Variant vol.2 no.41 Spring 2011

2011·5.1 MB·English

by  Variant and/or the authors

cross currents in culture
variant
number 41 spring 2011 free
2 | variant 41 | SPrinG 2011
contents
Variant, 41, Spring 2011 Online archive Letters 3
All articles from Variant are
Print ISSN: 09548815 Mute, ArtLink
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Variant is a magazine with the www.variant.org.uk
independence to be critical that Variant is published 3 times Investing, Advocating, Promoting... strategically 4
addresses cultural issues in a
a year. The most current
Interview with Andrew Dixon,
social and political context.
issue is posted on the Variant
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Through A Glass Darkly 48
Performative Practice... Without Border, Without Name
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Make Whichever You Find Work 54
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The State of Poetic License 60
Owen Logan
variant 41 | SPrinG 2011 | 3
letters
Mute’s 100% cut by ACE Taking another tack
We are very sad to announce that, on Wednesday, strategic partnership projections. As Mute – and I’ve worked with Artlink in the area of learning
Mute Publishing found itself in the category many others, such as the Scottish based Variant disability and the arts for the past 25 years, and
of ‘losers’ as these emerged from Arts Council magazine (another ‘loser’ of late) – has attempted been personally involved for way longer than
England’s (ACE) National Portfolio Organisation to discuss in a series of articles stretching back that. In that time I’ve watched education turn
decisions. The magazine had presented to ACE decades, the backdoor this structure has offered somersaults, healthcare pass the buck and social
a programme that combined a web and print to an entirely corporatised version of art, wherein services run round in circles, stood by as new
magazine, books and events, community self- genuine diversity and antagonism is replaced by ways of working and new terminologies became
publishing, education, and digital strategy superficially different versions of doing the same fashionable and just as suddenly fell outdated and
support and advocacy work, but faltered in the thing (and many platforms for critical discussion smirked as new and similar approaches couched
second stage of the assessment process, where gradually desist from analysing culture as a whole in different vocabulary took its place. Throughout
its financially precarious position and ‘weak’ to discussing the ins, outs, rights and wrongs of that time I have had the honour to be around the
governance structure – as well as the perception particular art forms), is one of the great untold most amazing activists, people who have fought
other organisations were better placed to deliver stories of mainstream contemporary culture. for the rights of people with learning disabilities,
to ACE’s strategic goals – proved fatal, resulting in As a critical platform seeking to understand people who have really made things happen.
a 100% cut to core funding. culture in the round – i.e. in the many and various I’ve seen it all before
We regard the process of being placed in ways it exemplifies, illuminates and engages with but perhaps not quite
competition with other arts organisations as larger processes (be they, to put it cheesily, part of like this; services
poisonous and distracting: while we will privately the ‘macro’ dimension of global economics, or the hacked to pieces,
question the sizeable uplifts granted to large, ‘micro’ level of subjectivity) – we have attempted greater stress placed
established organisations (which, in the greater to shore up our core editorial work with a range on families as their
scheme of things, need further funding about as of others that could help subsidise this. OpenMute, support systems are
urgently as Paris Hilton needs another handbag), our consultancy and tools agency, through which eroded, families with
in the end we recognise it as a familiar part of the we also facilitate the publishing activity of many homes under threat
divide-and-rule principle that has long marked the other independent producers, has been the most as a result of changes
operations of support agencies like ACE, where a visible result. But the free-content economy of to housing benefit,
chronic reliance on the parent body for the basic the web, which felt like a natural home for our benefits axed with little
apparatus of organisational reproduction nurtures discussions, eventually became Mute’s nemesis, understanding or care
fear among the ‘dependents’ – slowly but surely as sales and subscriptions decreased at the same of impact. We appear to
stripping them of all sense they can do anything speed our web readership grew, and a growing be going backwards to
for themselves, let alone together... The spectacle international community of readers slowly and a time when you were
of slavish gratitude for the spoils of public funds, unwittingly dealt our ‘business model’ a death- ‘bloody lucky’ to get
in which even organisations cut or killed felt blow. anything at all.
