Gallery director resigns

THE director of the Art Gallery of South Australia has resigned in protest against critically low levels of State Government funding that he says are threatening the gallery's viability.

WHAT'S ON

RELIGION TALKING

Home is where the art is

Raafat Ishak wastes little time dwelling on concepts of home and identity, writes Gabriella Coslovich

Artist fined for display of informer

AN INFORMER who helped expose corruption in the Victoria Police force €” and who some want killed €” has described the fear he felt after his name and a sketch of him were illegally displayed at a Carlton South art exhibition called Melbourne's Underbelly Archives.

Waterlow killings: family feared for 'unstable' son

WHILE working on a landmark art exhibition about schizophrenia in 2006, the leading Australian curator Nick Waterlow confided in his friend Martin Sharp, the eminent artist. Waterlow revealed that his son had a mental illness.

Art show defies Black Saturday devastation

FOR 17 years Marysville Primary School has run an annual art exhibition, showcasing local and interstate talent over the Melbourne Cup weekend. This year the only thing left of the school is a desolate field of rubble and charcoal €” but the art show is bigger than ever.

CAUGHT BETWEEN A ROCK AND FIRST PLACE

IT MIGHT look like a meteorite but Time and Tide Granite Monolith II, the naturalistic sculpture that yesterday won Sculpture By the Sea's $60,000 top prize, has received a wave of earthly praise for its "incredible simplicity". The artwork's 91-year-old creator, May Barrie, said the giant piece was "bloody hard work ... but still, because you want to do it, it doesn't matter". She thought it was a "a good work" and was glad others agreed.

The planner

FOOD FESTIVAL

Culture warriors practise soft diplomacy

An ambitious Australian arts program aims to grab the attention of the Obama Administration. Washington correspondent Anne Davies reports.

In the land of the superhero, X-mensch marks the spotter

SEMITE-spotting is a very popular pastime practised by Jewish people around the world: it involves the collecting and collating of Jewish celebrity names, then spouting off those names at any Semite-spotting-spouting opportunity. If you're at a party and someone puts on a Beck CD, there's sure to be a Semite-spotter somewhere who blurts out, "Hey, that's Beck, the alternative indie-rocker with a folk-funk sensibility; he's Jewish, you know." If you're at the cinema watching a Rob Schneider movie, there's likely to be a Semite-spotter sitting nearby ready to lean over and whisper, "Look, it's Rob Schneider on the screen; he's Jewish, you know." Then, after most of the audience has walked out, they'll lean over again and whisper, "Actually, he's not; we don't want him."

Creative Ideas Turn Trash Into Treasure

HUNTER artists have shown that one man's rubbish is another man's Rembrandt at the annual Waste as Art exhibition.

Put Caring In The Frame

THIS Thursday night the annual Forsythes Collectors Care Art Exhibition will open at the Front Room Gallery at the Newcastle Art School (TAFE).