Kate Holden

A giant of classical music, violinist Joshua Bell embraces everything from celebrity collaborations to working with disadvantaged youth in New York schools.

Acclaimed Irish choreographer and dancer Luke Murphy – whose dance theatre series Volcano has its Australian premiere at the Brisbane Festival – puts the sweating body at the centre of urgent questions.

For Brett Dean – internationally acclaimed composer, conductor, musician and mentor – each part of his crowded career feeds the whole.

An outbreak of bird flu threatens to reach the little penguin population on Phillip Island, as thousands of short-tailed shearwaters begin their migration to lay eggs. A plan is being made to protect the penguins, although it is currently secret.

This year’s Archibald Prize was won by Laura Jones with a mix of awkwardness and composure. After more than 100 years, the country’s most popular art prize is like a parasocial family album.

John Meade is inspired by American artist Robert Irwin’s insistence that beauty is the primary experience of art.

For actor, writer, director, singer and comedian Jonathan Biggins, the classic musical West Side Story represents a pinnacle of theatrical art.

When violinist Madeleine Easton first played Bach’s cantata ‘Christ lag in Todes Banden’, she started spontaneously crying. In that moment, her world changed.

Stadium pianist and composer Balázs Havasi draws from his Hungarian heritage and the epic Romantic paintings of Mihály Munkácsy to create his music.

For writer Miranda Darling, the work of American photographer Mary Ellen Mark galvanises her desire to arouse transformative images in her readers’ minds.

For French artist Laure Prouvost, the idea of the grandmother – symbolised in the Palaeolithic figurine the Venus of Willendorf – breaks the boundaries between the real and the surreal.

The Pram Factory – home of the radical 1970s theatre collective the Australian Performing Group – taught Evelyn Krape she had a voice.

German artist Sung Tieu’s fascination with the enigmatic artist Lutz Bacher stems from how they create politically charged connections between personal preoccupations and wider structures of power.

Author and playwright Louis Nowra says the historical nonfiction book Wisconsin Death Trip changed his life through its macabre insights into another world.

Frederick McCubbin’s 1886 painting Lost is a touchstone for Jane Harper’s bestselling crime novels The Dry and Force of Nature.

Yiwarra Kuju was a major inspiration behind Shannyn Palmer’s Unmaking Angas Downs, which just won the Prime Minister’s Literary Award for Australian History.

Director Imara Savage finds herself constantly drawn to the ‘body–earth’ artworks of Cuban–American artist Ana Mendieta.

For dancer and choreographer Tra Mi Dinh, Ann Veronica Janssens’ installation Blue, Red and Yellow is a sensory inspiration.

For Stephen Nicolazzo, founder of Little Ones Theatre and now artistic director of Brink Productions, Madonna is the reason he makes theatre.

When he travelled in India as a young man, director Nigel Jamieson encountered Kathakali classical dance and drama – an experience that has informed his entire career.

The biggest influence on Sri Lankan–Australian Anandavalli’s international dance career was the implacable determination of her mother, Lingambikai.

When Nicholas Jose saw Liu Xiaodong’s painting Smoker, in a Beijing exhibition that expressed the political unrest leading up to Tiananmen Square, it marked a turning point in the writer’s life.

For musician and conductor Stanley Dodds, Olivier Messiaen’s Turangalîla-Symphonie is one of the most joyous works of music ever written.

The ‘wholesome and simple’ art of Ken Done and his unpretentious approach is an inspiration to this artist and former MasterChef star.

The theatricality of Michel Gondry’s classic film Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind inspired award-winning director Ian Michael to portray love in all its glory and mess.

The story created by Tracey Moffatt’s powerful photographic series Body Remembers resonates in the life and work of dancer and choreographer Frances Rings.

For artist and writer Jennifer Higgie, feminist art historian Griselda Pollock revealed the structural exclusion of women artists and their work.

Not only did Chopin’s Preludes intrigue Musica Viva’s artistic director Paul Kildea, the piano the composer completed them on captured his imagination as well.

Proust’s masterpiece of autofiction, In Search of Lost Time, is a constant literary companion and source of inspiration for Melbourne filmmaker Alena Lodkina.

