I spend most of my time on this site these days cajoling people to go do “arts and cultural” stuff. If you look at the home page and the last dozen or so posts you’ll get a pretty clear idea of how broadly we understand those words and how different the voices are of the people who write for us – there’s Kirkstall Festival, a promo for family friendly gigs, something about a jewellery exhibition in Saltaire, a knowledgeable review of an avant garde pianist, a chatty girly piece on Leeds Skyride (sorry @EmilyHasGlasses), an amused appreciation of an architectural walk around Huddersfield, a nice write-up of some amateur dramatics, a clever reflection on an arty bell-ringing happening in a church in Halifax, some news about a healthy living hub on Armley Town Street, a critical report from the after party at a large zombie chase game in Holbeck, a plug for a music festival in York, a couple of opinion pieces on art funding, a jolly bit on dad dancing, some background on the new Morley Heritage Centre, a celebration of the joys of go-carting, a photo-blog about a trip down the canal, and some daft waffle about pedestrian safety and the narcissism of certain cyclists. That’s as random as it gets and a fairly typical week’s worth of contributions.
A lot of these posts generate conversations (we aren’t a site that attracts monosyllabic responses or trolling, thankfully) and the comments we get tend to be lengthy and thoughtful. I think it’s safe to say that we like our arts and culture here on The Culture Vulture, and the people who write, read and join in the conversations on here are a pretty positive, engaged lot.
One of the things I like best is getting people to do or see stuff that wouldn’t normally occur to them. Some of the best posts we’ve had have been from people who have allowed us to fix them up with a kind of cultural blind date (off the top of my head, this one from Rachel Jeffcoat – she really was in the dark, but that’s such a lovely piece. And, of course, Frank’s Dad Dancing!). But there’s only so far you can go with this. No matter how many times I invite Mick McCann to see a blockbuster musical he simply won’t play along – and I’m damned if I’m going to play any more David Bowie albums, no matter how much Mick enthuses at me about his musical hero. He thinks I have sold my soul to the commercial Beelzebub, and I think he’s just a bloody old grumpy bastard. We both wear very different cultural blinkers, and I can’t see either of us shifting very much.
I think that’s pretty true of most people. There’s nobody that “doesn’t do culture” (no matter what some people argue) but the type of thing that attracts one person and makes their life whole and meaningful can be an incomprehensible bore to another. So, even though we all are immersed in culture of some description, there’s no “arts and culture” in general that benefits us all in the same way.
I’ve been thinking about this a lot this week owing to Iain’s post advertising the What Next, Yorkshire event he’s involved in organising at the Playhouse, Wednesday after next. There’s been a back and forth in the comments (it’s not obvious but I bet we think a lot more alike than comes across) and we’ve both agreed we are Pollyannas – though Iain, being from theatre, is so fiercely competitive he’s thrown down the gauntlet and challenged me to a Pollyanna Off (I’m not sure how this works, but I think we meet at dawn in Bradford City Park, take twenty paces, turn, and fire off a volley of irrational optimism at each other?)
Joking apart, we can be as one with our Pollyannaish potentials, and both agree on the need for state funding (I’m a more cake and don’t go stingy with the icing kinda guy too) but for me there’s still something not quite right with how the What Next thing is framed (though I still can’t exactly put my finger on it).
It has something to do with the language. I find it hard think in those monolithic terms: “the public”, “arts and culture”, “audiences”. I’m not sure where I fit in, how to locate myself within these categories. And I find the whole notion that the main problem is how “arts and cultural organisations” should advocate for “the public” (or is it the other way around?) deeply flawed. I used to be a mental health advocacy consultant, working with big organisations around how to design services that clients actually wanted; we always argued there’s no such thing as a hard-to-engage client group, just a bunch of services and organisations that most people don’t see the relevance of. Big organisations would always see the value of what they did, the product they offered, the services delivered, even though nobody was turning up to take advantage of them … and the problem was always seen as how to get to poor benighted, ill-informed, badly judging punters to recognise what they were missing out on if only they’d engage, participate, and bloody well appreciate all we do for the stupid, ignorant bleeders.
I’m not saying that arts and culture organisations are as bad as all that (trust me, nothing can come near the arrogance of most psychiatric services in the 80’s) but I think I discern a similar dynamic. On the one side there’s the providers – the organisations that produce the art and the culture, who in their own estimation are going a terrific job. On the other side there’s the punters who don’t quite get what a terrific job you are doing and don’t understand sufficiently how bleak and diminished their lives would be without all that you do for them.
Well, yes. And no.
Yes, of course arts and culture organisations do a great job and more people should know about what they do – that’s kinda why The Culture Vulture was set up, to recognise the great stuff that’s happening and celebrate anyone who switched the telly off, got off the sofa, and gave something a go. Generally most of the stuff you’ll find on here is genuine appreciation of what arts and cultural organisations do to make where we live a better place, not clever-dick, professional criticism.
But also, no. Maybe “the public” understand the arts and culture well enough and are perfectly happy with the level of participation they already achieve. Maybe the public are fine as we are, thank you very much.
Let’s indulge in a little mental experiment for a moment. Imagine there’s a meeting over the other side of town from the Playhouse where “the public” are getting together to talk about how they get those bloody “arts and cultural organisations” over there to engage and participate and advocate more for their actual concerns and conditions, and stop thinking about themselves for a moment. I wonder how that conversation would work out?
