As one who has lived in Western Australia for the greater part of her life and currently works in the arts,  my interest was piqued by the claim of the editors of his collection that Western Australia may bid farewell to the defensive term ‘Cinderella State’, once adopted in relation to its arts and culture. Traditionally perceived in the cultural imagination as ‘behind’ its east coast counterparts, Western Australia has struggled with the entrenched perceptions of many in eastern cultural centres: an edenic state with its beach culture, sun and outdoor lifestyle, somehow not quite in step with the rest of the country, and possessing a slight but discernible cultural ineptitude. As one contributor to this collection states, Western Australia has been viewed as ‘an isolated enclave sitting on the edge of a void’; insularity and parochialism have regularly been invoked when describing the most remote city in the world.