The wildness at the heart of Australian artist and adventurer Vali Myers is an inspiration for Jodi Phillis.

At various stages of her life, American playwright Lynn Nottage has revisited the award-winning play A Raisin in the Sun. Each time, she sees its reflections on life and class through a different character’s eyes.

Listening to Wendy Carlos’s revolutionary Moog versions of J. S. Bach as a child sparked Will Gregory’s enduring love for the synthesiser.

For artist Diego Ramírez, John Milton’s charismatic Satan – the central character in his epic poem Paradise Lost – is a deeply resonant figure.

When she was a child, theatre-maker Zoey Dawson watched Bette Midler in the iconic 1980s film Beaches and realised who she wanted to be.

In 1979, The Specials recorded a cover of Jamaican–British artist Dandy Livingstone’s song “A Message to You Rudy” that changed Nicky Bomba’s life.

The tension between brutality and tenderness in Pina Bausch’s groundbreaking Café Müller was a revelation for theatre-maker Liv Satchell.

When he first heard Paul Simon’s song ‘The Boy in the Bubble’, Brendan Cowell realised that he wanted to be a writer.

For Torres Strait Islands dancer and choreographer Sani Townson, his talented family and rich cultural heritage are the roots of his work.

The philosopher Michel Serres showed publisher, writer and humanitarian worker Xavier Hennekinne that life can take you along several coinciding paths.

The melding of old and new in Igor Stravinsky’s radical score The Rite of Spring has been a lifelong inspiration for composer Mary Finsterer.

For opera star Nadine Sierra, the role of Gilda in Verdi’s Rigoletto has been an emotional touchstone since she was a young woman.

For First Nations theatre-maker Glenn Shea, the comedy series Basically Black remains as fresh and radical as when it premiered in 1973.

When multidisciplinary dancer Jacob Boehme read Sally Morgan’s iconic memoir My Place at 14, it showed him the freedom of seeking the truth.

Joni Mitchell’s classic “Both Sides, Now” has inspired writer and performer Laura Murphy since she was 14 years old.

Clarice Beckett’s haunting paintings, which were largely overlooked in her lifetime, are an abiding inspiration for visual artist Lesley Dumbrell.

Tracey Moffatt’s rebellious playfulness is a longstanding inspiration for documentary-maker Maya Newell.

For Joëlle Gergis, the film Baraka is a reminder of the love that drives her work to preserve our planet.

For writer Jayne Tuttle, the close relationship between life and work in Nan Goldin’s photography was revelatory.

Watching Claudio Abbado conduct the Berliner Philharmoniker taught violinist Daniel Dodds about the genius of the ensemble.

For Robert Drewe, Saul Bellow’s novel Herzog opened up the richness of interiority.

For Paul Selwyn Norton, seeing Trisha Brown’s Set and Reset as a teenager opened up a new world of dance.

Every time musician Ben Lee revisits Donald Barthelme’s short story ‘The Balloon’, it reminds him what art is for.

The greatest influence on Kate Grenville was her mother, whose own passion for storytelling and record keeping is among the award-winning author’s earliest memories.

For Filipino artist Leeroy New, Hayao Miyazaki’s classic animation Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind helped inform a creative evolution.

For playwright Morgan Rose, Hofesh Shechter’s dancework Sun opens up the mess and contradictions of being human.

Solange’s 2016 album A Seat at the Table is a touchstone for musician and visual artist Ripley Kavara.

For Australian Dance Theatre’s new artistic director, Daniel Riley, William Forsythe’s Three Atmospheric Studies – a dance work about the American occupation of Iraq – was a formative experience.

Ian Strange’s artistic investigations of suburban houses draw on Gordon Matta-Clark’s works on the fragility of home.

Back to Back artistic director Bruce Gladwin found the brilliance of the ordinary in Jeremy Deller’s re-enactment of the battle between striking British miners and the police.

For The Australian Ballet’s Dimity Azoury, the power of Simon Stone’s 2013 production of Hamlet opened up the possibilities of performance.

