Cave Urban, ‘Save Our Souls’, Sculpture by the Sea, Bondi 2014. Photo Gareth Carr.
Zero from Creative Australia. Creative Australia is the Federal Government’s only Arts funding body.
Create NSW, which is the NSW Government’s Arts Body has provided $400,000 of funding for this year’s Bondi 2025 exhibition. Thank you.
Yes.
Sculpture by the Sea applied in 2023 for the only substantial funding on offer until 2029. If we had been successful, that funding would have been provided to us for this year’s Bondi 2025 exhibition.
Creative Australia regarded our 2023 application in the bottom 30% of applicants nationally despite 700,000 visitors to our annual Sculpture by the Sea exhibitions in Sydney and Perth, which are the largest and best attended annual sculpture exhibitions in the world.
Did Sculpture
No.
The few other grants available are for very small amounts that would be shared between Sculpture by the Sea in Sydney and Perth contributing a maximum of only $50,000 to each exhibition.
No.
It took Sculpture by the Sea seven years before the Australia Council would agree to take a meeting with us.
This year, Creative Australia has refused two requests to meet with us that were sent to them in April and August.
It is very clear that the Visual Arts Managers at Creative Australia have no interest in Sculpture by the Sea, or the public and artists’ response to the exhibition, and are totally indifferent as to whether the exhibition continues or not.
We reiterate Creative Australia is the only Arts funding body of the Federal Government of Australia.
Each year for two decades Sculpture by the Sea in Sydney and Perth has provided $2 million to $3 million dollars of income to the exhibiting artists in the form of artist subsidies, awards and sculpture sales.
Currently, the artist subsidies and awards are provided by the exhibition’s sponsors, donors, and Create NSW which is the NSW Government’s arts funding body. We thank each of them for this important contribution to the exhibiting artists.
Does Sculpture by the Sea charge the artist’s to be in the exhibition?
No, however there is a $50 application fee when artists apply through an open call for artist submissions to exhibit.
What financial support does each artist that exhibits in Sculpture by the Sea receive?
For this year’s Bondi exhibition each artist receives a guaranteed minimum income in the form of an artist cost contribution of $3,000 if they don’t otherwise earn more than $3,500 from awards, subsidies and sculpture sales.
In addition, each artist receives up to $1,250 towards the cost of the machinery and crew to install their sculptures. This covers the full costs for most of the artists in the exhibition.
Would the artist’s receive more financial support if there was more government funding for the exhibition?
Yes.
When our organisation received $1million a year from the RISE fund in 2022 and 2023 shared between Sculpture by the Sea in Sydney and Perth exhibitions the artists received the following additional funding:
1. Each Australian artist in the Sydney or Perth exhibition received guaranteed income of $4,500. This was an increase from zero to $4,500 for the artists in the Perth exhibition. The total combined additional financial support for the artists over these two years was $500,000 or 25% of the total Federal Government funds received.
2. In addition, each artist in the exhibition from Australia or overseas received up to $3,000 towards their machinery and crew costs to install their sculptures. This amount covered for all but very few artists in each show.