Melbourne Museum Photo: Meredith Foley
Michaela Boland, ‘Arts becomes Creative Industries under premier Daniel Andrews’, The Australian 9 December 2014
LAST week Victoria’s new Labor premier Daniel Andrews junked the longstanding tradition of Labor ministries by ditching the arts portfolio.
In a state that has long boasted of being the nation’s arts capital, Arts Victoria no longer exists.
It has been rolled into a super ministry alongside film and multimedia technologies under the title of Creative Victoria.
Long-time opposition arts spokesman Martin Foley is the new Creative Industries minister in addition to having the portfolios of housing and disability, ageing and mental health.
Foley says Arts Victoria was established 40 years ago and the new portfolio will modernise thinking about cultural capital in a way that wasn’t possible before.
“It’s not a diminution of arts and culture, it’s a 21st-century model of giving arts another string to its bow,” he says.
“How do you reform in a new world where there are so many cross-disciplines, cross-platforms? This can take those sectors to a new level.”
The new mega department will develop a cultural policy intended to bring coherence to the sector.
