The Society of The Spectacle
By Elaine Ng

All eyes were on China this August for the grandiose spectacle of the 2008 Beijing Olympics. Some four billion television viewers—more than half the people on the globe—were said to have tuned in. In early September, less than two weeks after the Olympics conclude, a series of mega-exhibitions will open across the Asia-Pacific region. Beginning with the Biennale of Sydney’s closing celebration and leaping to... [more]

Cultural Regression
By Michael Young

The police raid on the Roslyn Oxley9 Gallery in Sydney on May 23 (see AAP 59) just hours before the opening of the Bill Henson (see AAP 50) exhibition was a clumsy attempt at censorship and an indirect attack on freedom of expression.

The police had received a complaint that the show contained photographs so obscene that... [more]