Virginia Trioli

You know someone's all out of runway for their cause when they start throwing around words like "decency".

If the newly re-elected Albanese government is serious about Australian culture and production, then Donald Trump could be inadvertently showing the way to ensuring it.

Richard Tognetti is exacting, virtuosic and at the helm of one of the world's best chamber orchestras. He sits down with Virginia Trioli to talk work ethic, what brings him joy and what irks him.

On a recent trip to Japan I went in search of what had been described to me as a near perfect example of an urban green development in one of the most green-starved cities in the world.

Tony Albert, one of Australia's most awarded and recognised contemporary artists, tells Virginia Trioli about seeking out "Aboriginalia" to remove it from circulation, and to give it new voice.

At 78, Jenny Kee feels so passionately about her fashion creations that she refers to them as her "children". And while she says her career is slowing down, the evidence for that is hard to find.

Tim Michin's career has evolved from working as a jobbing musician to winning major awards for his Broadway and West End musical, Matilda. But he's still driven by seeing how much he can make his audiences feel.

In the 1980s, Kate Ceberano was experiencing the wrong kind of recognition: backlash for comments she'd made about Kylie Minogue. Now, the singer reflects on how jealousy was impacting her.

My son is the same age as the teenager in Adolescence. Watching it together made me realise the reality of the school kids in the show is the shared reality of our own child.

You won't see award-winning filmmaker George Miller's eyes glaze over if you start to talk about your dreams. He tells Virginia Trioli he finds inspiration in the space between sleep and consciousness.

After another season exploring the essence of creativity with some of the nation's biggest names, I've learned they have a few things in common. 

A quick search reveals how common, casual and uncoupled from shame and insult the term now is.

Unlike the breeders of my generation, many parents today are highly involved in their children's lives and the clear majority of them, and their children, are very happy about it.

Memories of Black Summer are everywhere here. But I know as another diaster looms resilience is possible — it's something we will fight for. Even when the fights get so much harder.

The crude comments didn't surprise me, but what did disappoint me was how Sheargold's colleagues were such happy accomplices — chuckling along with easy laughs.

There's no colder gaze than that of an oncologist who is ensuring that you have really understood what she has said.

A human exchange on a flight reminded me that it is never too late to rediscover your ability to show compassion for others. 

From the Taylor Swift fans who made the most out of missing out on Eras tickets, to Princess Diana's unlikely confidant, these summer reads might be just what you need.

So much of what we hope and expect from Christmas is performative, and springs from the presentation of a perfect family holiday that inevitably is unattainable. It's hard to pick the fake when everyone is so desperately in search of the real.

I'm in the same agony of embarrassment and attempted recovery as most of my social media-addicted generation, as my Spotify Wrapped for the year has dropped — and I don't know who the hell they are talking about.

I am delighted and creatively stimulated by the brilliance of Cynthia Erivo's frock: a mad folly of extraordinary craft, labour and money that will be worn only once, but will live on in memory and in the diffusion of its aesthetic down through the more affordable items we will be buying next.

As the government ponders an unprecedented ban on social media use by under 16s, I can report from the front lines of juvenile social media activity that the troops are nervous. Even pretty angry.

In the era of workers quiet quitting, demanding their right to disconnect and working from home — how can work addiction be "one of the most important challenges in organisational psychology and public health in the 21st century"?

From avocado on toast to the "Peter Pan Syndrome", Boomers have long been sticking it to the next generation from their negatively-geared safe havens. But their eye-rolling arguments ignore the realty that, for good or ill, we have parented these kids differently. 

In the end, the Victoria's Secret show this week was a spectacularly failed reboot, because the one issue that this ultra-successful brand was trying to fix — diversity — was made even more obvious by its attempts at inclusion.