Ten year strategic plan sets out priorities but makes no promise of new funding.
For the first time, Arts Council England (ACE) has produced a long-term strategy for the visual arts as part of an attempt to boost participation and increase understanding and support for contemporary art across the country, while developing a more diverse sector. The strategy, named Turning Point, covers the next ten years and will run alongside the development of a national online database of contemporary art held in public collections.
Billed as the equivalent for the visual arts sector of ACEs Theatre Review in 2000, the strategy will focus on five main priorities: participation and education; support for artists; innovation and risk; diversity and leadership; and places, spaces and partnerships. Throughout the document, emphasis is placed on supporting strong leadership and increased diversity in the sector, in a bid to support the growth in interest in contemporary visual art over the past 15 years. However, unlike the Theatre Review, the strategy includes no specific funding pledges. Instead, there is a commitment to enter into further consultation with our partners and develop an action plan. Reference is made to the challenging economic climate in which the review has been undertaken and calls on the visual arts sector to be prepared to change and diversify, to look at issues of leadership and governance, and to support new ways of working and new partnerships.
In his foreword to the strategy, ACE Chair, Sir Christopher Frayling, describes contemporary visual art as a force for change which drives the creative industries. He describes the review as giving ACE the mandate to assume a broader leadership role for the contemporary visual arts and, working with others, to make the case for integrated planning and invest-ment to underpin the sustainability and growth of the visual arts. The strategy is underpinned by ACEs fresh commitment to participation in the arts, and the document acknowledges a distinct London bias in terms of visual arts provision with the East Midlands and East of England particularly poorly served.
The strategy, which was created in consultation with an advisory group made up of 39 senior figures from the sector, was based on a series of reports into the issues confronting visual arts in England. The summary of these reports describes the sector as being at a turning point, and raises concerns that collective investment in the contemporary visual arts sector has not kept pace with the expansion in audiences and participants or the expansion in artistic practice. The review process identified a growing problem of leadership and problems with pay and conditions in the visual arts, describing the sector as being supported by a predominantly young, white, middle-class, female and low-paid workforce& It also highlighted the need for support beyond contemporary visual arts so as to increase understanding of the contemporary within the context of the past.
At the launch of the strategy ACE announced that it is working with Tate, the Museums, Libraries and Archives Council and the Contemporary Arts Society to develop the first ever national online database of contemporary art in public collections in the UK.