Sara Robinson celebrates the role of Ludlow Assembly Rooms in the life of South Shropshire, and considers the key issues facing rural arts centres.
One of the exciting challenges of running the only dedicated arts venue in a large area is having to pull off the delicate balancing act of offering ?something for everyone? whilst maintaining a quality threshold and a clear vision. Wander around Ludlow Assembly Rooms on a Friday night and you might find Mid Wales Opera performing Rigoletto in the main auditorium, ?U-Like? ? a techno club night run by local young people in ?Oscars? function room, the youth dance group in the Studio and a Hayward touring exhibition of Goya?s etchings in the gallery. Other recent nuggets include the Assembly Rooms Patron, Pete Postlethwaite, performing in his one man show ?Scaramouche Jones?; hilarious outdoor antics in ?Streets Alive? (an annual, free street arts extravaganza in partnership with Ludlow Festival); the classic film ?Nosferatu? with live pianist and cabaret seating; Zygo?s theatre show performed in darkness; Steve Day (the UK?s only deaf comedian); Tony Benn; the Academy of St Martin-in-the-Fields; contemporary black dance from RJC; and (last but not, ahem, least) Puppetry of the Penis. And yes, they did have to put on another late night show because demand was so high?
Serving the whole community
Each week 120 young people access the Assembly Rooms? youth arts clubs and some join the ?Young Executives?, a decision-making group who influence the centre?s programme and facilities for their peers. Education and outreach activity forms a large part of their work, taking resources to some of the more isolated villages, many of which score surprisingly highly on the government?s Indices of Deprivation. South Shropshire?s beautiful landscape hides a host of economic, social and cultural poverty issues.
Visitor statistics speak for themselves; without the Assembly Rooms, Ludlow would be a very different place.
If I?m blowing their trumpet boldly from the highest Shropshire hill, it?s because I believe that Ludlow Assembly Rooms is one of a number of vibrant but unsung and underfunded market town arts centres that seem to have passed under the radar of the policy makers, funders and the media.
Rural exclusion
It?s not hard to play the poverty card. Pick three rural arts centres and divide their annual visitor numbers by their annual Arts Council subsidy. Now do the same for three urban arts centres? The disparity in funding levels makes revealing reading. Likewise, whilst the context of our work differs from urban arts centres, existing policy does not tend to take issues such as transport, rural diversity, population size, shortage of staff skills and artistic critical mass into consideration. Arts & Business states that 75% of all UK individual giving goes to London- based arts organisations and sponsorship is exceptionally hard to obtain in areas where the bigger firms do not have a presence. Local authorities in rural areas tend to lose out when it comes to central government allocation of funds and as a ?discretionary spend?, the arts are often at the bottom of their list. In South Shropshire for example, the District Council spends almost twenty times more on sports than arts and the officer responsible for arts development is a sports specialist with no arts background or training. Trusts and foundations can be fruitful as a source of income, but regeneration funds, almost all of which come via the Regional Development Associations vary according to regional priorities. In the Assembly Rooms? case, Advantage West Midlands has not as yet indicated any real interest in funding cultural activity.
Good husbandry
Despite this rather bleak funding backdrop, rural arts organisations have learnt to be exceptionally inventive and efficient when it comes to making ends meet. Tried and tested methods include a huge reliance on volunteer labour, low pay, vibrant Friends and membership schemes, local in-kind partnerships, cake stalls, book sales, auctions of promises, merchandise, lotteries and raffles. At a time when the Gershon review is forcing all policy-making bodies and their clients to implement efficiency savings, rural arts organisations could teach them a thing or two.
There is clearly much work to be done to paint a new and different picture, yet as eyes currently shift to focus on the rural agenda, now is a great time to be stand up and be heard.
On the agenda
Ten million people currently live in rural areas. According to the Guardian, approximately 116,000 people ? that?s equivalent to a city slightly bigger than Exeter ? uproot and move to the countryside each year and that figure is growing. Researchers at Newcastle University looking at the future viability of market towns found that shifting lifestyles, a growing commuter workforce, the Internet and out of town buying patterns were threatening their future. They concluded that market towns had to get ?back to basics? to fight this shift: the two most important factors that kept a town alive were having good food shops and having a cinema or theatre. This useful finding coincides with significant changes in strategic rural policy and funding. In April this year, the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA) will be increasing its devolved resources to Regional Development Agencies from £45m to £72m.
Whether the arts can pitch in for a slice of this bigger cake will depend partly on the Arts Council?s timing and ability to make the case at a national and political level. With support from the Government, it could work more proactively with the strategic bodies charged with bringing new leases of life to England?s 1,000-plus market towns and beyond; DEFRA, The Countryside Agency, Regional Rural Affairs Forums, English Nature, Regional Development Agencies and the European Commission. So it is great to hear that the Arts Council is currently revising its approach to supporting and developing the arts in rural England. Working with cultural policy consultant François Matarasso, it is mapping, researching and consulting, aiming to ?rural-proof? its own policies so that they are applicable and relevant to rural needs, whilst also identifying new opportunities for rural arts investment and development.
Time to speak up
Recent reports outlining the importance and impact of rural arts touring schemes and festivals are beginning to be heard beyond the arts world, but where is the voice for the professionally managed and especially equipped rural venues which offer creative experiences every day, all year round? The Arts Council is only part of the lobbying picture ? it is also the rural arts centres themselves that need to come out of hiding, push to the front, elbow their way into rural strategic plans and persuade the Arts Council to gather the data that prove their economic, social and cultural impact. Those of us concerned with rural arts centres could take a leaf out of the rural touring schemes? book; in 1997 they came together to form a national body, the National Rural Touring Scheme, a collective voice with which to lobby, research, debate, hold conferences, share good practice and funding information. There has been no better time than now for rural arts centres to form a national network from which to shine and shout about the exciting, vital, cutting edge and refreshing work that is happening in these supposedly quiet backwaters.
Sara Robinson is currently a Clore Leadership Fellow.
e: sara_robinson@btopenworld.com;
w: http://www.ludlowassemblyrooms.co.uk