Perspectives – Financial reviews

In the latest of our series offering senior arts professionals the opportunity to reflect on the current state of the arts sector, Anthony Field comments on the art of subsidy and the role of Arts Councils.

ArtsProfessional issue 136, 18 December, had an air of déjà vu in many respects. On page 2, a letter by Marcus Romer voiced concerns about the Arts Councils dismantling of its touring department. On page 3 there was a report about the weakening of business support for the arts, just as professional party politicians once again renege on their guarantees that Lottery funds would be wholly devoted to arts and cultural projects. Whilst it was perfectly proper for them to start a new lottery  the Dream Number Game  to raise money for the Olympics, it is breathtaking that they can so easily forget the absolute promises of all political parties about the Lottery funds being devoted to the arts.

And on the same page we have the sad but welcome response of the Welsh Culture Minister to the Review that rejected the move to place the responsibility for funding Wales six main arts organisations in the hands of party politicians. Over the past 50 years there have been similar moves by party politicians in England to take over responsibility for the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, English National Opera, the National Theatre and the Royal Shakespeare Company. Thank goodness that such a disastrous ploy has not been accepted by the arts world. Not only is there the question of how party politicians can be expected to assess the quality of work produced by these companies, but also, how can any Arts Council rate the work of the drama and music companies throughout the country if they no longer assess the major companies? A subsidiary factor in all this manoeuvring is the fact that without the national opera, dance and drama companies and our major orchestras in the Arts Councils portfolio, the case for a proper level of funding for all 1,200 arts organisations is considerably weakened.

Also on page 3 of AP there was a report of the Scottish Arts Council being authorised to clear debts of the Scottish National Orchestra and Scottish Ballet company on condition that they operate within agreed budgets. This is yet another case of déjà vu. It is hilarious, if not catastrophic, to believe that one can run creative organisations on a formula that prevents any deficit (or surplus) ever being incurred. This is in the very nature of the business of the arts and it is why a large Arts Council of Great Britain could make it all work over the decades, and why smaller portfolios are vulnerable  to the delight of the politicians.

Other interesting articles in the same issue of AP refer to the benefits derived from the arts in hospitals, schools and prisons, and such other sectors as heritage sites. Surely the Arts Councils should spend every penny on creating the work which, if considered beneficial to them, should then be purchased by the health, educational and prison sectors. It is really not the function of Arts Councils to fund social work. Similarly, it is not the Arts Councils job to divide its money between countries or regions, nor between drama and music, art and literature, touring and community work. In my 30 years as Finance Director of the Arts Council of Great Britain we always built up our budgets: never did we break them down. A key purpose in our professional lives was to keep 1,200 companies in existence. Maybe this was wrong and we should have let many of them go to the wall. Instead we only lost a handful in three decades.

Anyone interested in the whole world of public funding for the arts should read the first 20 or 30 annual reports of the Arts Council of Great Britain. From these, one can learn that there is nothing new about the art of subsidy in the 21st century. I am well known for quoting Life must be lived forwards but can only be understood backwards, and am therefore considered to be an old timer from the golden age; but all these problems have been faced in the past and must be overcome by artists remembering that their true creative forces will outlive governments. They represent the substance of faith which we find again when the ruins are cleared away.

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1950-1957
After qualifying as a Chartered Accountant, I entered the theatre and film world, being instrumental in bringing to London such banned plays as Tea and Sympathy, Cat on a Hot Tin Roof and A View from the Bridge to the Comedy Theatre, under the new Watergate Theatre Club. This led to the eventual abandonment of stage censorship in the UK.

19571984
I was Finance Director at the Arts Council of Great Britain for 27 years. During the last few years I helped promote Cameron Mackintoshs successful revivals, on tour and in the West End, of My Fair Lady and Oklahoma!.

19711980
As a Visiting Professor I pioneered training courses in arts administration at The City University and lectured at Harvard University on this subject. Some of my regular articles in The Stage have been published in Pages from Stages.

19851995
I returned to producing, starting with Im not Rappaport starring Paul Scofield.

19852006
I was Chairman for the first 10 years of the Liverpool Institute for Performing Arts and have recently stepped down from 20 years as Vice Chairman of Theatre Projects. I have acted as a consultant on new theatres, opera houses and concert halls all over the world, and I remain Chair of the Theatre Projects Trust.

Today
I have a particular interest in promoting new musicals and co-produced Eyam, Floyd Collins, Hello Again and Staring at the Sun. I now have some 10 possible productions scheduled for the West End, Broadway and the Edinburgh Festival in 2007.