Watching Jane Campion’s work showed Robert Lukins that writing can be as collaborative as filmmaking.

Maguy Marin’s Beckettian dance work May B has fascinated and moved dancer and choreographer Alice Cummins since she first saw it in 1992.

For Angela Tiatia, the performance art of Latai Taumoepeau was revelatory.

The Australian Ballet’s artistic director, David Hallberg, says French choreographer Jérôme Bel opened his eyes – and broke his heart.

The deepest influence on ARIA-nominated Emma Donovan is the music of her grandparents, Micko and Aileen Donovan.

Multidisciplinary artist Amrita Hepi pays homage to Adrian Piper’s groundbreaking short video Funk Lessons.

Acclaimed war photographer Stephen Dupont traces his vocation back to the shock of first seeing Goya’s Saturn Devouring His Son.

For choreographer Jo Lloyd, the discomfort of Leos Carax’s film Holy Motors is part of its uneasy brilliance.

Author Charlotte Wood explains how the still-life paintings of Jude Rae help her write.

Filmmaker Robynne Murphy is inspired by the collective genesis of a painting by sisters Lorraine Brown and Narelle Thomas.

Melbourne artist Lisa Radford, a friend and colleague of Damiano Bertoli’s, remembers his major work Le Désir, a series of performances of a little-known play by Picasso.

The whole-work aesthetic of Japanese doom-metal band Corrupted has been a major inspiration for the noise art of Marco Fusinato.

A 2007 retrospective of Tom Kreisler’s art has had a lifelong impact on Mitch Cairns’ work.

Broadcaster and composer Andrew Ford discusses how Luciano Berio’s O King showed him how to start with the simple.

Miles Franklin award-winner Amanda Lohrey on how the Hindu god Shiva danced creation into being.

Opera and film director Constantine Costi discusses how Caravaggio’s The Taking of Christ has influenced his approach to staging.

Artist and puppet-maker Bryony Anderson talks about the influence of Fiona Hall’s Paradisus Terrestris (1989-90) on her work and outlook.

Alexander Briger AO, an Australian and international star of classical music, discusses the influence of Mahler’s Fourth Symphony on his career.

Award-winning documentary and digital installation artist Lynette Wallworth describes a work that influenced her.

Last year, author Toni Jordan decided to write fiction full-time, in order to pursue her goal of subverting capitalism by making people feel less miserable. She is editing her sixth book and has started writing the next one.

A filmmaker, cinematographer and visual artist, Ling Ang has been documenting her dreams for three years with 3D graphics, installations and now a book.

One of the pioneers of Indigenous presence on screen, Rhoda Roberts has spent her life breaking barriers for First Nations artists. But with her new job, she may finally find some time for her own art.

Musician Ben Salter is ensconced in a studio at MONA, making music in front of the museum’s patrons as a kind of performance art.

The children’s author Ursula Dubosarsky says books can be like cats, sitting at the back of your mind demanding your attention.

Games composer, teacher, broadcaster and critic Dan Golding balances his different worlds in a chaos of creativity.

For Yuwaalaraay singer and writer Nardi Simpson, author of Song of the Crocodile, a sense of place is fundamental to all her work.

Composer Liza Lim is old-school – she still handwrites her scores, as the tactile act of notation flows into her music-making.

Garth Nix, one of Australia’s most internationally successful authors, says lying on the couch with his eyes shut is a crucial part of his working life.

Playwright and performer Kate Mulvany is working on her next play in an unusual space – under quarantine in a Brisbane hotel room.

On his company’s 10th anniversary, Shaun Parker – one of the stalwarts of Australian contemporary dance – looks over his shapeshifting career. “It’s weird, I didn’t like it. I loved it. You’d think I’d be more terrified, but I think, beginning to sing or dance or act, you’re becoming another role. I love that feeling of becoming someone else.”

“The Guaia is three-and-a-half feet tall, with arms as long as she is high. The pads of her fingers are as dark and shiny as wet wood, and splayed like a tree frog’s. Her face is forever young yet strafed, all hollow and crag, sexless. She sleeps behind …”

As the Australian Chamber Orchestra’s principal violin, Satu Vänskä teases astonishing music from her centuries-old instrument. But away from the stage, Vänskä’s musical tastes march to a very different beat.

