🔴🟠🟡🟢🔵🟣⚫️ NEW DIRECTION  Ed. No. 197 - DREAM - CREATE - BUILD

McMUFFIN TIME

(and a shared reckoning)

I hadn’t yet started to chomp into my breakfast McMuffin at the McDonald’s in Wellington NZ when my eye caught this message (pic above) covering the store wall.  It was a timely reminder of what an artist’s aspirational role is in life. Amidst the many and varied barriers, noise and constant distractions that are placed in front of us what other option is there? Artist’s though are really up against it presently. 

Us humans don’t appear to be in the space where we want to open up to any messages from the heart. Is that because we think we know even though our worn down paths are proving otherwise?

Just an example* is the current creative grants on offer by the City of Sydney. It’s great that Council has these $A20m of grants. I read that they have tried to simplify the application process. If the firewall of the grant briefing ticketing service is any first indicator of the ‘simplifying’ to follow then what’s the point of taking it further? 

Artists (nay creativity) and bureaucracy generally I have found do not mix well together. Bureaucracies of no matter what persuasion want people to fit in and toe the line. It’s a bit like expecting oil and water to mix. (At its best though this combination can produce some lovely rainbow patterns together!)

The “disciplining” of the free spirited (read undisciplined) has gone too far. Knowing how to deal with bureaucracy has now become the primary creative element of talent required…that’s not art. 

But if you can make it through that wall congratulations you qualify for an Honours Degree in Public Administration. When I did finally manage to get to the grants briefing session online I lasted 32 minutes until I glazed over. Actually I glazed over in the first 2 minutes. I just lingered in a catatonic state for a while. At the age of 72, in the face of what is no doubt fierce competition for the spoils and my frustrating attempts at negotiating our increasingly complex online systems it seems clear that getting one of these grants is proverbially like “passing a camel through the eye of a needle”.  

But I am still going to put my hand up anyway. This process will be has been an exercise for me to help clarify what I am aiming to create in the next couple of years. 

The very real bottom line though is that I now need a reasonably priced inner city rental for a living/studio space for two years before moving to New Zealand. The City's “Accomodation Grants” invitation (you pay $200 a week for two years for inner city accomodation) arrived fortuitously at this time. What’s to lose by having a go? (On deeper reflection I can lose the most important thing to me - my  health and well being.)

Interestingly there are also “Artist Support” grants ($A25,000 lump payment).

“RAISING A NEW STANDARD

What does Sydney and Australia have to say?”

This will be the title of my grant application. 

I am intentionally being blunt here when I say it is my belief and experience that now citywide, statewide, nationwide and worldwide standards have dropped below what can be classified as mediocre. This needs to be addressed. Surely it would be a positive step to let us all see and hear what Sydney/Australia has to say for itself?

Looking around our Sydney and our world a storm of disconnection is beginning to rage. 

And that’s because we continue to do things the same way expecting a different result. 

We’re not getting anywhere. Are we caught up on the finger instead of where it’s meant to be pointing? Our systems have become so good at justifying themselves. 

Sorry but they are not working adequately anymore. Our focus is unbalanced. 

The focus should be on the creativity rather than the administration of projects.

I must say the City's representative I met face to face to have a chat about all of this couldn't have been more helpful. This prompts me to say that I do feel that the City Council is genuinely trying to help. But we’ve all manufactured demanding terrain in the path of actually creating anything that will make any real impact. 

If we made this maze we can also unmake it. 

I am going to focus on producing a “painterly” version of my design for a new Australian Flag designed to encourage debate exactly on what I’ve just been alluding towards... 

i.e. “Raising a New Standard”.

This work will be part of a larger major artwork which in turn will be part of a larger public exercise to address the subject of inviting the “sunshine” back into our lives. 

That will keep me busy for a couple of years. 

BLUE PRINT FOR A NATION

(A major artwork as part of this project working towards a major event)

I want to inspire and encourage the way we should be thinking and feeling at this time. 

We’ve got to start looking at the bigger picture. And the bigger picture is YOO. Too many are wearing blinkers and clutching at yesterday’s territorial sovereignty. A new age is upon us. 

RETROSPECTIVE ON HOLD

It appears though that we are not ready to face that truth presently. This is making it very very challenging to actually do anything creative at this time. We’re holding on so tightly that in a confounding paradox I need to put my proposed Retrospective titled “Sunshine!” on hold! 

I mean can there be anymore challenges on our plates?

Too early for the Sun to shine. 

The storm will run its course which is nature’s way.

There is simply no point in taking a boat out into a raging ocean storm. 

If you are a lit candle it is best to protect what is most precious to you…YOO. 

This is valuing yourself when the world is not.

In any case it seems to be appropriate that my retrospective takes place just before leaving Australia to live permanently in NZ. This is a few years off yet. I have said previously that we are living in times when we have to have three goes at something before it is done properly. And this is proving to be the case with paving a way to let the "Sunshine!".

