Fringe to Famous examines relations between alternative and mainstream cultures in Australia to suggest a way forward for cultural policy thinking ‘after the creative industries’. Drawing on examples from music, streetwear, comedy, Indigenous screen and digital games, the book resists a tendency to represent the fringe and mainstream as abstract opposites. While recognising the fringe as an important site for renewal around ideas of cultural value, it foregrounds ways in which hybridisation between the fringe and mainstream has delivered both cultural and economic benefits.

The book features a large cast of Australian artists including musicians from Midnight Oil and the Hoodoo Gurus to Courtney Barnett; television comedy from Fast Forward to Aunty Donna and Black Comedy; designer Reg Mombassa from Mambo; Indigenous filmmakers such as Warwick Thornton and Rachel Perkins; and the independent games festival Freeplay.

Fringe to Famous sees thriving countercultures as crucially important in preserving spaces for experimentation and risk taking, while also celebrating the institutions that have enabled exchange between the margins and the mainstream – from festivals and public broadcasters to online platforms. The approach offers an alternative both to the economism of creative industries arguments and to a left critique that sees mainstream institutions only in negative terms.

In the wake of Federal Government’s Revive cultural policy, the authors bring together practical and policy perspectives on artistic innovation, policy activism, institutional enablers, public service media, business development and audience participation. At the heart of the book is an idea of ‘generative hybridity’ between fringe and mainstream that allows us to imagine new possibilities for arts and culture in the 2020s and beyond.

You can find footage of AM Peter Garrett’s introductory talk here, and both panel discussions here.