Global warming is an issue for artists as well as scientists, says Gillian Bates.
As I write this, somewhere out in the Arctic, four of our top artists are trudging along in the snow. Turner Prize-winners Antony Gormley and Rachel Whiteread, author Ian McEwan and choreographer Siobhan Davies are walking through the Svalbard archipelago to draw attention to global warning. What a roll-call of creative talent. It is frankly impossible to imagine the conversations around the campfire at night, but I reckon Gormley?s snowman won?t have a carrot nose.
I?m in a sunny office in Nottingham wearing what can only be described as ?light summer gear?. It is such a warm day that the street cafés are overflowing. (We do, in fact, have very nice street cafés in Nottingham, a place recently dubbed by the tabloids as ?the City of Terror?.) A friend, who is decorating his office next door, is so hot and bothered he has opened up all the skylights. Two weeks ago it was snowing and we were under severe weather warnings. So now I know ?it?s not just me?. The weather and our climate are so strangely out of kilter that summer comes, unexpectedly at the end of March? just days after the seas were so rough that a family was swept to their deaths in Scarborough.
And so, four of our greatest living artists have joined scientists to try to make people realise what is happening to the planet. They are on an expedition as part of the Cape Farewell Project, which is aiming to find new ways to raise awareness of the devastating impacts of climate change, in an area where temperatures are rising at twice the global average. Twice the global average? How scary is that? Will it make any difference that a few of the country?s cultural élite have donned ski suits and photographed passing polar bears? Will the experience influence their art? Will their art influence us?
I?m just one person sitting in my hot office, but around us the world is changing and we are involved. These four have moved pretty far from the traditional image of the artist, working in a solitary creative practice. There can?t be too many artists? garrets in the Arctic at all. They are out there; doing something that may influence future thinking? so what about you?
Gillian Bates is a journalist and arts marketing consultant.
e: gillianbates@gkbmarketing.freeserve.co.uk
Conference agenda ? More important than ever ? making the case for arts
Sue Isherwood highlights the ongoing crisis in local authority funding for the arts.
Arts organisations and workers have got the message from central government that the arts are expendable when politicians decide there are more votes to be won from promising better hospitals and schools and stronger immigration controls. In December and January there was much coverage in the press of the standstill funding for Arts Council England (ACE) over the next two years, a settlement which its chairman, Christopher Frayling said represented a £30m cut. Although a deal has been negotiated with the Department for Culture, Media and Sport which allows ACE to reallocate Creative Partnership funding, there are arts organisations that have recently discovered that standstill for them means major cuts. They are not the large national companies, but some of the vital smaller theatres and arts organisations that ensure access to arts for all communities across the UK. And this is the same set of organisations that is also reliant on local authority funding.
Currently local government puts more money into supporting the arts infrastructure than ACE does. Not enough people know that and not nearly enough people realise that this area of arts funding is even more in danger than central funds. Local government budgets have only just been set, so what these settlements mean for arts funding is only just becoming apparent for 2005/06. The National Association of Local Government Arts Officers (nalgao) has been aware of the difficulties of maintaining funding levels for some time. This year it has conducted a survey of arts budgets with its members across England and Wales, which makes for alarming reading. About half of budgets are at standstill, and a third are being actively cut. The picture is similar from large urban to small rural authorities and also represents a continuing trend. Over the previous two years cuts had occurred in 30% of authorities with 45% receiving standstill, and more than 50% are predicting cuts in the next few years. To our knowledge eleven local authorities have dispensed with their arts services completely since 2003. If two years? worth of ACE standstill funding represents a £30m cut in public support for the arts, then this local authority dis-investment must count for double that.
At the same time, we know that arts services are very efficient at helping local authorities achieve their corporate targets in such areas as social inclusion, healthy communities and services to young people. Our research also shows that arts investment provides strong leverage with £4.50 earned for every £1 invested. We know this, but the message is not being heard loudly enough at local and national levels. Nalgao?s annual conference is a major opportunity for members and like-minded colleagues to network, exchange ideas and plan for the future. It will not surprise anyone that this year?s conference theme is ?Making the Case for Arts? and that we will be concentrating on how strongly and loudly we can get the message across. We will be examining the range of local authority practice, listening to and debating with a powerful set of speakers and workshop leaders, including John Holden and Robert Hewison from Demos, Professor Max Atkinson from Henley Management College and Professor Hamish Fyfe of the University of Glamorgan.
?Making the Case for the Arts? is hosted by Cardiff City Council in the St David?s Hall concert and conference centre, from 3-5 May. For full details and booking information
or contact Pete Bryan,
e: nalgao@aol.com;
t: 0116 267 1441