Image credit: UNSW Creative Practice Lab. Photo by Heidrun Löhr
Making Australia’s rich history in the arts more accessible.
Australian Creative Histories & Futures (ACHF) is a four-year research infrastructure project being developed by researchers at the UNSW School of the Arts & Media in collaboration with the Australian Research Data Commons (ARDC), and university and industry partners across the country.
Australia’s cultural history spans decades of artistic practice, public investment, and cultural participation. However, much of this data - held in databases like AusStage, Design and Art Australia Online (DAAO), and Creative Australia - has remained fragmented and difficult to access in a unified way.
By strengthening these databases and enabling greater interoperability, ACHF will help support greater research and understanding about Australia’s rich creative ecosystem.
Investigating how Indigenous cultural and creative data is kept and shared is a key focus of the project. Guided by the FAIR (Findable, Accessible, Interoperable, and Reusable) and CARE (Collective Benefit, Authority to Control, Responsibility, and Ethics) principles, ACHF will work to develop best practice models of Indigenous data governance for the sector.
By building digital skills and data literacy across the arts sector, ACHF will enable more informed decision-making and fostering of innovation in cultural policy and practice.
Australian Research Data Commons. (2025). CARE Principles for Indigenous Data Governance. https://ardc.edu.au/resource/the-care-principles/
A collaborative partnership
Project Aims
Ensure sustainability by securing existing data assets, strengthening their technical and social architectures
Facilitate interoperability between data assets as well as knowledge exchange between their associated research and industry communities.
Develop Indigenous data governance, reparative description, and accessibility principles for the cultural data sector, in line with FAIR (Findable, Accessible, Interoperable, and Reusable) and CARE (Collective Benefit, Authority to Control, Responsibility, and Ethics) principles.
Upskill sector stakeholders in cultural data management and analysis.
Who will benefit?
Researchers in the creative and literary arts, the digital humanities and Australian cultural history
Arts and cultural policy makers, advisors and strategists
Indigenous artists and historians of Indigenous arts and culture
GLAM sector organisations
Artists and arts organisations
Regional, diverse and other underrepresented arts and cultural communities
Arts educators and students
Arts heritage organisations
State, regional and university libraries.
View the ACHF Project Plan
Our Team
Photography by Cassandra Hannagan, 2025
Australian Creative Histories & Futures is a co-investment partnership with the Australian Research Data Commons (ARDC) through the HASS and Indigenous Research Data Commons (DOI: 10.3565/3t64-zy41). The ARDC is enabled by the Australian Government’s National Collaborative Research Infrastructure Strategy (NCRIS).