Beyond State Borders
People who don’t live in the main urban centres are just as deserving of the best art product available as anyone else. And if they’re making the best art, it deserves to be seen as widely as possible.
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Adelaide hosts Long Paddock National Touring Marketplace in 2008 & 2014 -
Reclaimed Pianos by Circa. Image: Chris Herzfeld -
The Young King by Slingsby Theatre Company. Country Arts SA is managing the National Tour of The Young King in 2019. -
The Season, presented by Tasmania Performs will be spending 6-8 weeks in residence, engaging with regional Aboriginal communities in South Australia. Image: Simon Pynt -
In 2013, we managed the national tour of Freefall, the first production by young Adelaide circus troupe Gravity and Other Myths. While in remote Western Australia, a chance meeting led to a show at the Edinburgh Fringe, where they were picked up by a European agent and have now been touring the world ever since. Their latest work Backbone, commissioned through the Major Festivals, will have its only presentation outside of the Festivals at the Middleback Arts Centre in 2018. Image: Backbone by Darcy Grant -
If there was a colour darker than black, I’d wear it, ‘Black’ won a Ruby Award for innovation at SA’s Ruby Awards in 2013. An immersive, semi-site specific installation work, it arose from Performance Development program and a partnership with Illuminart and Mt Gambier’s Rising Damp Youth Theatre. The work premiered at the 2012 Regional Arts Australia National Conference, Kumuwuki, in Goolwa before heading back to Mt Gambier and then on to Bathurst NSW. -
If there was a colour darker than black, I’d wear it, ‘Black’ won a Ruby Award for innovation at SA’s Ruby Awards in 2013. An immersive, semi-site specific installation work, it arose from Performance Development program and a partnership with Illuminart and Mt Gambier’s Rising Damp Youth Theatre. The work premiered at the 2012 Regional Arts Australia National Conference, Kumuwuki, in Goolwa before heading back to Mt Gambier and then on to Bathurst NSW. -
If there was a colour darker than black, I’d wear it, ‘Black’ won a Ruby Award for innovation at SA’s Ruby Awards in 2013. An immersive, semi-site specific installation work, it arose from Performance Development program and a partnership with Illuminart and Mt Gambier’s Rising Damp Youth Theatre. The work premiered at the 2012 Regional Arts Australia National Conference, Kumuwuki, in Goolwa before heading back to Mt Gambier and then on to Bathurst NSW. -
For over a decade Country Arts SA worked with Patch Theatre as National tour coordinator, totalling 150 weeks on the road and audiences numbering over 250,000 supported by $2.25 Million of Playing Australia funding. Image: The Cranky Bear by Patch Theatre Company
Performing arts and exhibitions have been part of the national touring landscape in Australia as long as anyone living would remember, but things got serious when the federal government established the Playing Australia and Visions Australia touring funds.
The commitment to Subscription Seasons in 1993 generated an imperative that a minimum number of top shelf productions be available to import and 1994/95 saw us manage our first national tour – a 6 state, 19 venue tour of Australian icon, Circus Oz.
We’ve been leaders in national touring ever since, not just in the national conversations, but as a long-standing tour manager, especially in performing arts (upwards of 360,000 children have wondered at a Patch Theatre Company production through our 12 year, 300 venue tour management partnership alone) and we now own and manage the National Touring Selector which connects over 2100 creators and presenters of performing arts from Australia and New Zealand, especially connecting regional and remote venues with producers of tour-ready shows.
Now that we have also built a reputation as a producer of great art in our own right, we can adapt to the changing needs of makers, presenters and consumers to find new audiences for the best new work.
And persistent lobbying has seen a change to the way national touring is funded enabling new works like The Season to spend time in communities and Circa to unlock the stories within the pianos of Port Pirie and Burra.
P.S. Now international companies can be seen via Arts On Screen, but that’s another story…
