Arts In 30
Episodes
Weekender: Best of the year - movies, music, theatre and more
12 Dec 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Ce and Sky share their favourite picks of 2025.Movies mentioned includes Freaky Tales, KPop Demon Hunters, Twinless, Sirat, The Secret Agent, Sinners...
Weekender: Best TV shows of the year, the fifth Indigenous Art Triennial, and arthouse Summer films
05 Dec 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Rudi Bremer from Awaye joins the team to take us to the NGA where After The Rain, the fifth National Indigenous Art Triennial is bringing together a ...
Sarah Hanson-Young on local content quotas and ABC funding plus proposed changes at the State Library of Victoria
02 Dec 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Last week, the federal government passed legislation that will require video streaming services with more than 1 million Australian subscribers to in...
Weekender: Wake up Dead Man wraps demagoguery, faith, grace, and power in a fun mystery & Evelyn Araluen returns with The Rot
28 Nov 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Three films in, at a point where most franchises have run out of ideas and started phoning it in, Knives Out has returned with its best episode yet i...
What constitutes success (or failure) in Hollywood? And Peyton Reed on the 25th anniversary of Bring It On.
25 Nov 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Wicked: For Good has launched to a big opening weekend, taking in $226 million US in worldwide box office revenue, a substantial improvement on the a...
Weekender: Breaking consensus on Pluribus and Wicked For Good manages to land the broomstick
21 Nov 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Everyone in the world has come together in a single voice: shared perspective, shared understanding, shared goals - harmony. That's both the plot of...
The fraying relationship between universities and the arts
18 Nov 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Arts degrees are expected to cost $55,000 next year, but despite the rising cost to students, we’re seeing restructures, closures, and redundancies...
Weekender: Running Man and If I Had Legs I'd Kick You take on the perils of parenthood and Rosalia makes a play for album of the year
14 Nov 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Rose Byrne puts in an award-winning performance as a woman under pressure in the excellent If I Had Legs I'd Kick You. Glen Powell takes on an all-po...
Local content quotas announced for streaming platforms and David Szalay wins the Booker
11 Nov 2025
Contributed by Lukas
The Federal Government has announced plans for a local content quota for streaming video services in Australia. Any service with more than one millio...
Weekender: The Diplomat gets chaotic, Dangerously Modern provides a showcase of Australian art, and Die, My Love is a showcase for Jennifer Lawrence
07 Nov 2025
Contributed by Lukas
There’s a simple pleasure in seeing competent people doing their job well, which is one of the draws of The Diplomat, a show that follows in the tr...
Australia Design Centre set to shut down after six decades and accessibility in the arts
04 Nov 2025
Contributed by Lukas
The board of the Australian Design Centre has announced that the centre will close on June 30, 2026, unless additional funding can be secured. The ca...
Weekender: Horror picks for the spooky season, alien conspiracies and kidnapping in Bugonia, and Twinless gets two thumbs up
31 Oct 2025
Contributed by Lukas
It's Halloween, so Ce and Sky are diving into horror films and exploring what they love about the genre alongside a few picks - some famous and some ...
No TDM exception on copyright, songwriters push back against the politicisation of their songs, and Theatre of the Oppressed
28 Oct 2025
Contributed by Lukas
The Federal Government has announced that it won't institute a Text and Data Mining exception on copyright, an idea raised as a possibility in the Pr...
Weekender: Jacob Elordi's physicality shines in Del Toro's Frankenstein and deliver us from musical biopics
24 Oct 2025
Contributed by Lukas
It’s 1982 and Bruce Springsteen is on the verge of super-stardom, but the Boss, unready to leave the past behind, holes up in a house in New Jersey...
A basic income for artists and harmonising cultural leadership in Australia's orchestras
21 Oct 2025
Contributed by Lukas
After a three-year pilot program, Ireland has made a basic income scheme for artists a permanent policy, citing not only increased productivity and m...
Weekender: Wayward maintains its direction, on the hunt against After the Hunt, and two great art exhibitions.
17 Oct 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Featuring troubled children in a small American town, an outsider who can sense that something is wrong, and hints of the supernatural, Wayward seems...
László Krasznahorkai wins the Nobel Prize for Literature and how the arts engage with politics and the environment
14 Oct 2025
Contributed by Lukas
A “compelling and visionary oeuvre that, in the midst of apocalyptic terror, reaffirms the power of art.” That’s how the jury for the Nobel Pri...
Weekender: Taylor Swift breaks her own records, The Invocations wins a prize, and why is the current glut of caper films so disappointing?
09 Oct 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Taylor Swift's twelfth album, Life of a Showgirl, has broken sales records and immediately jumped to the top of the charts across the world, but crit...
From the Riyadh Comedy Festival to the EA acquisition, why does Vision 2030 see Saudi Arabia making a huge investment in the arts?
07 Oct 2025
Contributed by Lukas
The Riyadh Comedy festival continues this week and while comedians like Louis CK and Bill Burr defended their decision to perform, many of their coll...
