What is most interesting about Newcastle’s annual This Is Not Art (TiNA) festival, is that what started 12 years ago as a community festival of independent, emerging art and culture, is still a community festival of independent, emerging art and culture.
In an era when it’s not uncommon for even the most intimate art show to be sponsored by a massive alcohol company, the non-commercial nature of TiNA is remarkable.
Australia is being hit by a relentless, daily gauntlet of live music and art festivals, but TiNA retains a truly artist-run schedule of events.
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The National Tertiary Education Union (NTEU) at the University of New South Wales (UNSW) has vowed to fight the imposition of a “sub-standard” enterprise bargaining agreement (EBA) after a majority of general staff voted in favour of the agreement in a September 29-October 1 poll.
The agreement fails to meet award protections that limit the use of fixed-term employment, allowing for further deregulation of the workforce. It also reduces flexibility on annual leave entitlements and allows for forced redeployment within the university.
Seven refugee rights activists were forced out of Sydney’s Villawood Immigration Detention Centre on October 4. Two days later, another refugee advocate, Rosalie Scolari, was banned from Maribyrnong detention centre in Melbourne.
Private prisons operator Serco runs both detention centres.
Scolari was trying to visit gay Tamil detainee Leela Krishna, who was recently moved from Villawood to Maribyrnong. He has spent more than 12 months imprisoned and a community campaign has called for his immediate release.
In “The Return of Dr Strangelove”, a September 6 lecture hosted by Melbourne University and Beyond Zero Emissions (BZE), Clive Hamilton, author of Affluenza, Scorcher and Requiem for a Species gave a short history of the research and investment in geo-engineering solutions to global warming.
A move from fossil fuels to renewable energy is the logical “Plan A” response to human-caused climate change, but such a response would threaten corporate profits.
The Live Red Art Awards and Festival is taking place on October 17 at the Addison Road Community Centre in Marrickville, Sydney. The day will feature an exhibition and live performances.
Submissions for the multi-disciplinary competition, which was open to anyone, closed on October 1. As well as the winner announced by the judges, there will be a “people’s choice” award. For more information on Live Red Arts, visit . Below is a run-down on some of the artists whose work will be on display at the festival.
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As the rescue of 33 miners trapped 700 metres underground at the San Jose mine in Copiapo, Chile, was drawing closer, concerns were being raised about Chilean miners’ rights.
After the August 5 cave-in that trapped the workers, mining company San Esteban sacked more than 200 other miners, refusing to pay their wages and entitlements. The miners union in Chile is demanding the government pay the workers’ wages if the company won’t.
I asked Simon, a homeless man in Melbourne who has organised protests around housing, “If you had three wishes what would they be?”
“A roof over my head, a feed every day and someone to love me who I can love back. As simple as that”, he said.
“There's not much more to life when you break it down. There are too many people who get carried away with money, worrying about their next dollar. I live with nothing and supposedly I haven't got a long time left to live, so there's not much more you need.”
In a tragedy that occurs far too often, Tyler Clementi, an 18-year-old gay university student, committed suicide by jumping off a bridge in New Jersey on September 22.
Whoops! Why Everyone Owes Everyone & No One Can Pay
By John Lanchester
224 pages
Penguin, Allen Lane
Review by Mat Ward
If you don't know the difference between a credit default swap (CDS), a collateralised debt obligation (CDO) and a cheese sandwich, this highly readable book could help you in a painless, entertaining way.
Its author, John Lanchester, grew up in 1960s Hong Kong. He says the contrasts of obscene wealth and crushing poverty were “like a lab test in free-market capitalism”.
About 500 South-East Queensland health workers walked off the job and rallied in front of State Parliament on October 7, protesting against the Bligh government's offer of annual pay increases of only 2.5% a year for three years.
The unions are demanding increases totalling 12.5% over the three-year period. Queensland Public Sector Union general secretary Alex Scott said Queensland Health could return to "the bad old days" if workers were forced to leave the system over pay.
Almost 600 people poured into the town hall in Melbourne’s north-eastern suburb of Ivanhoe on October 6 to discuss the Victorian Labor government’s proposal to build a freeway across the Banyule Flats and the Yarra Corridor. The government intends to build the North-East Link to join the Western Ring Road to the Eastlink tollway.
The lack of public transport in the area was shown by the fact that the only way most people could get to the meeting was by driving, causing a small traffic jam outside.
On September 23, the Daily Telegraph reported on a wall mural in the Sydney inner-west suburb of Newtown by artist Sergio Redegalli with the slogan “Say no to burqas”.
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