ABSTRACT
The expansion of secondary education has dramatically increased the number of people who have been given opportunity to acquire basic skills or appreciation in one or other art or craft. Aboriginal people, long the object of discrimination, have made great use of western art forms to develop their own distinctive expression in painting, dance, theatre and film. The New Theatre in Sydney was formed by the Communist party in the 1930s, while the Genesian Theatre was formed by a group of Catholics in the 1950s. The Australia Council was established in 1973 to administer all the government’s grants to arts organisations. Australia’s major symphony orchestras, museums, galleries, parks and gardens are almost all government controlled. The exception is the Museum of Contemporary Art in Sydney. The management and governance of the elite cultural third sector organisations is rather different from the smaller organisations established to facilitate participation.