PIC: While roaming the net I found this Gif of a lighthouse 

that can be observed where the actual sunshine 

might be imagined to be coming out of the lighthouse itself. 

All set on a “safe harbour”#. 

But there's nothing artificial about true sunshine. GIF: Giphy 

# "Te HOPAI” means “safe harbour” in Māori. 

   My safe harbour can be Wellington NZ. 

   This is where I plan to call home for the final chapter of my life.

POSTSCRIPT

I’m becoming clearer in my view that my retrospective /‘event’ is about saying thank you to those who really do make a real contribution to our well being in this world and are so often set upon by the storm cloud of blind ignorance that wants to consume the light without earning it. 
It would be good to showcase some of these solid leaders and let them have their say at the event opening with my work over the years as a backdrop. There’s plenty that can be said and needs to be said. The artworks are relevant to the content of what these leaders will express. 

A BIT MORE

*I could have exampled/been critical of any single area of our human functioning here 

(other than the City of Sydney's Arts Grants programme). Fact is that there is plenty of scope for improvement in all walks of life on this flat and most challenging world we have become. - Neville Williams

POSTSCRIPT TO NEW DIRECTION No. 197 - DREAM - CREATE - BUILD

From: Neville Williams

Subject: Re: City of Sydney grants - Artist support grant

Date: 12 August 2026 at 7:05:42 am AEST

To: S___________

👋

On 11 Aug 2026, at 2:04 pm

Hi Neville,

 

Thank you very much for your message, time and careful consideration on the grant rounds.

 

I hope in the future you could find a grant more appropriate to your needs and circumstances, and I truly wish you all the best with your projects.

 

Thank you again.

 

Warm regards,

S_________

   

From: NEVILLE WILLIAMS 
Sent: Tuesday, 11 August 2026 9:10 AM
To: S__________
Subject: Re: City of Sydney grants - Artist support grant

  

Hi S________ ,

 

PROJECT/ EVENT: “RAISING A NEW STANDARD - WHAT DOES SYDNEY & AUSTRALIA HAVE TO SAY FOR ITSELF?”

 

I have reflected carefully on the two City of Sydney grants you showcased to me  i.e. “Artist Support” and “Accommodation” and am feeling that any application I might make here is not going to see it through the process for too many reasons.

 

That is not to say S_______ that there isn’t a pressing need for us all to address the declining standards increasingly evident in our world.

 

I have had to face the reality that there is something I can lose by “having a go” here and that is my health and well being. Nothing is more important than that. 

 

It’s just not a time when our world is letting the sun shine.

 

Thanks again for your time and professional approach. Perhaps someone else has what it takes to champion an appropriate high level quality arts creative project aimed to encourage “raising a new standard”?

 

I will continue to work in the background to make a contribution within my realistic capacity.

 

Your clarity helped make the complex simpler to me. That is appreciated.

 

Warm regards,

 

Neville Williams

8 Palmer Lane 

Darlinghurst NSW 2010

P: XXXX XXX XXX

NEW DIRECTION

 

 

Sent from my iPhone

_____________________________

Recent letter to “Te Tautiaki” Sunday Star Times New Zealand

From: Neville Williams
Date: 19 July 2026 at 13:02:14 NZST
To: sundayletters@stuff.co.nz
Subject: NEW ZEALANDERS ARE BETTER THAN JOINING IN THE MEDIOCRITY

Dear Editor,

NEW ZEALANDERS ARE BETTER THAN JOINING IN THE MEDIOCRITY

As a visiting Australian who hopes to live in Wellington New Zealand your article (“The Australian Warning: How close is NZ to triggering China’s wrath” Times July 19) was of interest.

Bullying no matter whether initiated by China, America, Australia, New Zealand or anyone always is a stop to anything actually creative in content happening and usually leads to something destructive. I get it that NZ joining the AUKUS pact might shore up a response to a bullying China. But isn’t New Zealand in a good position to focus on and initiate truly great creative initiatives that might bring a “United States of Oceania - USO” closer together co-operating and supporting each other on every level not just defence against any bully?

We all need to start looking at the bigger picture. 

We humans seem to have little problem allocating time, energy and funds to anything to do with defence issues (read fear motivated) but when it comes to allocating anything to peace initiatives it is seen as wasteful! Why? 

We need a reprogramming of our software up top.

New Zealand might better help the Asia/Pacific/Oceania region by getting our values resorted. 
New Zealanders are better than the mediocrity that exists in our World presently.

Lead the way Kiwi’s. (We don't seem to be doing it in Australia! Gone to sleep?)

 

Warm regards,

Neville Williams

8 Palmer Lane

Darlinghurst NSW 2010

Celebrate life!

⚪️🔴🟠🟡🟢🔵🟣⚫️

______________________