Ideas about 'populist' and 'lowbrow' art can hold institutions back from being truly inclusive. Cultural venues should be town squares, not cathedrals, writes Southbank Centre Chief Executive Elaine Bedell.
'Nothing unites us more in this country right now than the understanding that we are divided: no longer simply between Labour and Conservative, but between Remainers and Leavers. Wherever the Brexit chaos leaves us over the next few months we’ll be a country in need of healing and we’ll want to find those moments and spaces where we can enjoy the pleasure of shared congregation – and celebrate what it is that makes us human, social animals.
It’s our nation’s cultural organisations who most obviously have these open, accessible, civic spaces, and it’s the responsibility of those of us who work in art centres to create the sort of cultural entertainment that will bring our communities together. For many people, voting Leave was their one chance to send a strong message that they felt the globalised economy – the political and economic orthodoxy – had offered them few benefits. In some northern towns, and the Midlands in particular, many felt they hadn’t prospered from the result of public investment in the economic and cultural infrastructure of large metropolitan cities.' ... Keep reading on The Telegraph
'Nothing unites us more in this country right now than the understanding that we are divided: no longer simply between Labour and Conservative, but between Remainers and Leavers. Wherever the Brexit chaos leaves us over the next few months we’ll be a country in need of healing and we’ll want to find those moments and spaces where we can enjoy the pleasure of shared congregation – and celebrate what it is that makes us human, social animals.
It’s our nation’s cultural organisations who most obviously have these open, accessible, civic spaces, and it’s the responsibility of those of us who work in art centres to create the sort of cultural entertainment that will bring our communities together. For many people, voting Leave was their one chance to send a strong message that they felt the globalised economy – the political and economic orthodoxy – had offered them few benefits. In some northern towns, and the Midlands in particular, many felt they hadn’t prospered from the result of public investment in the economic and cultural infrastructure of large metropolitan cities.' ... Keep reading on The Telegraph