Creative Australia has performed a spectacular if not entirely unanticipated 180, with the announcement on 2 July that the artistic team of Khaled Sabsabi and Michael Dagostino will represent Australia at the 2026 Venice Biennale after all.

The announcement comes in the wake of an external review into the governance, decision-making and risk management processes at Creative Australia following its controversial February 2025 decision to rescind its invitation to Sabsabi and Dagostino.

Curator Michael Dagostino and artist Khaled Sabsabi. Photo © Anna Kucera

At the time, Creative Australia’s board voted to replace Sabsabi and curator Dagostino (Director of the Chau Chak Wing Museum, University of Sydney) because their selection posed “an unacceptable risk to public support for Australia’s artistic community and could undermine our goal of bringing Australians together through art and creativity”.

The reversal of that decision has been informed by findings of an external review, conducted by Blackhall & Pearl and commissioned by the Board in response to internal disquiet and external criticism of Creative Australia’s processes and thinking.

In an open letter, Creative Australia’s CEO Adrian Collette ate some serious humble pie. “We acknowledge that there were …...