compelled to reiterate the basic tenets of ACE’s We must now figure out what to do about this, Rather than continue
funding paradigm (excellence, innovation, global as all of us who’ve worked on the magazine for to be negative or merely
leadership and creativity), were truly depressing so long have no intention of stopping our work plead exceptionalism, I
in this regard – not one voice standing out for because of a funding decision. Many different want to take a slightly
offering a different vision or lexicon of practice. working models can and are already being different tack. Don’t get
For us, the relevant story is elsewhere, as it has imagined. Others in the many small to medium me wrong, I don’t want
always been, and is effectively being obscured sized digitally-led organisations which have to occupy myself with
by a smoke-screen of rhetoric: it is said that been cut will be trying to figure out their futures unimportant matters
‘adventurous and risk-taking programming is similarly, as will, it seems, many comparable and neglect priorities during crisis. I want to
being rewarded’, and a ‘resilient’ arts portfolio small organisations whose governing remits heighten expectations; raise the bar. In times like
composed. Although we concertedly participated aren’t deemed essential in the current round. these it is so necessary we up the ante.
in the process, adapting our organisation’s We are particularly perplexed by the blow dealt Artlink have recently published a magazine
operational model to that demanded by ACE’s to diversity-led organisations, who engage with called Utopia. An upbeat look at what should
‘Achieving Great Art for Everyone’ agenda questions we imagine will increase rather than be. In it we look at a series of ideas for objects
(within which we happily chose to deliver to the decrease in urgency in ‘Austerity Britain’. and ways of working which would benefit people
Excellence and Innovation Aims), the relevant We will attempt to continue the discussion with profound learning disabilities. We promote
story lies in the devastation being wrought in a number of places. One, on our website, alternative ways of understanding what is being
upon the social in general. Here, in the name of Metamute.org, which publishes weekly and said to us, taking time to look at the detail, to
prudent economic management, Government’s where we will open space for responses to ACE’s understand the individual, deciphering what is
disinvestment in art and education (two fields funding decisions, on Mute Publishing as well as being said through the twitch of an arm, flicker of
with which Mute interfaces most intimately) other organisations, as well as the Googlegroup, an eyelid, tilt of a head.
appears as a symptom of a larger programme of acedigitaluncut and media arts discussion list It is vital that we continue to find ways to
creative destruction, launched in the name of an CRUMB, where many are hoping to marshall understand the distinctive needs of people who
aggressively kickstarted, entrepreneurial Britain a more specific discussion about the apparent are often excluded from society, as in doing so
that we all know is doomed to fail, but not without disinvestment in the still badly understood we respect their right to be included. It is only by
wrecking the lives of millions. area of digital practice. ACE’s decisions reflect focusing on the detail of the individual’s needs,
To be a ‘winner’ in the arts variant of this a presumption digital has been ‘dealt with’ and working to remove the barriers they face,
competition (and that means those who, as by conceiving of it as integrated in routine that people with profound and multiple learning
The Guardian dubbed it, ‘won big’; not the organisational development processes, rather disabilities will be given the respect they deserve.
hundreds kept on on a shoestring), several than demanding to be explored as a highly self- Utopia proposes that we put our heads together,
kinds of compliance are required. Firstly, a near reflexive area of work with a long and rich history concentrate, cross disciplines, use our imagination,
religious belief in the power of art to ‘deliver’ linking into video, performance, independent think creatively, to find ways to ensure that
personal transformation. Second, a normative publishing, installation art, software development, people with high support needs remain valued.
and by now entirely standardised model of art- literature and more. Given the consolidation, Ultimately, respecting differences and valuing
organisational development, where success is surveillance and privatisation happening in the people for who they are.
measured via the ability to diversify funding digital realm as we speak, now seems exactly the For more information or if you would like to join
sources (via trading activities, rights management, wrong time to be making such a move. The fact in the discussion then please write to:
sponsorship, philanthropy and a variety of non- that ACE (and partner organisations like the [email protected]
public sources), have ‘reach and impact’ (loose BBC) are seeking to align themselves with digital Utopia is available at selected sites throughout
catch-alls combining audiences, media reception, innovation and broadcasting at exactly the same Scotland.