As Sydney-born, Paris-based artist Angelica Mesiti prepares to show her three-channel video work Assembly in the Australian pavilion at the Venice Biennale, she talks about emotional responses, music as a salve and the vital need for connection. “Dissonance is a word that was really important to this work. Basically, the work is using music as a metaphor. It travels through dissonance, through harmony, through polyphony, through cacophony.”

A woman has a baby and she can’t stop crying. She cries not just on the third day after giving birth with the “baby blues”, but as she feeds him, as she takes congratulatory cards from the letterbox, as she watches television and opens a tin of …

Archibald Prize-winning artist Yvette Coppersmith’s principal subject is herself, in works created with little concession to how they might be perceived by others. “To make a work without an awareness of an audience is virtually impossible, even though I began doing portraits or drawings of faces to hang in my childhood room, and that’s probably what I still want to do. It’s a very private process. It’s really private, actually. It’s only the fact that you’re an artist and part of your role is to share your work.”

A conversation about movement and personal history, with dancer Diane Busuttil.

After a decade of critical acclaim as Pikelet, musician Evelyn Ida Morris is releasing the first music under their own name – a grand suite of piano songs, both sung and speechless, about the experience of being non-binary. “Non-binary is very strange, because it’s about preserving that internal space, and feeling proud of it, and finding ways to communicate it.”

Inside the studio with conceptual artist Stuart Ringholt.

Yorgos Lanthimos teams mundane musings and deadpan delivery to create humour and horror. The Greek filmmaker talks about what inspires his twisted metaphors, and who they are for.

As a pioneer of conceptual art, Joseph Kosuth’s reflections on the world’s great thinkers glow with deeper meaning. “It’s not about how, it’s about why,” he says. “So I think – not to be vainglorious about it – I instituted, for very selfish reasons, a view of art as something quite different from the inherited tradition.”

A chat with urban planner, author and artistic director of the theatre company Mammalian Diving Reflex Darren O’Donnell.

Daycare operator Eliza and her life committed to children.

The Book of Exodus director Adena Jacobs on the ethereal connection between the stage and the audience.

A pioneering Melbourne designer discovers a family link to the birth of the Indian film industry.

Philippine pole-dancer performance artist Eisa Jocson.

In the workroom with punk veteran and abstract artist John Nixon.

Back to Back Theatre disorients and mesmerises audiences with large themes developed from very personal workshopping.

John Neumeier rehearses Nijinsky with the Australian Ballet.

Studio Voltaire director Joe Scotland on how art can help us think about and understand the world.

Father John Misty delivers bruising piss-taking, knowing manipulation of celebrity, and surprisingly sincere love songs.

A seat side stage with theatre production pair Carolyn Burns and Simon Phillips.

A chat in the back shed with futurist and artist Daniel Crooks.

Mary Coustas on comedy, her quest for motherhood, and not losing her ‘floral bits’.

Richard Mosse turns the war-torn landscape of the Democratic Republic of Congo shockingly pink.

Acclaimed NYC-based multimedia artist TV Moore brings his immersive work home to Australia.

Chapel Street's Benevolent ALIen.

Glyn Johns knows what it's like to be in a dark room with Keith Richards.

All the world’s a stage for Melbourne Symphony Orchestra maestro Andrew Davis.

“Few have noticed the highwire upon which Turnbull has been perched ever more precariously since the election. Only now is the wobble beginning to show. ”

The Victorian Labor leader stands taller ahead of the election.

In the world of Australian film and television, few people have spent more time on our screens than Angus Sampson.

How a Footscray fitter and turner became the king of Crown Casino's male burlesque hit, Princes of the Night.

For two albums, singer-songwriter Dan Sultan was ‘a collaborator’. Now he is himself.

Quiet please, there's a lady on stage. Lights go up on renowned artistic director Robyn Archer.

Dealing with tragedy, raw grief, blood and gore is just part of the job for a paramedic. Thank God they can do what they do every day.

“"I didn’t want to be the boy who cried sober."”