I value the arts - but grants are no measure of their value

[Richard Saville-Smith]

Image by Mark Wallinger.
I've always found immesurable to be one of the most interesting measures.


The cuts are coming and the arts are substituting feeling edgy for being edgy. My fear is that funding reductions are going to be applied not by squeezing everyone equally but by ceasing funding for a bunch of companies/projects altogether. The consequence of this is to increase the power of Fiona Hyslop and the Creative Scotland funding team(s). With less money to go round the funding decisions at the margins are the ones which will fall off the funding table. This worries me because I suspect that much of the stuff that appears marginal today is the most important for the future and the most deserving of funding.

But Arts funding is not a zero sum game. Those who protest the funding cuts on the basis that there is a direct correlation between funding cuts and a reduction in the amount of art are not necessarily right. If, for example, paying audiences were increased - the dependence on State funding would be reduced.

I’m not sure that Ian Duncan Smith is the sexiest of role models in an Arts debate, but what he is doing with the much bigger welfare system is truly radical – whatever your politics. It is this scale of imaginative leap that is now required in the arts. My proposal, here and here for Creative Scotland to deliver an “Arts in Scotland” digital platform involves this same kind of category shift. Instead of Creative Scotland investing/subsidising particular proposals, Creative Scotland should put effort and funding into a digital network which would enable and empower audiences.

The argument implicit in the “I value the arts”, and all the other anti-cuts campaigns, is that the only value is monetary. In an artistic context that’s rather a sad argument. The macro-economic position that has led to this sorry pass is not one for which the old Scottish Arts Council can be held responsible – (though the idea of blaming them is quite entertaining). If there is going to be less money – and there is – then having an anti-cuts Twibbon is just indulgent tokenism.

Much better to lobby Fiona Hyslop and Creative Scotland and get them to grasp the opportunity which the urgency of the funding situation demands – it’s the internet stupid! By energising audiences, increasing information and functionality, resulting in a greater ‘consumption’ of the arts there’s a win/win to be had: More art at a reduced cost to the state.

This blog was inspired by Edd McCracken's piece in the Sunday Herald

[Stuart Cosgrove]

Coming at this from another perspective I am a big supporter of 'particpation in the arts' where the value is greater public creativity, this often benefits from funding but funding is not its only measure of relevance. What's interesting is when small hotspot of creative activity grow up, in otherwise unfashionable places, - e.g. The Belshill Bands in indie music.

The Soup Dragons, BMX Bandits and Teenage Fanclub were helped by local rehearsal space and 'each-other' rather than a grant-system.

Festivals in Pittenweem and Nairn have grown up through local-'artist volunteerism' more than grants.

Great debate and one we need to keep alive in the public sphere.

[Richard Saville-Smith]

Hi Anne,

Did I sound like I was suggesting ending support for artists? Not me. Binary alternatives are a million miles from my thinking - it is not a zero sum game. As for using digital technology as an aid for experiencing art - barff - except for TV, Cinema, Gaming and the like. Digital technology is not another platform posing as a substitute, that's just not what I'm proposing.

What I propose is to address the audience not as data but as people - People who already use technology and who would want to use it more effectively to go out to more live arts - technology as a facilitator for the arts not a substitute. Facilitation includes listings & ticketing (the easy to understand bits) and EVERYTHING ELSE that social media makes possible. More audiences, less pressure on the arts budget - never going to work if people don't make it happen - practical, realistic, tangible.

I always admire your blog Anne!