I can only speak for myself but I’d probably start by disagreeing with the idea that “arts and culture” (that giant, granite monolith) “enhance every aspect of our lives” (the public is considered as sweet and consistent as sponge pudding). The fact is, most arts and cultural production I can live without. That’s not being controversial, it’s just recognising that as an individual I can appreciate only a fraction of a fragment of what’s on offer. There’s no way I could be engaged with everything equally, and it simply is impossible that I could participate in more than one or two things with the fervour and seriousness that arts and cultural organisations seem to feel is required.
For instance, if every theatre in the land closed down tomorrow it wouldn’t make much of difference to me personally. Unlike Iain I don’t consider it the place I go to to understand ideas, myself or the world in general. This isn’t an aesthetic incapacity on my part, or a moral hindrance, I just choose to make sense of the world differently and value other cultural expressions above the theatre. No amount of education, engagement, participation or conversation is going to change that. When I go to the theatre I’m there for a laugh, as a social occasion (usually for the free bar), merely to enjoy myself – I am disinclined to join in with some purported exploration of my soul or edification of my mind. Again, this is my free choice and not because I’m incorrectly enlightened. So I don’t really take much notice of my theatrical chums when they tell me about the “transformative” potential of theatre … you do your transforming your way, I’ll do it in mine. Then we are all happy.
Like most people, at best I’m passionate about one or two small segments of the arts and culture spectrum (in my case it’s a woefully obscure niche and entirely irrelevant to almost everybody else, there’s no reason you should be interested). I spend most of my time and energy on what is most significant to me personally, and I’ll merrily go along to a wide variety of stuff without any expectation that it’ll be more than just good fun, but I’ll actively avoid whole chunks of cultural deadwood (poetry! is there really any need for any more sodding poetry? I’d have been happy to have called it a day after Dryden to be honest.)
So I suppose I’m going along to the What Next Yorkshire meeting feeling a bit of a fraud. I’m not part of any arts and cultural organisation and I’m not sure that I’m exactly “the audience” or “the public” they are looking for either (they do sound like a fabulous bunch, I hope we can be introduced soon – I might be able to persuade them to contribute to The Culture Vulture!)
Phil
I agree with much of what you say. I’d argue that the arts are made for and by those who enjoy them, and most of us only really enjoy a small section of them. That’s fine, we don’t all have to be into everything, we certainly don’t have the time, and if people aren’t into any of it that should be fine too. Except today arts and culture often seems to be aimed at those who aren’t interested, as you say, at some notion of a ‘poor benighted, ill-informed’ public who must be reached, or ‘engaged’ or worse, to use that awful phrase, ‘given a voice’.
As such, although I’m not against state funding of the arts, over the last two decades this has increasingly come with strings attached. Arts orgs that receive state funding have been pressured into (or some maybe willingly accepted) going down the line of promoting their product, not on aesthetic and/or entertainment grounds, but for some other agenda: such as promoting ‘social inclusion’, economic growth or addressing ‘issues’. Even the idea that the arts ‘enhance your life’, as you imply, has an instrumental aspect to it: they may, but then it may not. We engage subjectively with art and culture bringing to it our own experiences and getting out of it our own pleasure. You cannot design ‘life enhancement’ into them.
Obviously any arts org would wants to expand their audience, and convince as many people as possible of the worth of what they produce. But when the aim becomes something extraneous to the arts, it’s the quality that tends to suffer. Rather than trying to solve society’s problems or engage those who aren’t interested, arts and cultural organisations need to have faith in art for its own sake aimed at an arts audience. As word gets out, hopefully others will get interested too and discover something new – but if they don’t, they don’t. And if state money comes with any strings attached, either they need to stand up to that, or consider standing on their own feet.
Paul
Actually I don’t think anyone has ever raised the question of attached strings. As far as I can tell most artists I know have totally bought into the inclusion ideology – seeing art as a motor of social transformation, an aesthetic nudge – though whether that’s because it’s the best way to get funding or if it’s an honest belief I’m not sure.
The funny thing is an individuals choice of art and culture is a fairly reliable indicator of social class and financial position. We all know of an occasional opera-loving oddball in Cottingley or Belle Isle, but it’s not statistically significant.
So why do so many people put so much effort into an endeavor which appears to have little chance of success (changing society by watching a play) and generally results in less interesting art?
Do you think it’s a dirty capitalist conspiracy? (Ha, I actually did hear an artist argue something similar a while ago, which is probably why the state is safe funding as much art as it can … there’s absolutely no danger of social transformation there.)
Phil
I suspect you’re right about most artists readily buying into the inclusion agenda – I was being unusually polite. I suspect it’s a combination of cynically realising that’s the best route to state funding, and naïve belief in the ‘power of art’ to heal all ills. While for government, lacking any inspiring political ideas or solutions society’s problems, they look to art (and education) to do their job for them.
Paul
Don’t suppose you can come to the meeting? I’m a bit outnumbered with the true believers …
If I’m free, I’m happy to.
I sometimes think that conversations/conferences like this, call it want you will, intend to ask questions like ‘How can we get more people to engage in theatre?’ but generally just talk about ‘How can we get more people into our Theatre?’ So fall at the first hurdle.