PAC Australia’s Third Thursday Exchange is a monthly online meeting for members to explore hot industry topics. Designed to keep members informed and connected on the latest trends, research and policy developments, each month the lunch-time discussions are lead by members or invited guests.
If you would like to propose a topic for discussion or a speaker please contact us here.
Catch up on previous Third Thursday Exchange content with the videos below.
At PAC’s Third Thursday Exchange members meeting in April we heard from a series of speakers regarding upcoming sector work:
In May, we’re talking about The Future Of Live events with the Advisory Board for the Arts. This session examines evolving audience behaviours and offers tools to strengthen your organisation’s audience engagement. This session is designed as a follow up to February’s session on designing the End to End customer experience.
You can view the presentation slides from today’s session HERE.
This month we’re looking at how members are embracing new models of financial accessibility for audiences such as Pay What You Feel (aka Pay What You Want, Pay What You Can, etc) – from how these systems are set up, what are the advantages/disadvantages and learnings along the way, and what this has meant for box office revenue.
The 2025 Australian Performing Arts Exchange (APAX) is set to arrive in the tropical Top End for our next instalment in beautiful Garramilla/Darwin from 11-15 August .
We’re excited to invite artists, producers and organisations interested in reaching performing arts presenters across Australia to apply to present their work as part of the 2025 APAX Arts Market. There are plenty of ways to put you, your project or organisation in the spotlight including pitches, showcase performances, artist profiles, company updates and roundtable discussions.
Part One consist of our National Presenter Outlook discussion, led by Katherine Connor and joined by special guests Anne-Marie Heath (The Art House Wyong) and Jeanette Wedmaier (Empire Theatre Toowoomba).
Part Two leads into our information session for Arts Market Applications as a part of APAX 2025.
You can download a PDF of the slides from the presentation via this link.
Featuring Courtenay Casey from PAC Australia’s research partners, Advisory Board for the Arts (ABA). The ABA recently completed a research piece on best practices in end-to-end customer experiences in cultural institutions. In this session they will present the findings to support all organisations engaging with audiences to better leverage the whole customer experiences to build audiences, visitors and engagement.
You can download a PDF of the slides from Courtenay’s presentation via this link.
An update on PAC Australia’s research plans for 2025, and a briefing from Angela Vivian from A New Approach on their report Transformative Edge (rescheduled from November 2024).
This is a a particularly exciting and relevant piece for our members as it outlines a framework for articulating how the arts sector provides cross-sectoral value that will be useful for your own advocacy work.
Hear from Sandi Woo, CAAP and project partners including Erica Sanderson (Bunjil Place), Penny Watts (Merrigong) and Anne-Marie Heath (The Art House Wyong) about the ENGAGE! Report and Toolkit. Learn about some practical tips and insights on everything from effective community engagement strategies to how we can support more intra-industry exchange about community engagement work in your regions and organisations.
The Engage! Report and Toolkit are available here.
Kate Fielding, Director of A New Approach provides some key insights, data and tools for members, looking at cultural policy; government spending data and what it means; and the new insight report and toolkit exploring how to develop effective partnerships – scalable for all organisation sizes. operations. You can find the reports here:
Thriving through Thick and Thin: Partnerships for Our Cultural Life
The Big Picture: Public Expenditure on Artistic, Cultural and Creative Activity in Australia
Rebecca Mostyn, Director Research Development and Partnerships at Creative Australia shares a special briefing for members on the outcomes of the latest research, which tracks the working conditions of artists with information on their artistic practice, income, career development and pathways, and their broader working lives.
You can find the research report, interactive dashboard, Creative Australia’s response and online webinars about the key findings at Creative Australia, and download Rebecca’s powerpoint from the session here.
We also point members to the March 2023 Third Thursday Exchange session that showcased examples of artists embedded in performing arts organisations, with the recording available further down the page.
A revisit of the persuasive APAX presentation from 2022 by Adam Williams, this session is an excellent primer to the findings of the PAC Australia / Advisory Board for the Arts Driving Attendance survey.
An Attention Architect (part marketer, consumer psychologist and futurist) Adam’s bespoke presentation focusses on the key challenges we need to be addressing in our marketing strategies, and provides research-based, actionable insights to overcome those challenges. Covering everything from branding, to pricing strategy and targeted generational marketing, Adam’s session transcends arts-specific marketing strategies to really understand what will capture the attention of your community.
Unfortunately Adam’s presentation was captured with a low sound level, thus please turn your volume up for this session.
This session focuses on our Research, Data and Training for 2024. Find out more about:
Climate change is one of the biggest external pressures the arts and cultural sector will face in the coming years. How can venue managers support a more sustainable way forward for our centres, staff, audiences and communities? Rosie Dwyer (PAC Australia) brings her knowledge and insight of the issues and conditions climate change will create for regional venues, and provide sector-specific solutions and examples of positive change to support venue managers to dip their toe in more sustainable waters.
A copy of the powerpoint presentation, including links to the carbon calculators and carbon offset solutions is available to download here.
We talk about relevancy a lot, particularly when it comes to programming. In an environment where costs to present are high, ticket affordability is diminishing and audiences aren’t attending like they used to, is relevant or quality programming enough? What is the radical re-thinking required of cultural institutions to bring the audience back, be relevant to a wider base, and reach audiences of the future? This session addresses the urgent re-think across the spectrum of what presenters deliver, from programming, to the traditional models and etiquettes of coming into our spaces, to shake loose the institutions that are holding us back.
