Genevieve got her dream job in her dream organisation. Six weeks later, her funding was cut

“I had to hit a friend of mine with a dead fish on stage,” Genevieve Trace laughs.

“So he then threw me down through the trap door and sat on it and I screamed for about six minutes for him to let me out.”

Trace is recalling her first experience at Metro Arts, as a QUT theatre student in 2008, performing in a friend’s experimental show.

It was the start of a 16-year journey that would include performing, pulling coffees in the cafe and selling tickets, to now leading the organisation as executive director.

“I think that gives me a pretty good understanding of the multifaceted nature of our organisation,” she says.

Metro Arts has nurtured artists and performers in Brisbane since 1981 but its federal funding has been axed. Credit: Metro Arts

“The thing that’s really made me stay with Metro Arts is that idea of the development of new work.”

Metro Arts – essentially two gallery spaces, two studios, a 117-person capacity theatre, a theatre bar and a laneway in West End – has been a launch pad for artists for more than 40 years.

In 2023 alone, Metro Arts supported more than 400 visual artists and performers, developed 32 new Australian works and had more than 32,000 patrons through its doors.

Over the decades visual artists such as Vernon Ah Kee, Gemma Smith, Warraba Weatherall and Meagan Streader have had their start or a major boost with Metro Arts. Theatre luminaries such as Wesley Enoch, Dead Puppet Society, Daniel Evans, Roxanne McDonald and Lafe Charlton all staged early works there, to name a few.

“I probably wouldn’t even have a company if Metro didn’t exist,” says Ipswich-based theatre maker Timothy Wynn (THAT Production Company).

Metro Arts provided a venue, logistical support and advice on applying for Arts Queensland funding for Wynn’s 2023 show Every Brilliant Thing, which would go on to win two Matilda Awards.

“I probably wouldn’t even have a company if Metro didn’t exist.”

Theatremaker Timothy Wynn

“I did a residency with Metro Arts back when I first graduated in 2013, and for one year, they gave me a free studio,” says Brisbane artist Elizabeth Willing.

Willing has a major installation, Kitchen Studio, at Metro Arts in September – a food-based artwork that she describes as her “dream project”.

“What sets them apart is that they support things that are very experimental. Metro Arts have always been there at crucial moments for me.”

“Independent producers struggle to afford a space to put on a show, and Metro has always been that space.” Timothy Wynn is one of hundreds of theatre practitioners helped by Metro Arts.

But, at the end of 2023, Metro Arts suffered a major blow when Creative Australia (formerly the Australia Council) declined to award multi-year funding for 2025-28, representing the loss of $270,000 a year from its budget.

“We’re working with the board on how we move through this,” Trace says. “But it will be a trimmer program.”

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After graduating from QUT, Trace worked at both the Queensland Academy for Creative Industries and Metro Arts while being mentored by former chief executive Liz Burcham.

Then, while pregnant and working at Metro Arts as a receptionist, she took another slight pivot and studied law. Another former chief executive, Jo Thomas, suggested she look at development and fundraising.

“I just sunk my teeth into that under the guidance of Jo and our development manager at the time, Celestine Doyle. Metro really didn’t have a strategy around donor engagement or sponsors around 2016. Eight years later we have great and growing relationships with sponsors and donors.”

Upon completing her law degree, she was made Metro Arts’ general manager.

“Everything that I learned from my law degree, I use pretty much every day… except for criminal law,” she notes.

The funding blow came just weeks into Trace’s appointment as ED, replacing Thomas.

“There are a couple of things that we’ve taken on board from Creative Australia and we completely understand. But the one thing that we did take issue with was that they couldn’t see the impact of Metro Arts. And we’re like, ‘OK, well, we’re gonna show you.’”

They responded with an open letter and over 400 statements from artists about the vital influence Metro Arts has had on their careers.

Creative Australia’s chief executive Adrian Colette and chair Robert Morgan sent an acknowledgement letter, which was “nice to get”.

“We’re being really upfront with our team, that it’s going to hurt us,” says Trace, “but we are very cognisant that for other organisations that were defunded, it’s a make-or-break situation.” Trace notes that Melbourne’s iconic La Mama theatre company has announced it won’t be producing shows at all in 2025.

Luckily, Metro Arts is not without a safety net.

Metro Arts’ original home at 109 Edward Street was built in 1889. Metro Arts sold the building in 2020.Credit: Ruth McCosker

Opened in July 1981 as the Brisbane Community Arts Centre, the organisation, renamed Metro Arts in 1988, occupied a heritage five-storey building at 109 Edward Street until 2020.

The old building was beautiful, but plagued with upkeep problems: rotting floorboards, flooding, and a perennially broken-down lift. So in 2020 the venue was sold and the organisation moved into a sparkling rented premises in West Village.

“When we sold the Edward Street building a large portion of the sale went into the Metro Arts Future Fund. It’s an investment portfolio to ensure Metro Arts is here for another 40 years.

“The business structures of the arts are changing and the pressures that are facing us are unprecedented.” Metro Arts executive director Genevieve Trace.

“So yes, we have that sitting there, but we now have to face the situation of what do we spend whilst not jeopardising the model to future-proof it.

“There’s lots of questions, but we’re in a more fortunate position than other organisations.”

The 2024 program is not affected by the cuts, and will include a two-week festival of dance works, Dance 24, opening on May 22, and an interactive theatre experience for children, Scaredy House, by company-in-residence Counterpilot, in June.

Trace says she takes pride in having brought new artistic associates Daniel Clifford (visual arts) and Benjamin Knapton (performance) into the fold.

“Both of them are really passionate about artist development, which is what we strive for here, that’s our main purpose, and creating career pathways for our artists.”

“You need that space to experiment and the permission to fail.”

Genevieve Trace

She says that unlike many arts organisations Metro Arts is about supporting ideas that are dictated by the artists themselves.

“I think sometimes in this industry, it’s about the shininess of things, but to get to the shiny, mind-blowing experiences, you need that space to experiment and the permission to fail.”

A case in point: the director of that fish-slapping show back in 2008, Daniel Santangeli, has also gone on to helm an arts institution – Footscray Community Arts in Melbourne.

“Failure only makes the experiment better,” Trace says, “because you know which variables work and which don’t.”

Metro Arts presents Dance 24 from May 22 to June 1.