Tunick’s nude artwork unveiled
New Mardi Gras have revealed the incredible premier image from photographer Spencer Tunick’s installation The Base, the mass nude-up that happened on the steps of the Sydney Opera House as part of the Mardi Gras 2010 Festival in March this year. Each person who disrobed for the artwork will receive a limited edition print of the photograph, which is now available for viewing on the Mardi Gras website. info: www.mardigras.org.au
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Such awesome pics! Ive studied his work and i cant detect an erect penis anywhere !
Lol maybe that should be the topic of his next work. Thosands of erections in one pic !!! Men only of course. Lol
I work in the media and every pres release, media contact that i had and the festival guide and mardi gras website had New Mardi Gras Presents Spencer Tunick. Even the title of the work was Mardi Gras:The Base. On the day, we were told all mentions needed to include New Mardi Gras as presenters. Unfortunately stories get edited, media has homopobia in it… there are reasons some media chose to remove mardi Gras branding. it went international. far more than any parade publiicty ever has! this is the biggest thing publiicty wise mardi gras has ever done. ever.
ddo you think every event produced by Sydney Festival or Adelaide festival or midsumma necessarily gets the correct presenter rights associated!?
all i can say was in years to come, as this image becomes a lasting representation of sydney and is used again and again 50% of times it is shown will be branded correctly amd remind people it WAS a mardi gras event. this will have huge payoff for the mardi gras in years to come. people saw this and thought, yeah that was cool, yeah gay rights, yeah visit sydney.
i do agree that why they even ventured an estimate loss of 400k if they coudln’t acurately estimate – did they not think people would be pissed!?
A.member. you put anything into google and you find 12,300 mentions..drop kick brings up About 6,790,000
I always follow every Mardi Gras season closely and yet even I had no idea that this Spencer Tunick photo shoot was part of this years season. I thought it was just a coincidence that it was being held at the same time. Now to learn that not only was it an official part of the MG season but that New Mardi Gras wasted their precious dollars on it – it’s unbelievable. What on earth did this event have to do with the gay and lesbian community anyway? Even if you can find some obscure link, that is no justification to actually fork out big bucks to make it happen
Not well branded?
Well a google search on mardi Gras and Spencer Tunick combined brings up 12,300 mentions.
What would you consider successful?
Interesting press from Great Coverage. However, it proves my point, NMG branding of this event was poor. Even name labels used for Stef the Board Co-Chair have only her name, and not NMG and her role. NMG branding is very poor. I dont want to give the parade to the city of Sydney to run in the future due to NMG not remaining relevant, we need to brand all events carefully and fully.
A.Member open your eyes and look into the Annual Report and note our Queen of losses Steph Sands, titled Treasurer Rob Portos and Tony Knight were all on the Board at that time and ask them what they did other than hiding under the umbrella of David Imrie
Phil. You proved my point. The current NMG board did nothing to create a sustainable future for NMG. It spent money in avenues that were existing and dwindling, as opposed to thinking outside of the square and implementation into new strategies for revenue to be made. It was courageous in trying something different with Spencer Tunick, however poorly managed, as branding for NMG was nearly non-existent.
I don’t mind spending money to make money. But that’s what it’s supposed to do. MAKE MONEY…. And you cannot say it made money when NMG have recorded a loss of $580,000
Well said A. Thomas. I certainly will vote for change. David Imrie, the last Co-Chair that crippled NMG, is today sending out email to members asking them to support the current board, for stability with sponsors. WHAT ! If I was a sponsor, I would prefer financial stability – not a loss of 1/3 of cash reservces. And listen to Imrie – I dont think so.
I do run a company, as it happens, but have nothing to do with the running of NMG. However, I know a special event when I see one, and I found out about it through NMG’s publicity.
Next year, NMG will have to make up the shortfall and probably not be so imaginative in their programming… or think of ways to create revenue other than the over-produced dance party.
A. Thomas’s crack about Labor spending “huge amounts of cash supposedly for the future” places him/her neatly in the conservative box. Can you imagine how the financial sector would be wailing now if Labor had adopted the Coalition’s plan of doing nothing about the GFC? When you need to spend money, show a bit of guts and do it!
As for the future, Labor has a few ideas about that- not many and watered down- all of which will be dismantled by Abbott if his party wins the election. Climate change, for example: it won’t matter a bit if Greens gain control of the upper house, because a Coalition would never put a climate change bill before the Senate anyway. In 10-15 years I’m willing to bet nobody will give a damn about parties and parades any longer.
For one, i barely even knew that the Spencer Tunick picture was put on by NMG. All i saw was the name Spencer Tunick. NMG was not branded well enough in this deal. That is poor management by the current board.
They did a deal for Sydney, not for NMG.
Great idea for the festival, but not for NMG.
Are people going to come to Mardi Gras festival because Spencer Tunick took a photo here? No.
Are they going to spend money because of Spencer Tunicks photos and come to NMG’s parties that help raise funds for the organisation to even exist? No
‘Is their sole object[ive] to have a vault full of cash?’ No, however, it is a primary imperative that the board of NMG do not lose such a staggering amount of money, digging into the $1.5 million cash reserves, which was set up by previous board directors. Maybe, it was easy for anyone to make cash during the 30th anniversary,however factually they didn’t lose $580,000 and be so far off the initial estimate of $400,000.
