5 Sourced http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public_consultation

The above list of resources is a sample of the diversity of approaches to cultural development and is by no means exhaustive.

6 Cavaye, J.M. 2004 quoted in, S Ruane, DRAFT Community Engagement and Cultural Planning manual, CAN WA, Australia, 2012 7 Project for Public Spaces, New York, http://www.pps.org/articles/what_is_placemaking/

DEFINITIONS

Community arts and community cultural development

Community arts and cultural development

Community engagement vs Community consultation

The definition of the practice has largely been approached by trying to define two key concepts: community arts and community cultural development. At different times both of these terms have been used interchangeably. At other times they have been understood as two separate but complementary processes. Community cultural development has been described as the process and the philosophical underpinnings of this practice and community arts as the medium or tool to achieve the artistic outcomes. This point is illustrated in the definition below:

A more contemporary way of describing this work is as community arts and cultural development, which encompasses both concepts, community arts and community cultural development.

Public consultation, or simply consultation, is a regulatory process by which the public’s input on matters affecting them is sought.5

Community cultural development is the process of collaboration between artists and community members on agreed upon goals. Community art is the medium through which this collaboration can take place and includes visual, media and performing arts.  The principles behind the work are active participation, intentional inclusivity and ongoing learning. The process builds community, increases awareness of the value of the arts in our lives, develops creativity and addresses common issues” (Community Arts Council of Vancouver, 2010).

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Community Cultural Development describes the work of artist – organisers (“community artist”) who collaborate with others to express identity, concerns and aspirations through the arts and communications media, while building cultural capacity and contributing to social change. In community cultural development work, community artists, singly or in teams, use their artist and organisational skills to serve the emancipation and development of a community, whether defined by geography (e.g., a neighbourhood), common interest (e.g., members of a union) or identity (e.g., members of an indigenous group) (Adams and Goldbard, 2002).3

As the practice of community arts and cultural development has evolved in Australia it has made important contributions in areas such as health, education, cultural diversity, rural and regional revitalisation, sustainability and social inclusion. This has led to some strong partnerships between artists, arts organisations and other agencies such as local government, various state departments and agencies, other non-government organisations and community based groups and corporate supporters. In fact, most successful projects these days result from collaboration between different supporters.4

It is important to note that the term engagement does not replace the term consultation. While consultation is a form of engagement, community engagement is generally used to describe a more intense form of public participation, where citizens are more actively involved in joint decision making and planning processes. It is a twoway flow of information and ideas where decision-makers and community members work together to mutually formulate policies, plans and actions (Cavaye, 2004).6

about the about the writers writers

The arts is an effective tool for community engagement.

Sandra Nicolaides

Placemaking Placemaking is a multi-faceted approach to the planning, design and management of public spaces. Put simply, it involves looking at, listening to, and asking questions of the people who live, work and play in a particular space, to discover their needs and aspirations. This information is then used to create a common vision for that place. The vision can evolve quickly into an implementation strategy, beginning with small-scale, do-able improvements that can immediately bring benefits to public spaces and the people who use them.7

L>R: Bill Bunbury; Sandra Nicolaides

Bill Bunbury Born in the United Kingdom, Bill Bunbury has worked as a producer/presenter in both radio and television from 1969, producing education programs before joining the newly formed ABC Radio National Social History where he produced programs for Background Briefing, Hindsight Verbatim, Street Stories and Encounter from 1985 to 2007. Bill is currently Adjunct Professor of History and Media at Murdoch University. He has won various awards including the United Nations Peace Prize, 1986, for his documentary Vietnam The War Rages On; the New South Wales Inaugural Premier’s Award, 1997 for his six part radio series Unfinished Business and Gold Medal; and in 1996 the New York Radio Festival Award for Best history documentary, Timber For Gold.

Bill has also worked extensively in International Radio Training in Pakistan, Tanzania, Papua New Guinea and in Australia with indigenous radio, both with the ABC and at Bachelor College Northern Territory. More recently he has completed radio production with South West Noongar people for Community Arts Network WA. With an initial Honours degree in Literature, Bill has always emphasized the importance of narrative, of storytelling as an important aspect of communication, whether it is in history or the arts. The arts, whether in the form of music, writing, painting or acting, he believes, breathe life into the human story and enrich any community that they serve.

Sandra has 20 years’ experience working with communities towards community cultural development outcomes. While with the Tasmanian Community Arts Network, she collaborated on many projects with Local Councils state wide, assisting them to develop integrated cultural plans and policies. In 1997, Sandra joined the Australian Capital Territory (ACT) Government as the ACT Cultural Planner and won three planning awards for her cultural planning work before initiating and developing a Cultural Map of the ACT. In 2001/2, she worked directly with 18 Local Councils in the Australian Capital Region to help them develop their own cultural maps. The resultant Regional Cultural Map was launched at the Australian National Museum in 2002. In 2008 Sandra established her own cultural planning company, Cultural Edge and since then has written cultural strategies and plans for four city councils and collaborated with 15 Victorian regional councils to assist them develop greater links with their communities.

about the writers

Perth Office King Street Arts Centre Ground Floor 357-365 Murray Street Perth WA 6000

Published by Community Arts Network WA (CAN WA)

PO Box 7514 Cloisters Square Perth WA 6850

ISBN: 978-0-9586491-6-2

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Growing Communities: Arts and Culture in Local Government

The opinions expressed in this publication do not necessarily reflect those of the Community Arts Network WA staff, the Board or members. CAN WA reserves editorial rights on all copy for inclusion in CAN WA publications, unless otherwise agreed prior to publication. All care has been taken to advise project coordinators of protocols and responsibilities with regard to representing communities in articles and photographs. These responsibilities lie with project coordinators who have supplied CAN WA with photographs and information. Community Arts Network WA manages the Creative Networks Fund on behalf of the State of Western Australia through the Department of Culture and the Arts.

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Thank you to all of the local governments who contributed to this publication

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Growing Communities celebrates the contribution local government makes to community creativity, arts and wellbeing.