Stop-start approaches to arts and cultural coverage might keep adding more ‘content’ to the ABC’s platforms, but they do little to redress the invisibility of Australia’s cultural life across news and current affairs coverage.

When Kamilaroi and Bigambul artist Archie Moore won the Golden Lion at the Venice Biennale last Saturday — the biggest art news in the world — Channel 9’s evening bulletin covered it as news. However, there was no mention of it on the ABC’s 7pm news bulletin. 

As far as arts news goes, Moore’s award was a World Cup, a Grand Slam, an Olympic gold. It’s not only a global accolade, it’s also the first time in history that it’s been won by an Australian. Despite this, the national broadcaster was ill-prepared to recognise and act on a pivotal art event as news.

More than a year after the release of “Revive”, Australia’s national cultural policy, the ABC has never been more depleted in arts and cultural expertise. The broadcaster’s entire operations have been separated into “news” and “content”, with arts and culture having landed on the side of repackageable work. On this distinction, only news is accorded the status of an ongoing, expert commitment, while strategy on “content” seems more generic: arts and culture as interchangeable content, ready to be repurposed…

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