Writings, News
Jo Higgins
Routledge publication: Youth Programs in Art ...
Routledge publication: Youth Programs in Art Museums - An International Perspective
Writings
Jo Higgins
Art Guide Australia: Field Notes. A Grassroots ...
Art Guide Australia: Field Notes. A Grassroots Approach to Public Art
Events, Review, News
Jo Higgins
Berlin trip: Connected Audiences Conference and ...
Berlin trip: Connected Audiences Conference and some Art, Art, Art....
Writings, News
Jo Higgins
Art Guide Australia: Home Truths - feature story
Art Guide Australia: Home Truths - feature story
News, Writings
Jo Higgins
Artlink magazine's 'Hyphen' issue published
Artlink magazine's 'Hyphen' issue published
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Connected Audiences Conference - Culture & Young People: What could possibly go wrong?

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I’m heading to Berlin next month to co-present a paper and deliver a workshop with my former MCA Australia colleague Yaël Filipovic at the biennial Connected Audiences Conference.

Convened by the Institute for Cultural Research Participation in Berlin and the American Institute for Learning Innovation, in 2025 the conference has the brilliantly apt provocation: “Culture and Young People: What Could Possibly Go Wrong? Factors, Challenges and Opportunities of Cultural Participation for Youth”

Yaël and I will be sharing our experiences with youth-led programming in Australia; the importance of institutional support; and how we have taken our learnings forward in our respective careers.

I’m really excited for the opportunities to connect with and learn from peers internationally, to test and develop my own skills and ideas in relation to institutional practice and working with young people.

I’m very grateful to have received funding from Creative Australia to undertake this professional development opportunity and excited to share my learnings on my return.

UPDATE (30 May 2025): My participation at the conference has received additional support, with a Professional Development Grant from the NSW Government through Create NSW. This funding kind of funding is so invaluable for independent creatives and I’m incredibly grateful to have the support to undertake this work, to build networks and share learnings with international colleagues.

This project has been assisted by the Australian Government through Creative Australia, its principal arts investment and advisory body.

 

This project is supported by the NSW Government through Create NSW.

OTHER POSTS

ABC Arts: Thinking Together at Bundanon

Detail of Keg de Souza’s Growth in the Shadows, 2025.

I was down on Dharawal Country last month for the opening weekend of Bundanon’s newest exhibition, Thinking Together: Exchanges with the natural world.

Bundanon is such a special part of the world and it’s a vital part of the Australian arts ecology with its residency program and artist commissions.

My write up of the weekend, and my conversations with artists Keg de Souza, Robert Andrew and Isabel and Alfredo Aquilizan has just been published on ABC Arts here.

OTHER POSTS

Collecting: Living with Art book launch

Last year I had a dream commission, working with Kym Elphinstone to help realise her new book, Collecting: Living with Art (Thames & Hudson Australia) that is out this week.

Over seven months I had the joy of interviewing 26 artists, collectors and creatives, talking to them and writing about their ideas of home, creativity, the role of art (and artists) in their lives and what it meant to live with art on their walls, in their wardrobes and even, occasionally, on their ceilings.

There’s profiles on Penelope Seidler AM, Gene Sherman AM, Tony Albert, Ramesh Mario Nithyendran, Lottie Consalvo & James Drinkwater and so many more.

I’m excited to be in conversation with Kym and Stephen Todd, Design Editor for the Australian Financial Review, tomorrow at Berkelouw Books in Paddington, sharing some of these really special stories and insights.

The book is on sale now everywhere but if you purchase it via the Thames & Hudson website here, you can get a 20% discount with the code LIVINGWITHART20

You can read more about the book here.

OTHER POSTS

Art Guide Australia: Mystery Road - Zanny Begg profile

I had the opportunity to profile artist, curator and gallery director Zanny Begg for the latest issue of Art Guide Australia.

We had an expansive conversation reflecting on the ways her activism, research, filmmaking and feminism continue to shape her arts practice ahead of her exhibition opening at Dubbo Regional Gallery.

You can read it online here.

OTHER POSTS

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Art Guide Australia: Home Truths - feature story

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Illustrations by Caitlin Aloisio Shearer for Art Guide Australia.

My first feature for Art Guide Australia was published in the Jan/Feb issue of the magazine. I’ve always really loved this magazine so I was thrilled to have the opportunity to write for them.

Looking at the implications of the ongoing housing crisis for artists and creatives (an essay commissioned the same week my rent went up again), I spoke with artists Sarah Poulgrain, Keg de Souza, Claire Healy and Sean Cordeiro and curator and writer and Pari co-director Tian Zhang.

I also looked at this staggering (and largely, staggeringly depressing) major economic study, Artists as Workers, written by David Throsby and Katya Petetskaya and commissioned by Creative Australia. Discoveries like the fact that the gross creative income for a visual artist in Australia in 2021-2022—$22,500—has remained unchanged since 1986 were pretty demoralising but talking to creatives like Sarah and Tian, whose practices are working to reimagine ideas of community and collectivisation, I was reminded again of how important artists and creativity is to everyone’s wellbeing. Now we just need to fund it…

But the article is now online, so you can read it here.

OTHER POSTS

I live and work on the unceded lands of the Gadigal and Bidjigal people and acknowledge their unbroken connection to this Country. I pay my deepest respects to their Elders, past and present, because this always was, and always will be, Aboriginal land.