Labour rights for artists, cultural democracy for workers
Bodies of Work – A Symposium
Labour rights for artists, cultural democracy for workers
BOOK NOW
Have art and cultural sectors lost their connections to the rights, welfare and aspirations of working people and communities? What can legacies from past alliances and struggles teach us about current campaigns to combat precarity and poverty amongst cultural workers?
What do the histories of union-led initiatives such as ‘art and working life’ offer us for the future? What can we learn from overseas experiments on basic income or co-operatives? Does the new National Cultural Policy give us hope?
Three days of talks and discussion, activist training and art, will explore these big questions, in the latest edition of Vitals’ ongoing Bodies of Work initiative in collaboration with policy provocateurs, Reset Arts and Culture.
Creative team: Curated by Emma Webb, Justin O’Connor and Tully Barnett
Light refreshments will be offered for morning and afternoon tea, please note that as this is a free event lunch is not provided.
Program
Download the full PDF program for this free, three-day national symposium!
THREE-DAY PROGRAM
DAY ONE – Wednesday 1 November
Art, communities and activism
10am
Welcome to Country and introduction to Bodies of Work, Vitalstatistix, and Reset Arts and Culture
10:30am
Keynote: Crying Through Our Singing – A Union Hall, Communal Luxury and Cultural Activism
A love letter to and potted history of the Waterside Workers Hall, the power of singing, women and wharfies, and the time for communal luxury, mutual aid and collectivism.
Speaker: Emma Webb, Artistic Director, Vitalstatistix
11:30am
Panel: Art and Working Life – Legacies and Futures
A wide-ranging discussion tracing the histories and futures of artists working with unions, including the famous ‘Art and Working Life’ initiative of the 80s, exploring the place of art and culture in everyday life and as a force for radical change.
Speakers include:
>Ali Gumillya Baker, Unbound Collective, artist and scholar
>Catherine Story, artist and ACTU educator
>Kathie Muir, researcher and arts worker
>Ian Milliss, artist and activist
12:30pm
Lunch – please note that as this is a free event lunch is not provided
1:30pm
Workshop: Activism and policy toolboxes
This workshop will empower participants to build their skills and develop their ideas for campaign planning. A provocative toolbox of strategies and activities, sharing insights about how the policy process really works. For all levels of activist experience.
Speaker: Greg Ogle, Senior Policy Officer, South Australian Council of Social Service
3:30pm
Break
3:45pm
Panel: Campaigns, alliances and civil society
An inspiring discussion of current campaigning work, building alliances across unions, communities and civil society, what cultural organising looks like today and what it might offer the future.
Speakers include:
>Abbey Kendall, Director, Working Women’s Centre
>Aira Firdaus, union and community organiser
>Ben Eltham, arts commentator and NTEU activist
>Dale Beasley, Secretary, SA Unions
>Jessica Alice, Chair, Arts Industry Council of South Australia
>Pas Forgione, activist, Anti-Poverty Network of South Australia
5:30pm
Arts Industry Council of South Australia event
Jessica Alice, Chair, AICSA, in conversation with South Australian Minister for the Arts, the Hon. Andrea Michaels MP, about the SA Government’s new taskforce into sustainable careers for artists and arts workers. Incl. drinks, snacks and networking.
7:30pm
Close
DAY TWO – Thursday 2 November
Basic income, dignified work, real rights
10am
Coffee and updates
10:30am
Keynote: A Basic Income for Artists – The Irish Experience
An exclusive-in-Australia presentation about the successful campaign for a basic income for artists pilot in Ireland and the lessons arising from the first year of its implementation.
International guest speakers:
>Angela Dorgan, CEO of First Music Contact and former Chair of National Campaign for the Arts who championed the Basic Income for Artists pilot in Ireland
>Sharon Barry, Director, Culture Ireland
12:30pm
Lunch – not provided.
1:30pm
Panel: Winning cultural labour and income rights in Australia
A deep dive into how the arts and cultural sectors can ‘dare to struggle, dare to win’ – what we should be fighting for in our unions, workplaces, and the public policy space and what we might dare to imagine next.
Speakers include:
>Ben Eltham, arts commentator and NTEU activist
>David Pledger, artist and activist
>Ian Milliss, artist and activist
>Jennifer Mills, writer and MEAA activist
>Penelope Benton, Executive Director, NAVA
>Sam Whiting, scholar and activist
3:30pm
Break
4pm
In-conversation: CoUNTess: Spoiling Illusions since 2008
A conversation about Melinda Rackham and Elvis Richardson’s extraordinary 2023 publication about data, gender politics in the asymmetrical art world, and the ground-breaking project The Countess Report.
Speakers: Melinda Rackham in conversation with Jennifer Mills
6pm
Performance lecture
A Perfect Day by Catherine Ryan
A guided listening tour through ‘pop song schedules’ – songs in which the singer lists everything they do in a day. This darkly funny and smart performance work explores how the pressure to be productive determines the rhythm of our existence under contemporary capitalism, through subversive pop song samples and numerous low-brow musical interludes.
7:30pm
Close
DAY THREE – Friday 3 November
Culture as Foundational
10am
Coffee and updates
10:30am
Panel: New thinking about culture and social foundations
A globally informed panel looking at the wide range of new ideas and empirical work which is changing thinking about culture and public policy. A touchstone here is the work around culture and the social foundations undertaken by the Reset Arts and Culture Collective and their collaborators overseas.
Speakers include:
>Abigail Gilmore, University of Manchester
>Ben Eltham, Monash University
>Justin O’Connor, University of South Australia
>Tully Barnett, Flinders University
12:30pm
Lunch – not provided.
1:30pm
Participatory session: A New Cultural Policy – Culture, democracy and change
A participatory process that will bring together the themes of the three days, make space to plan campaign priorities and consider how to elevate progressive change both inside and outside the national cultural policy framework of ‘Revive: A Place for Every Story, A Story for Every Place’. Time to collaborate, build solidarity, and imagine the future together.
4:30pm
Drinks and networking
6pm
Performance lecture
A Perfect Day by Catherine Ryan
A guided listening tour through ‘pop song schedules’ – songs in which the singer lists everything they do in a day. This darkly funny and smart performance work explores how the pressure to be productive determines the rhythm of our existence under contemporary capitalism, through subversive pop song samples and numerous low-brow musical interludes.
7:30pm
Werk – DJs Ben Eltham and Catherine Ryan
10:30pm
Close
Supporters
Bodies of Work – A Symposium is supported by Vitalstatistix, Reset Arts and Culture, University of South Australia SA/CP3, Flinders University/Assemblage, Arts South Australia and the City of Port Adelaide Enfield