influence), and offer ‘engagement’ – all of which, time just demonstrates further ignorance and Alison Stirling, Artlink, Edinburgh
it is reiterated, can only be achieved by bodies in shortsightedness.
www.artlinkedinburgh.co.uk
possession of larger executive boards, which have Yours sincerely, Pauline van Mourik Broekman,
represented on them ‘experts’ from the realms of Director and co-founder of Mute
Finance, Legal, Development and Artistic Vision,
and who watch Income and Expenditure lines metamute.org
like hawks, assuring they mitigate risk, execute
their mission and stay on a number of targets,
as these encompass financial, audience and
4 | variant 41 | SPrinG 2011
Investing, Advocating,
Promoting... strategically
Andrew Dixon, Chief Executive of Creative
1
Scotland, interviewed by Daniel Jewesbury
DJ: I suppose the most obvious question is, how is Creative the total picture back to Scotland and back to art, 4IP, and trying to mainstream that as actually
Scotland different from the Scottish Arts Council and visitors. I mean we’re not a tourism agency but a valid part of what we do. So moving into some of
Scottish Screen, its predecessor organisations? with that festivals guide, if we can produce the those new territories.
content of it with The List, then tourism agencies
AD: Well, in a number of ways. Firstly, we’ve taken as well as others can onwards promote it. But DJ: Is there a danger then that the definition of creativity
on the combined responsibilities for TV, the arts becomes, it becomes very difficult to pin down, it becomes
let’s take the visual arts. It’s actually terrific:
and creative industries, also the responsibility for very broad and sometimes almost comes to almost
in Glasgow International or in Edinburgh in
stimulating cultural export; secondly, we are very include everything?
festival time because you’ve got a guide to
committed to not just being a funding body. We are know what is happening that month and there AD: Creativity does often include a wide range
a funding body, or investment agency as we call it, of things. Would we fund a food festival? Yes,
is the kind of evidence that shows that people
but we are much more of a promotional body and possibly, if it had a creative… cultural element
literally follow that and you know, they move,
much more of an advocate for the cultural sector to it. Would we fund a restaurant? No! There are
they take their information and move from one
that can give something money. We are not about kind of borders and boundaries to everything we
thing to the other, but for the rest of the year,
just monitoring what happens to that money, we / you do, but looking in the visual arts. Visual arts
the chances of someone finding a gallery as a
are about getting behind the cultural organisation, for years has been breaking down barriers. It has
visitor are pretty slim actually. So, yes, how do
getting behind the artist and trying to shine the driven a wedge between art form barriers of the
spotlight on him and to package things together in past and there is far more collaboration going on
a way that tells a story of what’s happening in the ...we’re not just a cash across visual arts and other media.
cultural sector in Scotland. Even in craft, if you look at the work of the
I use the analogy, we’re not just a cash machine machine in Edinburgh that Dovecot and innovative work that they do with
in Edinburgh that dishes out grants but we craft and arts. Visual arts has been at the forefront
will dish out a lot of grants but, whilst we are a dishes out grants... of breaking through the art form silos. We are
supporting organisation, the support doesn’t stop, getting rid of all the art form silos here, which I
we have to move on and find how we can help suppose is the next big difference. There will be no
we as a national organisation help things locally.
promote them. It kind of manifests itself in a art form budgets and we will have generic budgets
Now, in some ways that should be an Edinburgh
couple of examples already. that are more strategic, much more planned and on
job to promote galleries in Edinburgh but we
One is our artist residencies programme. a larger scale and able to punch the weight.
can take the overview for Scotland and work to
I mean, when I arrived, everywhere I went in
find new mechanisms of promoting visual arts, DJ: But with criteria in terms of assessing quality of
Scotland I found an artist in residence. You go
promoting public art, promoting whatever it is, application, assessing the effectiveness of funding – the
to the Isle of Skye and there is a visual artist,
film, film locations… We’ve got to try and tell a criteria still needs to respond to the art forms.
writer, musician in residence, doing fantastic work,
story because it’s not been told in the past quite
hidden away, nobody else would know that this is AD: Why?
as positively as it should be so we’re underplaying
happening because their work is not shared more
our strengths, that is the feeling. So that is the DJ: So ... there is a uniform set of criteria that will be used?
widely and they would be working in isolation
from other artists in residency in Stirling and second bit of difference. AD: We’ll try and get a common set of criteria.
