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Cottesloe’s 2025 Sculpture by the Sea was cancelled because the organiser said it could not secure the federal funding needed to stage an exhibition of that scale. The decision was announced on 3 December 2024; no Cottesloe exhibition took place in March 2025. The event returned in March 2026, and the Western Australian Government said another edition was planned for March 2027.
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Why was Sculpture by the Sea cancelled in 2025?
The Town of Cottesloe announced on 3 December 2024 that the exhibition would not take place in 2025 because of funding issues. The Town said it had made a long-term funding commitment and provided in-kind support, and hoped the event could return for a belated 21st birthday in 2026. The Town’s announcement described its own role and the cancellation.
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Repair Windows errors before they cause bigger problemsFix Now →Fix the driver behind crashes, sound loss and screen glitchesFind Drivers →The organiser, Sculpture by the Sea, said the decisive problem was the lack of federal arts funding. In its 3 December 2024 media release, it said the Catalyst and RISE funds had ended in 2023 and that it could not stage an exhibition of this scale without secure federal support. It described a typical Cottesloe exhibition as drawing 230,000 visitors over 18 days in March.
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The accounts differ on the funding application timeline. ABC reported that Creative Australia said the organiser had known of the funding decision since May 2023 and had not made a later application. ABC’s report conveyed Creative Australia’s position; the available accounts do not resolve the disagreement. PerthNow reported a $700,000 shortfall associated with a rejected four-year investment grant application, while the organiser and ABC framed the lack of federal support and its timing differently. That shortfall is PerthNow’s reported figure, not an independently established total.
The organiser also said exhibiting artists collectively contributed about $1 million toward display costs, and that 50 per cent of artists did not recover any of their costs through sculpture sales, awards or subsidies. Those figures come from its December 2024 release. They describe the financial burden it said artists faced, alongside the event’s reliance on outside funding.
How did the cancellation affect Cottesloe businesses and artists?
Business owners anticipated losing some March trade
Vidette Wood, owner of Amberjacks Fish and Chips, told PerthNow that March was the business’s busiest month or sometimes equal to January. She estimated the exhibition brought about 20 per cent more takings than the business would otherwise have made that month. That is Wood’s estimate for her business, not an audited measure of the event’s economic impact.
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“March is the busiest month of the year for us; it is equal to or sometimes even beats January, so it is significant to lose that,” Wood told PerthNow. She also said she expected people to keep visiting the beach in hot weather, while estimating the event added 20 per cent to what she would otherwise take for the month.
The organiser and artists faced the funding problem directly
Sculpture by the Sea founder David Handley said the event could not be staged at this scale without a main potential source of income: “You just can’t put on an exhibition or an event of this scale when one of your main potential sources of income is not there.” The organiser’s account of artists’ contributions and unrecovered costs points to another pressure, but does not establish how individual artists viewed the cancellation.
PerthNow reported that Cottesloe artist Geoffrey Drake-Brockman had exhibited four times. The reporting documents particular business, artist and organiser perspectives; it does not establish a single view among residents, nor does it describe a resident survey.
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Could the event have moved to Scarborough?
Scarborough was raised publicly as an alternative. Stirling mayor Mark Irwin told PerthNow he had spoken with the State Government about moving the event there. Handley rejected that proposal on artistic and site grounds, arguing that Scarborough’s long, flat beach would make the sculptures seem swallowed by the landscape.
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“Scarborough Beach is a very different geographic layout to Cottesloe . . . (its) long, flat sandy beaches do not suit Sculpture by the Sea, because the space of an open, long, flat sandy beach swallows sculptures,” Handley said. These are the mayor’s and organiser’s attributed views, not the result of a formal comparison. The available reporting does not provide comparable site costs, logistics or a balanced assessment of how the two beaches would work for the exhibition.
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Is Sculpture by the Sea coming back to Cottesloe?
Yes. The exhibition returned to Cottesloe in March 2026. In its 2026 support announcement, the Western Australian Government also said the event was set to return again in March 2027.
The same government announcement said the 2024 exhibition drew more than 235,000 attendees and generated $4.5 million in local economic activity. Those are state-government figures specifically for the 2024 edition. They are distinct from the organiser’s December 2024 description of a typical exhibition attracting 230,000 visitors over 18 days.
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