Speakers: Ruth Hartt – Culture for Hire; Joel McGuinness – Geelong Arts Centre; Wanyika Mshila – Sydney Opera House; Giuliana Bonel – The Empire and Facilitator – Penny Miles.
A preliminary study into how Australian performing arts organisations are responding to the global environmental crisis, across programming, practice and policy. In particular it reinforces the need for policy frameworks so that Australia can keep up with commitments from our international counterparts across presenting organisations and theatre companies. PAC Australia members organisations who have participated in this study include include Bell Shakespeare, Dancenorth, Polyglot and Terrapin. (Download report here.)
Jodie Wainwright and Jessica Pantano from Milk Crate Theatre discuss the social impact measurement framework that they have developed, and report on how they’ve used this in their Arts and Job Readiness project. You’re welcome to download and use their Arts and Job Readiness and 2022 Annual Impact reports, and reach out to Jodie or Jess to explore opportunities to share and develop this work in your own space (via their website).
Alison Pinder and Mark Labrow from Mandurah Performing Arts Centre, discuss the impact and evaluation of their Art of Wellbeing Program with Katherine Connor. They have kindly provided their Evaluation Summary for members, and you can view either the full Third Thursday Exchange session or their presentation recordings below.
Merindah Donnelly and Kate Eltham from BlakDance discuss their recent experiences on the road with the work Silence, providing guidance and tips for working in this space.
Discussion about the Artist / Presenter relationship, showcasing different programs and examples from around Australia. Led by Bradley Rush – Redlands Performing Arts Centre with Anne-Marie Heath – The Art House, Fiona de Garis – Bunbury Regional Entertainment Centre and Leland Kean – Merrigong Theatre Company.
Marc Goldenfein from ArtsPay discusses their merchant facility, specifically created to raise funds for the arts, and Kate Fielding, CEO of A New Approach shares her insights on the new national cultural policy Revive, as well as ANA’s three-year, national study of ‘middle’ Australia, with learnings and opportunities for members.
You can view a copy of ArtsPay’s presentation, including their contact details, here.
Regardless of your level of engagement with sponsorship or philanthropy, questions about the ethics of arts partnerships are filtering through all parts of the performing arts sector and will require all organisations to take a position. In this session, PAC Australia member Monica Kane and colleague Liesbeth Goedhart will share a framework specifically designed for arts organisations to assist in forming their position – or establishing your ‘red line’ that won’t be crossed when it comes to any kind of partnership.
Authors Monica Kane and Lisbeth Goedhart have kindly shared their PDF A Guide to Ethical Partnships for members download and use, and this Googledrive contains their Public Draft Ethics & Governance guide, research and links to online resources and media.
This exchange explores Membership Programs with Lucinda Bertram and Pauline Bagnall from Frankston Arts Centre and Amanda Shepherd from Theatre North, as well as hearing from Brad Spolding – Brisbane Powerhouse about their new vision and programming strategy. The exchange was held on Thursday, 17th November 2022.
An update on PAC Australia’s policy priorities, and member consultation for the new National Touring Charter. This meeting was held on Thursday, 21st July 2022.
New approaches to supporting sustainable careers for artists and arts managers, with Dr Kate Power, University of Queensland’s School of Business and Mik Auckland from HOTA. This meeting was held on Thursday, 16th June 2022.
An update and briefing for members on Deakin University’s Audience Diversification project, with Anne Kershaw and Abbie Trott (Deakin University) and Shayne Price (Whitehorse City Council and PAC Australia board member). This meeting was held on Thursday, 21st April 2022.
A new model for APAX 2022; the commissioning process and Local Giants update with Marion Potts and the Performing Lines team. This meeting was held on Thursday, 17th March 2022.
PAC Australia’s Federal Election priorities and a benchmarking study. This meeting was held on Thursday, 17th February 2022.
A discussion between members about the latest emerging issues of operating with COVID, and particulary the Omicron wave – how organisations are coping with newer terrains of staff and supply chain issues due to confirmed COVID, shifting policies and potential postponements, and the intersection of presenters and producers with the updated COVID Safe Touring Guidelines.
Leading the conversation: Peter Ross (Entertainment Venues Tamworth), Guiliana Bonel (Brisbane Powerhouse), Andrew Threlfall (CDP Theatre Producers) and Kerri Glasscock (Sydney Fringe and Venue 505). This meeting was held on Thursday, 20th January 2022.
Members are joined by Hannah Torrance and Andy Donovan from the Australia Council to review the changes to Playing Australia guidelines, and Chris Howlett and Adele Schoenhardt from the Australian Digital Concert Hall to discuss what’s next for presenters who wish to take part in the Digital Presenting Pilot program. This meeting was held on Thursday, 16th December 2022.
This session is an opportunity for all members to hear from states who are currently operating or re-opening with COVID in the community – how re-opening is tracking, what was unexpected, what you will need to consider that public health orders don’t articulate, etc.
Last year, we were all navigating the unknown terrain of re-opening and re-establishing COVID-safe operations – this year, members in COVID-free states have the opportunity to learn from those who are already doing it, and states with COVID in the community can hear from others facing the same experiences. This meeting was held on Thursday, 18th November 2022.