Future brighter for artists thanks to funding announcement

Marrugeku and Magabala Books were announced last week as the organisations that have secured funding from The Australia Council.

Marrugeku is expected to receive $300,000 annually over the next four years while Magabala will attract $275,715 a year over the same period under a program which funds small to medium “arts organisations of significant regional, national or international standing”.

Magabala Books chairman Edie Wright said only through support of the Australia Council, government departments and Arts WA could the organisation publish Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander artist’s works and he has high hopes for the future.

“It will also support our plans to ensure that the diversity and talent of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander storytellers, writers and illustrators are recognised in Australia and by an international audience,” he said.

“The funding ... will secure the publication of at least 40 new titles over four years; our congratulations go to two important organisations, Marrugeku and Kimberley Aboriginal Law and Culture Centre Aboriginal Corporation, who received recurrent funding from Australia Council for the first time.

“While we are grateful and relieved to have secured funding in the current climate, we are also very mindful of the uncertainty facing those organisations who were not funded.”

These thoughts were echoed by Marrugeku Inc general manager Bruce Gorring who said the funding offered security for an organisation’s artistic plans.

“We are delighted that the Australia Council and its peer process have endorsed Marrugeku in this way, we see it not only as a mark of the esteem in which Marrugeku’s work is held but also as respect for the communities from which that work arises,” he said.

“We are acutely aware that while Marrugeku has been fortunate on this occasion, many of our colleague companies have lost funding either in part or whole due more to arithmetic than lack of merit; as a consequence, we are all the poorer for that outcome”.