Research

NAVA is an industry partner on three current research projects supported by the ARC Linkage program:

• Visual Arts Work: sustainable strategies for the Australian visual arts and craft sector led by researchers from RMIT University and The University of Melbourne, and industry partners the National Association of the Visual Arts (NAVA), and the Australian Museums and Galleries Association (AMaGA).
• Precarious Movements: Choreography and the Museum led by researchers at the University New South Wales (UNSW) and Monash University Museum of Art (MUMA) with industry partners the National Gallery of Victoria (NGV), TATE UK, Art Gallery New South Wales (AGNSW) and independent artist Shelley Lasica.
• Empowering Australia’s Visual Arts via Creative Blockchain Opportunities led by researchers from the University of Wollongong (UoW), University of Southern Queensland (UniSQ) and The University of Queensland (UQ) with industry partners the National Association for the Visual Arts (NAVA), Australian Network for Art & Technology (ANAT), CSIRO Data61, Copyright Agency and Australian Copyright Council.

NAVA also supports the longitudinal studies by Professor David Throsby on the economic circumstances of arts practitioners over the last three decades as well as The Countess Report, an independent artist run initiative that publishes data on gender representation in the Australian contemporary art world.

• Artists as Workers: An Economic Study of Professional Artists in Australia (2024) - The seventh in a landmark study carried out independently over the last four decades by Professor David Throsby and colleagues at Macquarie University, with support from Creative Australia.
• Creating Value: Results of the National Arts Participation Survey (2023) - The fifth study in the research series exploring Australians’ engagement with arts and creativity.  
• Visual Arts Work: sustainable strategies for the Australian visual arts and craft sector - Four year research project (2019-2023) led by researchers from RMIT University and The University of Melbourne, and industry partners NAVA and AMaGA.
• Productivity Commission report on Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander visual arts and crafts (2022) - Examines the value, nature and structure of markets for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander visual arts and crafts.
• 2022 Countess Report - Gender representation in the contemporary visual art sector. Reveals stagnation in gender equity. Also see Countess Report 2019 and Countess Report 2016.
• NSW Museum & Gallery Sector Census (2022) - Conducted every four years.
• Australian Public Galleries Snapshot (2020) - Data from 197 of Australia's small-to-medium public galleries by M&G QLD and PGAV on behalf of the National Public Galleries Alliance also, Australian Public Galleries Snapshot 2019, National Public Galleries Alliance
• The All Conference Artist-run Initiatives Sub-sector (2019) - Report on the characteristics of Australia’s small-scale visual arts artist-run initiative (ARI) sector.
• UAMA Survey Report 2017-2019 - aggregated membership data collected from 22 university art museums over the three-year period, 2017-2019, reflecting the significant and dynamic roles they play in local and regional contexts, and nationally, as a major part of Australia’s cultural ecology.
• NAVA report: The economics of Australia’s S2M visual arts sector (2017) - The first comprehensive study of the Australian S2M sector undertaken since the 2002 Contemporary Visual Arts and Craft Inquiry (Myer Inquiry).
• Present State — An inquiry into the visual arts sector in Western Australia (2016)
• Mapping the Australian Craft Sector (2014) - National Craft Initiative (NCI) research report.
• First We See: National Review of Visual Education (2008)
• NAVA research: The Big Picture: a Planning Matrix for the Australian Visual Arts and Craft Sector (2005) - Identified key trends and made 22 propositions for action.
• Myer Inquiry: Report of the Contemporary Visual Arts and Craft Inquiry (2002) - Findings and proposals for the sustainability of the contemporary visual arts and craft sector for the consideration of governments and cultural organisations.
• Visual Arts Industry Guidelines Research Project (VAIGRP) (2001) - Recommendations for governments, the community and arts professionals themselves to ensure the sector is more viable, sustainable and productive. Produced the Code of Practice, ideas for policy and legislation, and a series of research reports on various aspects of the art industry.

Designing for a better Australia

Recognising the importance of craft and design within an increasingly complex social, economic, and cultural ecology, at the end of 2009 NAVA began the process of establishing a new peak body to promote Australian design. The Australian Design Alliance [AdA] was launched in September 2010. Following this, the National Craft Initiative (NCI) was launched in March 2013.

The CoUNTess Report

NAVA backs the research of CoUNTess: a report on gender representation in the contemporary visual arts. It reveals that there is a continuing imbalance of power with men holding more positions at senior levels and male artists significantly better represented by commercial galleries.

To promote fair and ethical trade

The Indigenous Art Code was developed in the first instance by NAVA and then by the Australia Council for the Arts, who worked closely with an Industry Alliance Group made up of artists, Indigenous art centres, commercial art galleries, public art galleries, auction houses and visual arts peak bodies; including the Association of Northern, Kimberley and Arnhem Aboriginal Artists, Umi Arts, Ananguku Arts, Desart, Australian Commercial Galleries Association, NAVA and the Australian Indigenous Art Trade Association.

After a period of public consultation the Industry Alliance Group endorsed a final Code in August 2009. The Code was publicly launched on 29 November 2010.

Economic Study

S2M Report 2017.

Image: Contemporary Art Centre of South Australia, Richard Bell, Morphett Street Mural, production view, 2016.

Photo: Marie Falcinella

NAVA commissioned Economists at Large to measure the economic and cultural output of Australia’s small-to-medium (S2M) visual arts organisations. Throughout 2016, we conducted surveys of urban and regional galleries, artist-run initiatives (ARIs), Australian Craft and Design Centres (ACDCs) and Contemporary Arts Organisations (CAO).

The data in this study reveals that the small-to-medium (S2M) visual arts sector employs over 2,000 people, puts $100 million into the economy and produces 26,000 new art works each year with a budget worth just 0.03% of Federal Government revenue. However, there has been a 17.5% decline in per capita federal arts spending from 2008 to 2013.

This research project was supported by a Knowledge Exchange Grant from the City of Sydney.

VAIGRP

In 2001 the four year Visual Arts Industry Guidelines Research Project (VAIGRP) produced:

• The Code of Practice for the Australian Visual Arts and Craft Sector;
• Ideas for Policy and Legislation;
• a series of research reports on various aspects of the art industry.

The outcomes were used to inform the work of the Commonwealth Government’s ‘Contemporary Visual Arts and Craft Inquiry’.

With funding from the Australian Research Council and a contribution from the Australia Council, this project was initiated by NAVA and undertaken in partnership with the Universities of Sydney and Macquarie and the Art Gallery of NSW, a year later joined by Simpsons Solicitors.

In 2005 the final report was released of another NAVA initiated major research project. The Big Picture: a Planning Matrix for the Australian Visual Arts and Craft Sector which studied the impact on the sector of five intersecting forces significantly determining its fate:

Government Policy;

Economic Environment;

Globalisation;

Technological Change;

Community Attitudes.

The report identified key trends and made 22 propositions for action.

Again with funding from the Australian Research Council and a contribution from the Australia Council, this research project was undertaken by NAVA in partnership with the Department of Art History and Theory at the University of Sydney.