Adelaide writers’ week sacrificed to save city’s prestigious arts festival, documents show | Adelaide writers’ week

Adelaide writers’ week has been sacrificed to save the 2026 Adelaide festival, which contributes more than $60 million to the South Australian economy each year, documents show.

It wasn’t just Australian and international visiting writers and academics who began leaving in droves after the Adelaide festival board announced on January 8 that controversial Australian Palestinian academic Randa Abdel-Fattah had been removed from the AWW programme.

According to freedom of information documents obtained by Guardian Australia, protests headlining Australia’s longest-running and most prestigious international arts festival also posed a march threat.

Internal briefings prepared for an extraordinary board meeting on January 12, two days after three board members resigned in protest and the day after chairman Tracey Whiting resigned, warned of a “cascade of retreat” that could lead to the collapse of the entire 2026 Adelaide festival. AWW is overseen by the Adelaide festival board.

Internal briefings reveal major Australian theater and dance companies scheduled for the festival warned artistic director Matthew Lutton that they were “considering their positions” after AWW boycotts began. The identities of the companies were drawn up in documents.

While local exodus is already ongoing, the administration has warned that it is preparing for a second, global wave of cancellations as allegations of censorship and government interference reach international action.

The briefing said that if an announcement was made within the next 18 hours that the 2026 AWW had been cancelled, it “could prevent artists from withdrawing from the 2026 Adelaide festival program and mitigate reputational and financial damage by preventing consecutive withdrawals in the coming days.”

Any delay in announcing AWW’s cancellation would “significantly increase the risk that the reputational damage resulting from Adelaide Writers’ Week will be transferred to the Adelaide Festival”.

It was also stated in the briefing that future Adelaide festivals could also be at risk.

“Currently, when invitations are sent to national and international artists, they accept without hesitation as they do not consider the possibility that their values ​​may not align with those of the Adelaide Festival,” the briefing said.

“However, if artists withdraw from the Adelaide Festival citing concerns about their value, this could create serious friction in future years. Such withdrawals could lead artists to hesitate before accepting invitations and re-evaluate their desire to engage with the Adelaide Festival.”

At the extraordinary board meeting, AWW director Louise Adler told the three remaining board members, Lutton and Adelaide festival general manager Julian Hobba, that only 12 of the 165 AWW sessions had remained intact.

He called on the board to issue a full public apology to Abdel Fattah and cancel the 2026 event, which is no longer salvageable at this point, and focus on rebuilding for a return in 2027.

Adler then left the meeting. His detailed resignation statement was published in the Guardian the next day.

The Board continued its deliberations and eventually decided to cancel AWW 2026.

While SA premier Peter Malinauskas publicly denies his office is applying undue pressure on the festival’s independence, FoI documents suggest his January 2 letter to the board was the main catalyst for the crisis.

Minutes from previous meetings show that the board stood by its decision to include Abdel-Fattah on the 2026 roster as late as Dec. 20, stating that he had “a long and distinguished career in academia” and that canceling it would “risk placing him in the same category as those associated with hate speech or hate crime activities who are not himself.”

But three days after Malinauskas wrote to the board and said: “I am of the opinion that Dr. Abdel-Fattah should be removed from the programme”, the board complied “in the light of recent national events and Government correspondence”.

“The Board agrees that the Government’s involvement has significantly changed the risk profile and that failure to act could jeopardize current and future funding and the overall viability of the Festival,” minutes from the January 5 meeting.

Although the Adelaide festival received $9.8 million in state and federal funds, it covers almost all of that investment through more than $4 million in ticket sales and more than $3 million in sponsorship and philanthropy. It contributed $62.6 million in gross expenditure to the South Australian economy in 2025.

In contrast, AWW is the Adelaide Festival Corporation’s loss leader; it increases foot traffic and hospitality spending to the state, but contributes almost nothing to the festival’s box office. More than 160,000 attendances were recorded in 2025, but the vast majority of its sessions are free to the public.