Queensland Art Gallery Presscuttings Book 10 : Record of press coverage, March 1982 - May 1984

4• _1' :-'/ . ' q ' l '1 14 Februa ry 1983 . Th e cou r i e r - Mai l. Queensland Cultural Centre Brisbane 'garden of culture will ·give fertile boost to art BRISBANE, • city of• mlUlon, ha• cul• mraly mar • halled lt • elf In • way once never dreamt of. However hard the times, and whatever the criticisms that can be levelled at it - which it has weathered before - the place is now an exciting community and capital, worthy of the mention the Queen accorded it in her mC$$8ge to the world last Christmas. She had visited it for the 1982 Com• monwealth Games, and for the international Festival '82 it stased in conjunction with the Games. When Brisbane, which bcsan only 160 years ago aa a British penal settlement, can play host to 40 guest nationa of various com• positions, then it is homo. It is home, too, to its own inhabitants. And, though looking distantly quartered or cornered in relation to Queensland's g~g– raphy, it does centrally represent its vast (and Australia's most) decentralised state of so many people of mixed origins. Culturally, it serves the state extremely well, and should do so all the more in times to come. One all-embracing and positive meaning for culture is that of being related; being home. It is no mere accident or· extravagance that the Queensland Cultural Centre near– ing completion on the Brisbane River's south bank is described in information brochures as "a new home". Being home, Brisbane and the culture it displays arc receiving a new roof. The estimated final cost of the Queens– land Cultural Centre is now S 130 million - which seems gargantuan! In times to come, cw will care about that, even if they think of II. Some of the greatest buildings in the world with which the centre can rightly be omparcd (go to Washington DC for confir• mation) have cost in their day a mint but I By DAVID ROWBOTHAM I that is nothing now; they stand strong and glorious. The centre's art gallery, auditorium, res– taurant and carpark were opened to the pub– lic last year; and what a popular attraction all that proved itself to be. Into the bargain, there is already the col– ored fountain in tho middle the river - a long-stemmed nower of water rising in front of the "garden" of culture the centre will vir– tually be. state, and droves of visitors and tourists from abroad. It will be a centre of exhibitions, meetings, browsings, promenades and every category of daylight and night-time entertainment from around Australia and the globe, staged out of doors and in. It will be the cultural centre-point of the "ring" of more than 200 parks and gardens for which Brisbane is noted. Many of those parks, gardens and "squares" arc annually used for the activities associated with the staging of the Brisbane Warana Festival, which is for all people - with all their varying interests. A 'new home' for artistic expression The Performing Arll Complex, designed to contain thrcc'thcatros - a concert the– atre, a lyric theatre, both 2000-scaten, and a special studio theatre for smaller drama events - is expected to be finished structur– ally this year, and fully operational in 1984. Last week I was given a tour of the interior of that complex. No stretch of the imagina– tion is needed to see just how magnificent and popular it will be when its doors, shops and bistro arc opened to the public. The museum, now under contract, is ex– pected to be finished not later than early 198S. The library, the plans of which arc on the table, is likely to be finished at the end of the same year. The large, entirely integrated centre will, with its beautiful landscape, be a national and international "knockout", attracting and serving Brisbane's million, the real of the It was this festival, which has now been on the go for 21 years, that last year was ex– tended into a major Commonwealth Games Festival '82. Hundreds of thousands of extra people from overseas, and from throughout Austra– lia, swarmed into Brisbane for the Games and festival. The festival fielded I500 events, twice its normal number, and the finest festival pro– cession in Australia. More than 40 Com• monwealth countries contributed - with representative cultural groups - to the dou– bling of those events. Many will return, from Asia to Canada and other parts, for this year's Warana Fes– tival. That annual festival, with the city it– self, will never be the same again. Unprece– dented dimensions have been added to its character. Consider, too, the city's Queen Street Mall. With the freedom that it offers, with its redesigned shops and theatre fronts, w1 its kiosks, cafcs and arcades, it has bcco an exciting centre of its own, pointing dire ly towards Victoria Bridge and the magnc cally ornamental and entertaining Quec land Cultural Centre rising beyond. Could not the Government buy the cit · and the Mall's, historic Her Majesty's th atrc, which now seems to be in the rig place more than ever, a component live-t h atre part of the Mall? It seats 1400. Should not that scaling kept? Governments have saved from · t hammer such centrally valuable theatres other cities. For the purpose of a way of living (anot h meaning for culture), Brisbane has becon the envy of many in Sydney and Melbou rn though these will not admit it. The culture of Brisbane is linked to tw the most splendid holiday-cultural bea "capitals" of Australia - the Gold Coa and the Sunshine Coast. The spread from the.Tweed River to th Noosa River, with Brisbane booming in th middle, could not be bettered for its sense o relatively infinite spaciousness. From its Brisbane headquarters, scrvin Brisbane and the communities of the wh 1 Moreton Bay coastline, and serving th whole of the state, the Queensland Direct ,. ate of Cultural Activities now annually di, tributes about $4 million a year. · The directorate lists I500 cultural organ, sat ions in Queensland, and, since its found tion in 1968, has pipelined $23 million int cultural activities near and far . The picture that I have tried to prcsc• still seems to me to be just a fraction of th culture of Brisbane, and of Brisbane's rclJ tion to its state. It is a beautiful city by all world sta nr ards. By night, its high-rise lights bl a1 above the great artery of its ri,.,cr. It is hom .