Yvonne Murphy analyses the history of state-delivered arts funding and considers its future role in sustaining and encouraging the creative sector.
An urban myth was doing the rounds nearly 10 years ago on social media. It went something like this: “When Winston Churchill was asked to cut arts funding in favour of the war effort, he simply replied, ‘then what are we fighting for?’ ” There is no known record of Churchill actually saying this. He did say: “The arts are essential to any complete national life. The State owes it to itself to sustain and encourage them.”
A Second World War provided a horrific impetus for us to imagine the society we wanted post war leading to the creation of the NHS and the Arts Council. Over seventy years later, we must once again seriously consider what kind of society we want and think about not why but how the creative sector and creatives and artists are part of that reimagining. We need some fresh, radical thinking and to enable that we must ensure creatives and artists are ‘be at the table’ and embed them in our in decision making processes.
In the recent Arts Council of Wales investment review 139 organisations across Wales, and across all art forms, applied for the holy grail of multi-year funding. 81 organisations were successful, 23 of which were awarded core funding for the first time. Of the 58 who didn’t make the grade, a handful were previously core funded, the largest of those being National Theatre of Wales. This process follows hot on the heels of Arts Council of England’s investment review, which also oversaw large scale organisations losing their funding and was also followed by much analysis and challenge of the process and decision-making. The recurring theme is that arts councils are making tough decisions with too small a pot of gold, and whatever way they slice the pie there’s not going to be enough to go around...Keep reading on Wales Art Review.
An urban myth was doing the rounds nearly 10 years ago on social media. It went something like this: “When Winston Churchill was asked to cut arts funding in favour of the war effort, he simply replied, ‘then what are we fighting for?’ ” There is no known record of Churchill actually saying this. He did say: “The arts are essential to any complete national life. The State owes it to itself to sustain and encourage them.”
A Second World War provided a horrific impetus for us to imagine the society we wanted post war leading to the creation of the NHS and the Arts Council. Over seventy years later, we must once again seriously consider what kind of society we want and think about not why but how the creative sector and creatives and artists are part of that reimagining. We need some fresh, radical thinking and to enable that we must ensure creatives and artists are ‘be at the table’ and embed them in our in decision making processes.
In the recent Arts Council of Wales investment review 139 organisations across Wales, and across all art forms, applied for the holy grail of multi-year funding. 81 organisations were successful, 23 of which were awarded core funding for the first time. Of the 58 who didn’t make the grade, a handful were previously core funded, the largest of those being National Theatre of Wales. This process follows hot on the heels of Arts Council of England’s investment review, which also oversaw large scale organisations losing their funding and was also followed by much analysis and challenge of the process and decision-making. The recurring theme is that arts councils are making tough decisions with too small a pot of gold, and whatever way they slice the pie there’s not going to be enough to go around...Keep reading on Wales Art Review.