The board of Redfern-based arts venue, Carriageworks, has announced that Australia’s largest contemporary arts centre will go into voluntary administration.
It is the first major arts venue in sydney to declare financial strife and may prove an ominous portent for other major gallery and performance spaces if state and federal governments resist funding a cultural rescue package. Major cuts to recent Australia Council funding rounds and mass cancellations of productions and exhibitions across the country have left many arts organisations and artists facing an uncertain future.
Government funding accounted for one-quarter of Carriageworks’ annual revenue. The venue otherwise relied on event bookings for the majority of its income, but the timing of the current crisis dealt a brutal blow to that vital revenue stream. The cancelled Sydney Writers’ Festival would have been in full swing now, with Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week Australia and design event Semi Permanent, running during VIVID Sydney, also scrapped.
“Following the earlier loss of shifts for casual staff, in early-April we stood down almost half of our core staff and asked those remaining to move to a three-day week, Carriageworks CEO Blair French said. “Focussing on…
