December 18, 2022

METAPHORS POTENT TOOLS IN THE WORLD OF ARTS FUNDING 

Sam Trubridge 
Dominion Post, Dec 15 2022  

Sam Trubridge is director of The Performance Arcade and other theatre, dance, and live art projects with 25 years experience working in New Zealand and overseas.  

Artists are good at metaphors. We know their power, and we also know their dangers. Metaphors can become potent tools for cultural critique, or they can backfire on us. 

Creative NZ named its funds for our more established arts organisations, Toi Uru Kahikatea and Toi Tōtara Haemata, after trees. At CNZ workshops we’ve been furnished with glowing descriptions of our arts ecology as a thriving native forest – chirping birds, fresh undergrowth, taller saplings, leaf litter, and above everything else those two towering ngahere. 

But all is not well in the woods, as recent press suggests. [More]