Dates: 5- 7 November 2025
Location: Flinders University City Campus, One Festival Tower, Station Rd, Adelaide
For more information, contact: CHASS.VPED@flinders.edu.au
Across the Asia-Pacific region, the arts, culture, and creative industries are proving to be a dynamic sector. Radical changes in society, in technology, in participation and in models of financial support are profoundly impacting the sector, with implications for educational and cultural institutions alike.
There are implications for the health and wellbeing of the arts sector, as well as significant health and wellbeing benefits for audiences and participants. In this symposium we explore those tensions.
The symposium will bring together leaders from universities and arts institutions to share experiences, ideas, and strategic visions in response to the sector’s most pressing challenges and opportunities around health and wellbeing.
In particular, the symposium will ask how leadership in the sector can formulate and drive responses to the following key questions:
How can the arts and university sectors work together to make the case most effectively for the efficacy of arts and health ?
How can these collaborations support the wellbeing of artists to be in a position to support the use of arts for the wellbeing of communities? How can universities and arts institutions and community sector collaborate to conduct research, prepare future workforces and advocate for better understanding the impact of arts experiences on wellbeing?
How can international collaborations across the Asia-Pacific in arts for health and wellbeing be both widened and deepened?
How do topics like climate action, decolonial practices, ceding power and opening public space contribute to the role arts can play for the health and wellbeing of diverse communities?
What role does leadership and governance play in supporting arts for wellbeing?
The Symposium will be held in Flinders University’s new City Campus, adjoining the Adelaide Festival Centre, during the internationally renowned OzAsia Festival.
Wednesday 5th – Robyn Archer Oration : Petra Kalive |
All Welcome |
Free |
|
||
Thursday 6th – Day 1 |
General Admission |
$50 |
|
People of First Nations |
$20 |
|
Small to Medium Organisations |
$20 |
|
Students |
$20 |
|
Flinders University Staff |
Free |
|
||
Friday 7th – Day 2 |
All Welcome |
Free |
General Admission
The standard registration fee for the Arts Leadership Symposium is $50. This includes access to all sessions, workshops, and networking events, as well as symposium materials and meals.
Discounts and Eligibility Criteria
People of First Nations
We are committed to supporting the participation of First Nations people in our Symposium. We offer a ticket fee of $20, when applicable.
Small to Medium Organisations
We recognise the importance of small-to-medium organisations to the landscape and development in the arts and culture sectors. Therefore, we offer a ticket fee of $20, where applicable to employees of small to medium organisations within these fields. To qualify, your organisation must have fewer than 15 employees. To receive this discount, please register using your organisational e-mail.
Students
We encourage students to join us and gain valuable insights from industry leaders in the arts and culture sectors. Students are eligible for a ticket price of $20, where applicable. To receive this discount, please register using your institutional e-mail.
OzAsia Festival’s Lucky Dumpling Market
Indulge your senses at OzAsia Festival’s Lucky Dumpling Market with the sights, sounds, tastes and smells of a bustling Asian open-air food market along the banks of Karrawirra Parri/River Torrens.
Local restaurants
Adelaide’s local restaurants are sure to impress with a range of prices and culinary styles for you to explore.
For more information, contact: CHASS.VPED@flinders.edu.au
Wednesday 5th November
Opening night - The Robyn Archer Oration
Dunstan Playhouse
5:00PM - 6:30PM
In this year’s Robyn Archer Oration, Petra Kalive — Artistic Director and Co-CEO of State Theatre Company South Australia — reflects on the values that guide her practice as both artist and leader.
For Petra, leadership is less about authority than it is about holding open a space: a threshold where creativity, care and risk coexist. She will explore how wellbeing is not a pause from the work, but the ground on which brave, uncompromising art can be built.
Drawing on her experience, Petra will consider leadership as an artform in itself — a choreography of listening and daring, resilience and imagination. This oration offers an insight into how theatre can model more humane ways of being together, and how care, when placed at the centre, can shape both the stories we tell and the futures we create.
Petra will be introduced by Robyn Archer AO, and the questions and discussion after the oration will be led by artist and activist Violette Ayad.
OzAsia Show and Dinner– 6.30pm Por Por’s Big Fat Surprise Wedding. Show & three course dinner at Adelaide Festival centre.
– Advance Bookings essential
OR dinner options at Lucky Dumpling Market, Elder Park
Thursday 6th November
Morning
Flinders City Campus, Level 14
9:30AM - 9:45AM
Flinders City Campus, Level 14
9:45AM - 10:45AM
Flinders City Campus, Level 14
11:10AM - 12:30PM
Afternoon
Flinders City Campus, Level 14
1:45PM - 2:00PM
Flinders City Campus, Level 14
2:00PM - 3:15PM
Flinders City Campus, Level 14
3:45PM - 5:00PM
Join us for an hour of networking and cocktails. For dinner you’re encouraged to attend the Lucky Dumpling Market in Elder Park as part of the Oz Asia Festival. A special area has been cordoned off for Symposium guests for this self-funded option. Staff will guide attendees to Elder Park upon conclusion of the networking.
Friday 7th November
Morning
Flinders City Campus, Level 14
9:30AM - 9:45AM
Flinders City Campus, Level 14
9:45AM - 10:30AM
Flinders City Campus, Level 14
11:00AM - 1:00PM
Afternoon
Flinders City Campus, Level 14
1:30PM - 3:00PM
Flinders City Campus, Level 14
4:15PM - 5:00PM
Peter Monteath was born in Brisbane and educated in Queensland and in Germany. He has taught previously at The University of Queensland, Griffith University, Deakin University, The University of Western Australia and The University of Adelaide. He has also been Adjunct Professor at The University of St. Louis Missouri and the Technical University of Berlin, where he was an Alexander von Humboldt Fellow. At Flinders he teaches modern European history. His research interests span modern European and Australian history. He is now Vice-President and Executive Dean of the College of Humanities, Arts and Social Sciences.
Tully Barnett is Associate Professor in Creative Industries at Flinders University and Director of Assemblage Centre for Creative Arts. Her teaching and research focus on cultural policy, cultural value and evaluation. She is co-author of What Matters? Talking Value in Australian Culture (2018). She is a founding member of the Reset Arts and Culture team.
Benny Lim is the Associate Professor of Practice in Cultural Management and Director of the Master of Arts in Cultural Management Programme at the Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK). Beyond academia, he is also an active arts practitioner. Over the last 23 years, he has conceptualized and produced numerous theatre productions and art festivals, often focusing on issues affecting marginalized communities. Benny also holds several governance and advisory roles. He is the Board Chair of Along the Edge Limited, a non-profit arts organization in Hong Kong. He is also a member of the Programme Sub-committee of The TENG Company in Singapore and a member of the Advisory Board of the University Arts Centre, CUHK Shenzhen. In 2023, he was appointed by the Hong Kong Arts Development Council as an Arts Advisor (Arts Administration) and Examiner (Drama) for a tenure of three years.
A Bachelor of Arts is the most common degree among non-executive directors of Australia's 100 biggest public companies, and two thirds of Australia‘s workforce have studied humanities and social sciences.*
By 2026, around 61,000 new positions will be created for Arts Professionals according to the National Skills Commission. So what does that mean for you? Job opportunities range from Business, to Media, to Government and Politics, to Marketing, Writing and more.
*The Academy of Social Sciences in Australia
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