Losing this amount of money has the potential to cripple NMG, much like the last time when Mardi Gras folded (which by the way had a number of current board directors on it). This is poor financial management, which has been controlled and implemented by the current board.
And for what? NMG can say as much as they want that they put the deal on to have Spencer Tunick take a picture with 5000 naked bodies.
But for the rest of the world, noone could even tell it was part of Mardi Gras Festival, or that NMG were involved.
NMG produced a crap party which is the primary fund raiser for the organisation. I know NMG cannot make everyone happy at the parties and that the NMG party crowd has been dwindling.
But the current board needed to somehow mitigate the $580,000 loss. It’s liken to the Labor govt. spending huge amounts of cash supposedly for the future, and simply praying that it all works out.
That isn’t reasonable management. That’s flipping a coin.
Most of the current board members have had 2 terms to change and implement strategy for the future. A strategy which was proposed prior to them coming onto the board and was disregarded.
Change is needed.
To Phil Scott: No Mardi Gras isn’t a bank. But if you think it’s a great idea to burn over 33% per cent of your ‘rainy day’ funds when you have a clear indication that the party ticket sales are going to tank badly you don’t have a clue of what it means to be a director of a company and the duties that it involves. keep up the good work on the sparkly stuff. I’m sure that’s what NMG needs right now.
Hi to David.
check this out !
http://www.smh.com.au/multimedia/entertainment/art-and-design/spencer-tunicks-the-base/20100301-pbp4.html
This year may not have been a financial success but in terms of branding, I remain pretty impressed. The Spencer picture is amazing and one that will go down in the MG history books. There was international buzz for it when Lady Gaga was asked to pose, Amanda LePore got great publicity world-wide for the parade, plus the party featured so many world-famous acts that for once no one had to rely on making a big deal out of former ‘Popstars’ performances. From what I read in the AGM email sent out to members, there are still a great deal of cash reserves in the bank too, so I guess the people there are doing something right.
I work in the nightclub industry where nearly everyone is so in debt, I can’t believe they can get out of bed in the morning. A huge number of entertainment ventures run at a loss ALL the time. Why don’t we give these people a chance to get things back on track. What’s the alternative? Shut down NMG and hand the parade over to City of Sydney? I’m sure everyone would be happy with that…
Greg said Was it a responsible decision by a responsible Board?No.
Actually that is a yes Greg, the Board as with all past and present NMG Board vote on the Festival and the concept of the Festival.
Lets be clear Greg, the nude photo did not cost $580 000. The lack of governance and controls that you and your boards failed to implement led to mistakes such as the parade/party split happening. That is what cost the big bucks in all this.
Do not judge from your oh mighty height, when you were on the board for 3 years or so and left behind little structure or governance as a legacy. You only have to read the annual reports from those years to understand that.
In this year’s annual report, it is stated that the Audit and Risk committee needed to be re-instated… WTF??? Audit and Risk is critical to an organisation.
A monkey could have made money on the 30th anniversary and a proven business model.
What takes guts and strength is leading an organisation through the hard times. Which is what this board has done.
This event probably did more to get the concept of Gay and Lesbian equality into the media locally/internationally than the last two parades combined. If there was a loss because of it, personally I’m more than willing to let it slide.
Was this a fantastic event for Sydney ? Yes.
was this a fantastic event for NMG ? Doubtful at best.
Was it a responsible decision by a responsible Board?No.
There are $580,000 thousand reasons why this is true. Despite all the spin the result speaks for it self.
What, is NMG a bank now? Is their sole object to have a vault full of cash? The Tunick photo was a great event, visible and symbolic. So it “lost” money, big deal. If people like Alex and Adam were running NMG, I guess the organisation would be flush with funds and produce absolutely nothing of interest locally or internationally.
ha ha ha
how do we know Adam is not the Treasurer – he sure has the same grasp of financial matters.
“New Mardi Gras CEO Anna McInerney said the decision to split the parade and party was an evolutionary one.
We’ve looked at how other major festival-type events are produced around the world and one of the clear lessons is that they run as a series of parties, she said in an official statement.” – SSO 20th May, 2009
Translation: I forgot to book the RHI and it might cost you a million bucks.
oops quite right but you get my point…
Adam thankfully you’re not the NMG treasurer!!! If each of them got $1000 it would add up to $5 Million not $500,000.
So they went from a $400,000 profit last year to almost a $600,000 loss this year? That’s a difference of $1 Million.
Can’t blame the party-parade split for $1 Million lost down the drain.
What did those financial whiz kids at NMG do to lose so much dosh? Apart from waste a hundred grand on the photo above?
see all those people on those steps? there’s about 5,000 of them. if mardi gras gave each and every one of those people a thousand bucks it still wouldnt add up to the size of the loss on the season.
that’s the lasting brand impact of this folly. a white naked f*cking elephant on the opera house steps.
great work & legacy NMG board. you (and the previous board who were responsible for the fuck up on the booking) should hang your heads in shame.
What a fantastic event for Sydney which will be visible for years to come. Its a shame it was not sufficiently branded by New Mardi Gras to give the organisation greater global and local kudos and visibility.