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For too long, it’s looked as though the ABC has been afraid of the arts. Over the years, Aunty has marginalised and axed arts programs, shunting them off its main channel or consigning them to obscure timeslots, like 10pm Tuesdays. Early in 2021,
The Mix, which ran unheralded for seven years on ABC News, was quietly retired.
The short-lived
Art Nation was terminated in 2011 and we’re now a long way from the days when magazine-style overviews such as
Express and
S
unday Afternoon offered hours of interviews, documentaries, films and feature stories. More recently, whenever the ABC has produced arts programs, its discomfort has been evident. One indication of a lack of confidence has been the push to insert comedians at any opportunity. It’s as if the operative thinking is that, unless attention to books, film, theatre, visual arts, opera and music comes with a few laughs, no one will be interested.