Art festival features Great Debate

Six Great Debaters, including three Southern Cross University visual arts academics, and their audience will consider whether art theory is relevant to the practice of art in the Great Debate, part of a three-day visual arts festival in Byron Bay from July 1 to 3.

The festival, 48-Hours of Visual Arts (FEHVA), has sessions including the business of art, art and social change, how curators select and program art, public art, the Great Debate and an art auction and sale highlighting artists of the Northern Rivers.

Head of Southern Cross University's School of Arts Associate Professor Jan Davis, a printmaker, will be joined by painter John Smith and painter/printmaker Gary Jolley, to make up the SCU debating team taking the 'yes' case for the festival debate.

Professor Davis said she was delighted Southern Cross University - as an institution training people to make, think, talk and read about art — was able to support a regional visual arts festival.

"Working in the visual arts can be a very solitary occupation. It's also competitive and people need to be multi-skilled and savvy. So as well as inspiring people, the festival will offer insights into career development, regional services and regional opportunities which will be invaluable," she said.

The FEHVA program of about 40 artists and speakers includes: arts broadcaster Caroline Baum; Museum of Contemporary Art, Sydney, director Elizabeth Ann Macgregor and curator Russell Storer; former Sotheby's CEO Robert Bleakley; and ARMA Museum of Art Ubud, Bali, director Agung Rai.

SCU students and staff will be involved in a number of festival sessions, with postgraduate student Rochelle Summerfield and graduate and visual arts tutor Christine Willcocks taking part in a panel on co-operative studios and galleries. Student and artist/photographer Cal Mackinnon, and painter and SCU art tutor James Guppy, also a 2005 Archibald finalist, will feature in short films at the festival.

Twelve SCU visual arts students, drawn from many who expressed interest, will assist the festival as behind-the-scenes volunteers.

Professor Davis said SCU would state the 'yes' case in the Great Debate, which is on the final afternoon of the festival.

"We would have been happy putting either side of the debate forward, but the coin was tossed and we got the 'yes' case — which I must admit, sits pretty comfortably with me," she said.

"I'm not going to give our argument away — but art theory is simply ideas, and art practice really can't be separated from ideas. My team mates and I have explained the relevance of art theory quite a few times before in our careers."

Making the 'no' case in the Great Debate are ceramist and chair of the National Association of Visual Arts Michael Keighery, contemporary artist and former president of the Asian Australian Artists Association Lindy Lee, and Tweed River Regional Gallery's museum and gallery coordinator Gary Corbett.

High profile artists at the three-day festival will include: public artists Judy Watson and Janet Laurence, environmental artist John Dahlsen, art activist Lucille Martin and indigenous artist Karla Dickens. A sculpture walk at Cape Byron, artsCape curated by Merran Morrison, will coincide with the FEHVA festival. Another 16 artists will feature in interviews and segments on-screen during the festival.

The Great Debate is on Sunday July 3 at 3.30pm, as part of the 48 Hours of Visual Arts (FEHVA) festival, at the Upstairs Studio of the Byron Bay Community and Cultural Centre from July 1 to 3. For information or program details see www.fehva.com or contact coordinator Dee Tipping on 02 66855214. Organisers hope the event will become a national arts event, similar to the Byron Bay Writers Festival. The festival is an initiative and fundraiser for the Buttery Fundraising Through Arts Program.