Olympic arts : Sydney 2000 and the Cultural Olympiad

The charter of the International Olympic Committee prescribes that a `fine arts' event be held in conjunction with the sporting programme as an equally important aspect of the official Olympic Games calendar. As part of the staging of the 2000 Olympic Games, the Sydney Organising Committee for the Olympic Games is responsible for organizing and staging a `cultural' programme. Despite its centrality to the charter and ideals of the Olympic movement, the Cultural Olympiad has been greatly overshadowed by the frenetic nationalism, spectacle and media hype which surrounds the sporting events. This article sets out to explore the Sydney 2000 Cultural Olympiad in the context of the contending political agendas which are shaping the proposed programme. Also considered briefly are the discourses of identity — local, national and global — that will be mobilized, contested and defined through this festival of Olympic arts.