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The current COVID-19 lockdown impacting Greater Sydney has led the organisers of this year’s Australian Performing Arts Exchange (APAX) to advise that conference and arts market will now take place entirely online.

Combining an arts market with professional development opportunities, the annual event - presented by PAC Australia (Performing Arts Connections Australia) - was due to be held at the National Institute of Dramatic Art (NIDA) in the Sydney suburb of Kensington, with a mix of physical and digital sessions.

Running from Tuesday 7th to Friday 10th September, APAX 2021 will follow the 2020 edition of the event in running entirely online.

Speaking to ArtsHub, PAC Australia’s Executive Director, Katherine Connor advised “when APAX went online last year, it really opened access to all corners of the sector, and it was so amazing to hear about teams who would watch sessions together, then switch off the live stream and start talking straight away about work they wanted to program for their audiences, or shifts they wanted to make in their own organisation based on what they’d just seen.”

With this year’s APAX has the theme Thrive and aims to explore the regenerative nature of the performing arts, Connor added “the market program and the speakers in this year’s line-up really will instil some much-needed optimism and energy and remind us all why we do what we do.

“‘We’re beyond disappointed we can’t be gathering in-person for a second year in a row, but we all still absolutely need to be thinking about what we want the future of the performing arts sector to look like, and APAX online gives us the chance to do that together.”

Keynote speakers for the conference include author, educator and physician Dr Jenny Brockis, an expert in the science of high-performance thinking and improving brain health and wellbeing; Yaron Lifschitz, the Artistic Director and Chief Executive of Brisbane’s Circa; and Kate Fielding, Chief Executive of arts and culture think tank A New Approach.

Other sessions at APAX include a series of pitches from tour-ready performances and companies seeking bookings with the many performing arts centres across Australia, including Circa, Slingsby, Barking Gecko, Windmill and Belvoir; and breakout sessions exploring such topics as inclusivity and diversity, the environmental impact of the arts, and the role of theatre in Indigenous Language revival.

This week’s Zoo and Aquarium Association Australasia conference, also due to have been held in Sydney, has also had to be presented as an entirely online event.

Image: September's Australian Performing Arts Exchange was to have been held at the National Institute of Dramatic Art in Sydney.

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