Weekender: Bad Bunny headlines the Super Bowl, The Lowdown makes a play for show of the year, and Dwayne Johnson asks for your consideration
03 Oct 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Bad Bunny is one of the biggest musicians of the 2020s, with multiple hit records and a massive worldwide fanbase. With the recent announcement that ...
Two major literary awards celebrate Australia's best writers & recreating the sound of Indiana Jones
01 Oct 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Two major prizes — The Prime Minister's Literary Award and the Queensland Literary Awards — have announced their choices over the last week, addi...
Weekender: One Battle After Another and Spinal Tap II tell very different stories of the world
24 Sep 2025
Contributed by Lukas
With two major films launching this week, The Screen Show's Jason Di Rosso pops in to share his thoughts.One of Hollywood's major auteurs, Paul Thoma...
Jimmy Kimmel's suspension and return & more details emerge about Meanjin
24 Sep 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Last week, ABC chose to suspend Jimmy Kimmel Live! from broadcast, after criticism from the Chairman of the FCC. The network has now reversed that de...
Weekender: The Studio sweeps the Emmys, the lingering power of The Names, and a Springsteen rarity revealed
19 Sep 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Claire Nichols from The Book Show joins the team to talk through the biggest name in comedy at the moment: The Studio. With a record-breaking 13 Emmy...
The 2025 Emmy Awards' winners and losers, and Arts Project Australia mounts a major exhibition
17 Sep 2025
Contributed by Lukas
The state of television and streaming is perhaps more precarious than it’s been since before the “streaming revolution”... so what do this year...
Weekender: The case for genre fiction in the Top 100 and a new Australian supergroup
12 Sep 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Welcome to the Arts in 30 Weekender, where we're setting the news aside and sharing our tips on what to check out and what to skip from the world of ...
Meanjin to close after 85 years and Anthropic agrees to $1.5 Billion dollar settlement with authors
10 Sep 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Meanjin is set to shut down after 85 years, with the board of their publisher, Melbourne University Press, saying that it’s a purely financial deci...
Tropfest lives, and filmmaking under the eye of the Iranian government
03 Sep 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Tropfest, the biggest short film festival in the world, has been resurrected six years after it was last staged. With a slew of sponsors and partners...
Major changes in Opera Australia leadership and Campbell Addy's eye for movement
27 Aug 2025
Contributed by Lukas
After a challenging 12 months, which saw the exit of the CEO and artistic director and a ten million dollar operating deficit, Opera Australia has an...
More than 50 authors withdraw from Bendigo Writers Festival and celebrating the best poetry of the century
20 Aug 2025
Contributed by Lukas
More than 50 writers pulled out of the Bendigo Writers Festival over the weekend, as did the festival's official bookshop, after organisers sent a co...
Productivity Commission considers a copyright exception for AI companies and awards season in Darwin
13 Aug 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Last week, the productivity commission published their interim report on Harnessing data and digital technology. Among the ideas under consideration ...
Should credit companies decide what content is allowed? And award-winning science photography
06 Aug 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Two online game platforms, Steam and Itch.io, have removed hundreds or thousands of games that are tagged as including adult content. They've said th...
A 10 year plan for the arts in Australia and a short history of street art
30 Jul 2025
Contributed by Lukas
What will the arts look like in Australia in a decade? And what could it look like with a plan and strategy that’s looking that far into the futur...
Judging a film festival and how Taylor Swift inspired Pete Murray
23 Jul 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Winning a film festival prize can launch an independent movie far beyond the festival circuit, leading to critical attention and international distri...
Another round of layoffs hit the games industry & an amibitous start for Creative Futures
16 Jul 2025
Contributed by Lukas
After a fourth round of layoffs have hit Microsoft's games division, what does it mean for the industry at large? And with comments from competitors ...
Is there any appetite for risk at Creative Australia? And the story behind the art of Emily Kam Kngwarray
09 Jul 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Khaled Sabsabi is once again Australia's representative to the 2026 Venice Biennale, after the Board of Creative Australia reversed their previous de...
Politicians and musicians clash over Glastonbury chants and Anna Wintour steps away from the role that's defined her career
02 Jul 2025
Contributed by Lukas
UK punk duo Bob Vylan have the political world in an uproar after their set at Glastonbury Festival, which included some inflammatory language about ...
"It has never been harder to make a living in the creative sector." What's gone wrong in Australia's arts capital?
25 Jun 2025
Contributed by Lukas
For decades, the assumption has been that if you're from one of the smaller towns in Australia and you want a career in the arts, you'll have to move...
Hollywood studios sue AI company and Creative Australia takes aim at music listening habits
18 Jun 2025
Contributed by Lukas
"A bottomless pit of plagiarism." That's how Disney and Universal have referred to Midjourney — a generative AI platform — in a new lawsuit that ...
Marg Horwell takes home a Tony and the Perth Cabaret Festival ceases operations
11 Jun 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Marg Horwell has taken home the Tony Award for best costume design for a play for the Broadway production of The Picture of Dorian Grey, adding to he...
