Despite reporting huge profits in its 2014 Annual Report, Senator Brandis awards $150k additional funds.

The Australian Ballet have reported one of its biggest ever profits in its 2014 Annual Report, registering a surplus of $8.54 million. The huge sum bettered 2013’s profits by almost $2 million. However the report also revealed a continuing trend of a deficit between ticket sales and performance costs. The company achieved box office takings of $25.5 million – $14.4 million less than the $39.9 million cost of staging the company’s artistic programme, showing a “performance gap” of 64%.

Despite this, the occupancy of Australian Ballet’s performances remained consistent with previous years, achieving 84% capacity on average across the company’s 184 performances last year, with more than 274,000 patrons attending. Melbourne and Sydney performances were best attended, achieving 83% and 91% capacity respectively, however performances in Brisbane only managed to achieve 45% attendance, and performances during the company’s tour of Graeme Murphy’s Swan Lake to the United States were also less well attended than anticipated.

The company was able to report total earnings of $56.1 million thanks to millions of dollars in donations and philanthropy from the Australian Ballet Foundation as well as commercial activities...