ACE embodies an outdated system that lacks adherence to the arm’s length principle. Simon Tait argues we need to find a way to fund the arts and protect our cultural assets.
The music sector has gone apoplectic over cuts in the subsidy for music, first with the Arts Council’s unexplained and, frankly inexplicable decisions, and then with the BBC’s loony attempt (failed, so far) to lop 20% off its orchestras’ budget.
Simon Rattle led that charge in a recent speech at a Barbican concert following up on ACE’s November decision, without consultation with apparently anyone at all, to cut English National Opera out of its circle of favoured music makers for 2023-26. “When the two largest supporters of classical music in this country cut away at the flesh of our culture in this way, it means that the direction of travel has become deeply alarming. It’s clear we are facing a long-term fight for existence and we cannot just quietly acquiesce to the dismantling or dismembering of so many important companies” he said.
Now his chum Nicholas Hytner has joined the fray, looking a little further than the omnishambles around the November announcement about the next three years of the National Portfolio. He sees the end of the Arts Council as it has become and a complete rethink of the whole arts funding system.
Politicians have long dismissed the passionate complaints of the arts sector as theatrical histrionics, which will not be taken seriously by the electorate, but something has changed...Keep reading on Arts Industry.
The music sector has gone apoplectic over cuts in the subsidy for music, first with the Arts Council’s unexplained and, frankly inexplicable decisions, and then with the BBC’s loony attempt (failed, so far) to lop 20% off its orchestras’ budget.
Simon Rattle led that charge in a recent speech at a Barbican concert following up on ACE’s November decision, without consultation with apparently anyone at all, to cut English National Opera out of its circle of favoured music makers for 2023-26. “When the two largest supporters of classical music in this country cut away at the flesh of our culture in this way, it means that the direction of travel has become deeply alarming. It’s clear we are facing a long-term fight for existence and we cannot just quietly acquiesce to the dismantling or dismembering of so many important companies” he said.
Now his chum Nicholas Hytner has joined the fray, looking a little further than the omnishambles around the November announcement about the next three years of the National Portfolio. He sees the end of the Arts Council as it has become and a complete rethink of the whole arts funding system.
Politicians have long dismissed the passionate complaints of the arts sector as theatrical histrionics, which will not be taken seriously by the electorate, but something has changed...Keep reading on Arts Industry.