"Beauty of Distance" is the title of this year's Sydney Biennale of modern arts. The title is obviously an echo and ironic association with the famous book written about Australia titled "Tyranny of Distance," which depicted the dilemma of Australia associating mentally with Europe (England) yet being geographically remote from it.
One might say that the international perspective of Australia has changed a great deal due to Britain's entry into the European community, American supremacy and the increasing importance to Australia of Asian economic development.
Indeed, toward the end of the last century, Australia adopted the foreign policy of putting priority on getting closer to Asia. This "look toward Asia" policy was accompanied by a constant inflow of "Asian" immigrants into Australia and by the educational and cultural policies that encouraged Australians to learn Asian languages and expose themselves to Asian culture.