Esther Anatolitis

Esther Anatolitis (Ευσταθία Ανατολίτη) (born 21 April 1976) is an arts and cultural strategist who has made a significant contribution to creative leadership and arts advocacy in Australia. She is Editor of Meanjin.., Honorary Associate Professor at RMIT School of Art, and a member of the Governing Council of the National Gallery of Australia.
==Early life and education==
Anatolitis was born in Sydney, Australia, and grew up in Sydney and in Greece. She is the youngest of two daughters of master craftsman and wood machinist Stratis (Ευστράτιος), and goat herder, factory worker and homemaker Konstantina (née Retsou), who both migrated to Australia in 1964. The family later migrated back to Greece in 1980, intending to remain permanently, but later returned to Australia. Anatolitis was educated at Eastlakes Public School, where she was identified as a gifted and talented student, and then went on to the select-entry public schools Woollahra Primary School in the OC program and Sydney Girls High School, then to the University of New South Wales and the University of Sydney. Her higher degree studies were in arts, law and architecture, and she moved to Germany in 2001-2002 to work on the Serve City program at the Bauhaus. Stratis and Konstantina returned to Greece permanently in 2010, and Anatolitis has lived in Melbourne since 2002.
==Leadership roles==
Anatolitis is a former chief executive of the National Ethnic and Multicultural Broadcasters’ Council, Express Media, Craft Victoria, SYN Media, Melbourne Fringe, Regional Arts Victoria, and the National Association for the Visual Arts. She was a founder of the Emerging Writers’ Festival, and served the Melbourne Writers Festival programming committee. She was a founder of the Australasian Society for Continental Philosophy and the Melbourne School of Continental Philosophy. She is a former director of the Australian Centre for the Moving Image, Regional Arts Australia, Antipodes Festival, Open Spectrum Australia, a former chair of Arts Industry Council (Victoria), and founding chair of Elbow Room Productions. 
In her public space and cultural infrastructure work, Anatolitis created the ten-year strategy for the Kingston Arts Precinct in Canberra, and was a founding director of Contemporary Arts Precincts who established Collingwood Yards. As a broadcaster, Anatolitis established the frameworks for what became SBS4, participated in the broadcast trials that established 2FBi, led SYN 90.7FM, and ran a multilingual newsroom at the NEMBChttps://radioinfo.com.au/people/movements/esther-anatolitis/.
As a policy leader, Anatolitis has secured bipartisan policy outcomes and has been appointed by both Liberal and Labor government ministers to public roles: she was a member of the inaugural Victorian Government Creative Industries Strategy Expert Reference Group, the Arts Victoria Small-to-Medium Sector Review, the City of Ballarat arts and cultural policy review, the City of Greater Bendigo arts and cultural policy review, and has conducted policy and program reviews for the City of Melbourne.
==Public voice==
Anatolitis is a champion for the public value of the arts who is outspoken on the central role arts and cultural policy should play in Australian politics. She is a defender of artists' rights who has stood up to exploiters of artists. During the pandemic Anatolitis led national advocacy in the Australian creative industry to secure urgent support, and created Australia’s first national arts advocacy training program. She convened the National Executive Directors’ Network, headlined several national arts industry forums, and co-convened the national policy forum Australian Cultural Policy: The Next Decade. 
She has been profiled in The Age, the Australian Financial Review, the Canberra Times, Neos Kosmos, The Greek Herald, SBS and the ABC. 
Anatolitis' leadership style is known for fostering critical thinking and centring creative voices. Her leadership resources have become industry standard in Australia, most notably her recruitment processes which have been adopted by non-profit arts organisations across the nation. Her book Place, Practice, Politics was published in 2022. 
Anatolitis is a former arts policy columnist for Meanjin, The Conversation and Arts Hub. She regularly speaks at writers’ festivals and arts and political forums across Australia, and is a regular commentator on radio and television including on The Drum, 730, Late Night Live, and RRR SmartArts. She is a critic of contemporary art, architecture and design, whose work has been published internationally. 
A prominent member of Australia’s Greek community, Anatolitis was a signatory to the community’s support for marriage equality and the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Voice to Parliament. 
==Academic work==
Anatolitis has taught in the architecture program at RMIT University. She has examined PhD theses and served as external critic for graduate students in architecture, interior design, graphic design, fashion and art at RMIT Practice Research Symposia since 2005. She has taught in philosophy and arts at UNSW and the University of Sydney, and has presented guest lectures at Australian and European universities. Anatolitis has conducted faculty reviews as an independent panellist at Federation University and UNE. Her company Test Pattern is a research partner on a major project funded by the Australian Research Council. 
==Creative work==
For ten years Anatolitis collaborated with Prof Hélène Frichot on Architecture+Philosophy. Her ongoing project INDEX-SYSTEM culminated in a sole exhibition at Mailbox. 
Anatolitis is a prolific writer, commentator, and the author of books and book chapters on art, architecture, public space, politics and power. She has convened artist salons and other collaborative and mentoring programs that foster public voices. 
==Editor of Meanjin==
Anatolitis succeeded Jonathan Green as Editor of Meanjin in late 2022 and is the journal’s first editor for whom English is not the first language. Anatolitis has previously edited arts, news and peer-reviewed academic publications in multiple languages, and was publisher of Voiceworks. Her first announcement as Editor was to hand over full editorial control for the journal’s first-ever edition presenting work exclusively by First Nations writers, guest-edited by Eugenia Flynn and Bridget Caldwell-Bright. Other changes include a focus on languages other than English, experimental work, and foregrounding First Nations writers, with a full redesign from the Winter 2023 edition. 
==Awards==
Anatolitis was an AFR Women of Influence finalist, a finalist in the Melbourne Awards for her contribution to the city's profile and a Victoria Day Award for the Arts recipient
Category:1976 births
Category:People from Sydney
Category:Australian people
Category:Arts
Category:Culture