Sue Clark

Head
Community Cultural Development

In the 1980's Sue worked with the Australia Council Community Arts Board, designing and coordinating intensive learning programs for community arts officers working in local government, and artists working in community contexts.

Sue has worked as the Manager of the Community Development Unit, in the Victorian Ministry for the Arts (1982-1992) now known as Arts Victoria, where she pioneered and brokered project opportunities for over 500 artists working in community partnerships. Sue introduced many new funding and support programs, resulting in enabling collaborative project links with health programs, neighbourhood/townscape planning schemes, trade union workers, rural renewal projects, ethnic communities, and schools, as well as a diverse range of local government arts programs, for festivals, youth arts and art responding to social and environmental agendas.

At that time, Sue also established the Community Arts Resource Centre that became a State and National artist referral, community information and communication service centre. She has also facilitated the commissioning of artist directories, case study materials and evaluation reports, which provided an overview and guidance to work practice.

In 1992 Sue established her own business, and since then she has been engaged in diverse assignments involving research, community planning and arts management:

Appointed as a Research Fellow at The Victorian College of the Arts (2000 - current), Sue has been contributing to Indigenous Arts Management Course curriculum developments, Arts Management lecturing, and to Public Art and Community Cultural Development seminars.

Sue was involved as a committee member for a Digital Design Bienale, working with RMIT's Lab 3000, for an exhibition at the Melbourne Museum (2005).

In her work as a cultural analyst, Sue has been published both in Australia and China in the Deakin University publication on Cultural Planning, her articles focussing on Strategies for Change and Diversity and The Culture of the Built Environment. In addition, she was published as part of the Victorian State Government's Melbourne 2003 Strategy, as an Information Vic publication titled Metropolis - the role of culture in urban development.

Sue has teaching qualifications in both the visual arts and performing arts, with extensive educational experience at secondary and tertiary levels. Throughout her career, Sue has contributed to numerous curriculum development innovations, and to the research and development of new models of art practice at the community level.

Sue took up The Victorian College of the Arts appointment as the CCD Course Coordinator in October 2004 and was appointed in July 2005 as Head, CCD Program, and is currently driving the upcoming launch of the Centre for Cultural Partnerships in 2008.