Professor Sharman Pretty
Professor Sharman Pretty’s career has been built from a combination of experiences as an educator, performer and arts manager.
Professor Pretty’s formal education was in Music. She trained as an oboist in Australia, and in Germany with acclaimed performer and composer, Heinz Holliger. After a period as a professional performer, she moved into higher arts education initially taking a post at the Canberra School of Music, Australian Capital Territory. She has moved between the higher education and arts management sectors throughout her career. In between, she has held positions at the Australia Council for the Arts and as General Manager of the acclaimed Australian Youth Orchestra. She has held key roles on national and international boards, including on the international Board of the Federation Internationale des Jeunesses Musicales, and as Chair of the Music Council of Australia, the national peak body for advocacy and representation of all genres of music.
In 1995, Sharman Pretty was appointed Principal and Dean of the Sydney Conservatorium of Music, The University of Sydney, following a major review of the institution, with a brief to implement extensive reform. This she achieved, including facilitating the redevelopment of the derelict historic premises in the Sydney CBD through a $145 million project. The rebuilt facility reopened in August 2001 to widespread acclaim of being one of the finest music education facilities in the world – an “architectural, engineering and acoustic triumph” (former NSW Premier, the Hon. Bob Carr). Concurrently she led a range of ground breaking educational initiatives at the Sydney Conservatorium, including the establishment of the Australian Centre for Applied Research in Music Performance, the development of instrumental teaching to remote areas of Australia through videoconferencing using broadband technology, and the building of a range of innovative partnerships with industry.
With an established reputation as a visionary leader and effective facilitator of change, in 2004 she was invited to take up the position of Founding Dean of the National Institute of Creative Arts and Industries, a Faculty of The University of Auckland, New Zealand. The National Institute of Creative Arts and Industries is a unique initiative, with the aim: “To achieve for the University of Auckland a national centre of excellence and innovation in contemporary creative arts and industries research, education and practice by advancing excellence in each of the disciplines represented, and through the development of synergies inspired by and responding to the unique cultural heritage, the people, the environment and the international positioning of Aotearoa/New Zealand.” The Institute embraces the disciplines of Fine Arts, Design, Architecture, Urban Design, Planning, Music (classical, popular and jazz), and Dance Studies.
Amongst her achievements in this role were the establishment of the New Zealand Centre for Art Research and Discovery, the establishment of numerous international academic partnership agreements including with the Royal College of Music London and the Glasgow School of Art, the design and facilitation of learning and teaching innovations in the areas of intellectual entrepreneurship, contextually relevant curriculum, and response to diversity, and interdisciplinary projects in the Scholarship of Studio Teaching, and Drawing and Inscriptive Practice as a mode of expression across the spectrum of art forms.
Professor Pretty commenced as Dean of the Faculty of the VCA and Music at The University of Melbourne on 30 March 2009.