💰 First Nations · WAThe WA Government’s 2026 Regional Aboriginal Arts Development program — funded through Royalties for Regions and the Regional Creative Industries Fund — has put $691,060 into seven Aboriginal-governed arts and culture bodies. Martumili Artists (Pilbara) receives $150,000 for mid-career artists Owen Biljabu, Marianne Burton and Marlene Anderson to create works of scale; Warmun Art (Kimberley) gets $150,000 for a truth-telling project on Gija Joomooloo, the 750-year-old boab relocated from Gija Country to Kings Park, culminating in a large-scale audio-visual work; Warakurna Artists $148,514 for workshops with Nola Campbell, Nyungawarra Ward, Nancy Jackson and Maureen Baker; Tjarlirli Art $95,361 for silk painting workshops; Magabala Books $50,000 for trade fairs and market development; Bidyadanga $50,000 for digital storytelling; Wardandi Wanil Art Centre $47,185 for governance and an artist-led Art Leadership Group.
💰 Visual arts · WAART ON THE MOVE takes the largest share — $230,000 to expand its SHIFT Touring Development Initiative and fund feasibility studies for upgrades at The Cannery Arts Centre and The Junction Co. Southern Forest Arts gets $90,000 to bring regional and remote artists, curators and works to Perth for the Radical Futures WA Regional Visual Arts Summit at the John Curtin Gallery, and the City of Busselton receives $61,280 to fund an assistant curator at Saltwater Gallery covering touring, lender and artist engagement. The touring-circuit work is the interesting part: it’s infrastructure, not project funding.
🎨 Updated · NTThe NT Government has locked Desert Mob in at the Araluen Arts Centre from 2026 to 2030 with guaranteed annual funding, announced at the opening of Desert Mob 2026 on 10 September — over $500,000 contributed for this year’s event alone. Now in its 35th year, Desert Mob brings together hundreds of artists from more than 30 community-controlled art centres across Central Australia, running to 25 October. For a catalogue model built on First Nations artists and community-controlled centres, this is the pipeline to watch: Desart now has the runway to plan, and collectors get a fixed annual calendar.
🎭 Funding policyABS data in the 2025 General Social Survey found 22.8% of Australians aged 15+ — more than five million people — attended a theatre performance in the past year. Yet Sydney Theatre Company turned over $28.75m in continuing operations in 2025 against an underlying operational deficit of $8.76m (a $786,418 comprehensive surplus arrived only via one-off funding and fundraising), Queensland Theatre posted a $989,000 deficit despite 42% box-office growth, and Bell Shakespeare’s expenses outran income. The structural culprit is Baumol’s cost disease — theatre can’t productivity-gain its way out. Producers are pushing Live Performance Australia’s Live Performance Production Incentive, a UK-style tax offset costed at around $93m a year that the industry claims pays for itself; state arts ministers support it, federal arts minister Tony Burke has made no commitment, and the National Cultural Policy consultation is framed as the pivot point. MEAA separately wants a $200 government-funded cultural pass for young people.
🎵 Music · fundingThe National Songwriting and Recording in Schools Stimulus offers $5,000 to $100,000 in matched funding for contemporary songwriting and recording programs across primary, secondary and tertiary settings — schools, TAFEs, universities, music academies. Funded activity includes songwriting workshops, artist residencies, recording and production programs, mobile recording studio projects, co-teaching models, teacher professional development and industry pathway programs. It was developed out of Music Australia’s May report More than Notes on a Page on the music education ecosystem. A rare domestic pipeline play — the same students are tomorrow’s artists and, at thest.art’s level, tomorrow’s scholarship applicants.
📚 CollectionsThe initiative — $11 million over four years for transporting, installing and insuring national collection works — has now supported more than 327 works on loan to 42 institutions in every state and territory. The newest tranche sends Tiwi sculptor Jock Puautjimi’s works to Swan Hill, Ntaria/Hermannsburg Potters ceramics to Temora, Nicole Foreshew and Warwick Thornton video works to Moonah Arts Centre, and a Margaret Olley still life to Tweed Regional Gallery from 18 September. Regional and suburban galleries can register interest via the NGA.