Is the government ignoring evidence of rock art degradation at Murujuga? And Daniel Browning hangs up the headphones
04 Jun 2025
Contributed by Lukas
The Federal Government has given a proposed approval for an expansion of Woodside's North West Shelf gas project near Karratha in Western Australia. ...
Judges quit the Queensland Literary Awards over Black&Write decision & Michelle de Kretser wins the Stella Prize
28 May 2025
Contributed by Lukas
K.A. Ren Wyld won the Black&Write! Fellowship, only to have it withdrawn at the last minute over comments she had made on social media. Since the...
Behind the scenes at Eurovision and major losses at national companies
21 May 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Eurovision is a phenomenon in Australia, with more than 450-thousand people tuning in for the final this year. But what's it like to compete in this ...
The value of cultural diplomacy and the winner of the Archibald Prize
14 May 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Over the last few years, the European Union has set out to include art and culture in their diplomatic work in Australia. Around the opening of their...
International musicians to platform local artists in NSW under Michael's Rule, and curating a brand new biennale in Mongolia
07 May 2025
Contributed by Lukas
NSW has become the first state to reinstate Michael's Rule for touring musicians, with the Minn's government offering a $20,000 discount on the hire ...
New voices and deep engagement: the importance of criticism
29 Apr 2025
Contributed by Lukas
For almost a quarter of a century, Peter Rose has steered the Australian Book Review as its editor, giving a space for Australian writers to engage c...
The arts at the polls
22 Apr 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Australia heads to the polls on the 3rd of May to elect a new federal government. And while the campaign so far has centred on the cost of living, th...
The Oscars embrace stunt design and Maud Page takes over at the Art Gallery of NSW
15 Apr 2025
Contributed by Lukas
The Academy Awards have announced a new category, which will recognise the best stunt design in a film, but what does it take to actually pull off th...
Can the arts industry revive its appetite for risk? And are the visual arts a gig economy?
08 Apr 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Whatever their medium, artists deal with sensitive topics, often taking a critical, anti-establishment approach. But at the moment, some artists are ...
Creative Australia, local quotas, and AI theft: Tony Burke revives Labor's arts policy
01 Apr 2025
Contributed by Lukas
In 2023, the Labor Government launched a major arts policy, Revive: a five year plan that promised substantial funding and a renewed focus on the art...
Meta uses pirated books to train its AI platform and Wanda Gibson makes history
25 Mar 2025
Contributed by Lukas
After internal documents from Meta were made public via a US court case, many Australian authors have found out that their work may have been used by...
Justin Baldoni, Blake Lively and the court of public opinion
18 Mar 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Last year, the actor Blake Lively accused her co-star Justin Baldoni of inappropriate conduct on the set of their film, It Ends With Us. That's led t...
Another music festival cancelled as the live music inquiry hands down its recommendations
11 Mar 2025
Contributed by Lukas
The parliamentary inquiry into the live music industry has been handed down with a range of recommendations. But at the same time, another music fest...
More voices call for change in the leadership of Creative Australia
04 Mar 2025
Contributed by Lukas
An exclusive conversation with the gallerist Josh Milani, who represents Khaled Sabsabi, the artist at the heart of the controversy engulfing Creativ...
Creative Australia's leadership faces questioning at Senate estimates
25 Feb 2025
Contributed by Lukas
The fallout over Creative Australia's decision to drop Khaled Sabsabi and Michael Dagostino as Australia's representatives to the 2026 Venice Biennal...
Resignations and condemnation in the wake of Creative Australia's Venice Biennale decision
18 Feb 2025
Contributed by Lukas
The decision by Creative Australia to cancel their own selection for Australia's representative at the 2026 Venice Biennale has led to shock and cond...
The human impact of the APY Art Centre Collective investigations and Perth Festival powers up a new site for art
11 Feb 2025
Contributed by Lukas
The remote art centre collective at the heart of claims of white interference in black art has been cleared of any wrongdoing for the fourth and fina...
APY Art Centre Collective cleared by ORIC & the challenges facing the Australian music industry
04 Feb 2025
Contributed by Lukas
After nearly two years of scrutiny, the remote art centre collective at the heart of claims of white interference in black art has been cleared for t...
Donald Trump's impact on the arts and a shrinking market for Australian authors?
28 Jan 2025
Contributed by Lukas
While Karla Sofía Gascón became the first openly trans woman to be nominated for Best Actress at the Oscars for her role in Emilia Pérez, former U...
Preserving art during natural disasters and farewell to David Lynch
21 Jan 2025
Contributed by Lukas
In the wake of the fires in Southern California, with the loss of private collections and the threat to the Getty Museum, how are Australia's cultura...
INTRODUCING — Arts in 30, coming to this feed soon
17 Jan 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Your survival guide to arts and culture in Australia and across the globe, Arts in 30 with Daniel Browning is a new digest of the big stories in arts...