The third difference is really the kind of We’re still working on that actually but there will
so on. So I came back from visiting the artists in
creative industries and the economic side. You be a much simpler, common set of criteria that
residence that we had, at the time we had 57, and
know, we still will invest in straight cultural, is around quality of production, track record,
we put extra resources.
individual artist’s projects on artists’ terms. It’s delivery, in some instances it is leverage of other
For the first year we are trying to get 200 artist
absolutely pivotal for what we do. In fact, we will resources… commitment to accessing audiences
residencies or awards that we can pull together
put more money into that. But we’ve got a remit, or reaching audiences… it is not rocket science,
in a single programme called Creative Futures,
if not of money – not of new money – to support it’s always been there. But we will have our craft-
which has maybe forty or fifty partners that are
specific criteria or theatre-specific criteria.
running those residencies. The difference is that
they will all be branded together as Creative We’ve got to try and tell a DJ: I suppose some organisations have… audience, box
Scotland Residence Programme. There will be 200 office and they can measure their participation in certain
artists, we will bring them together through social story because it’s not been ways. For other organisations it is quite different in how
networks; we will bring them together physically… organisations reach their audience. So there have to be
told in the past quite as
there is a want to… and we will promote and different ways of evaluating…
advocate the work that is going on so that the work
positively as it should be AD: There are different criteria for different
is not hidden. For those that want to be… away
programmes but we’ll have common criteria across
and hidden, that’s fine but many people responded
the art forms that is what I’m saying. I mean film
very positively to the idea that they are part of a
the creative industries and to co-ordinate that is slightly different. With film… we will still have
bigger community.
and to encourage the likes of Learning and Skills a discrete film programme. For various reasons
Another example is that there is the festivals
Agencies, Enterprise Agencies, to put their money we’ve got criteria – especially Lottery-specific –
guide that we produced. It’s a similar story of going
behind creative industries, whether that’d be we have to fulfill. That will have a set of specific
round in Scotland, and everywhere I went there’s
the games industry, design, fashion, potentially criteria. Everything else: festivals and events,
another festival and nobody had an overview,
festivals and to piece together the economic story quality of production, talent, access to education,
nobody had a picture of what was happening 52
about the cultural sector. quality of development – all those will be across
weeks a year in Scotland. We’ve just gone into a
Sometimes economics and business language art form, anything will be put forward.
very simple partnership with The List2 who came
doesn’t go down well with artists but actually if it’s
to us, actually, with an idea of a different sort of DJ: I would like to ask about the arms-length principle
the way that we will get more investment, more
festivals guide for Edinburgh, but we said it would and where that sits within Creative Scotland as an
resources into the cultural sector then it’s a really
be great if you’d do one for the whole of Scotland. organisation that has the power to commission the
important role for us to play. So things like getting
They produced this guide to festivals, 280 of them, work directly? Is there a danger in using those powers
engaged for the first time in digital media, okay –
across Scotland and it’s now linked on our website that Creative Scotland almost becomes a rival to the
the Arts Council has funded and Scottish Screen
that you can search all what, ifs and where. So organisations that it funds?
has funded individual projects but actually putting
it puts individual festivals that might have been pilot projects together in this partnership we’ve AD: No. I mean, primarily artists and creative
hidden away, like Pittenweem or smaller festivals had with Channel 4 and Scottish Enterprise that practitioners are at the heart of our thinking.
into a bigger context of festivals in general… enable some kind of bigger scale developments We might strategically commission a service to
DJ: So it’s a question of creating a national strategy for happening like Central Station, the likes of ISO be delivered or a… some geographic delivery
cultural activity then? apps, (the developers behind Central Station, but in the cultural sector but we wouldn’t say… we
who have also worked for BBC iPlayer, Glasgow want this piece of art for Dumfries and Galloway
AD: Yes it is.. well,...I hesitate to use the word School of Art etc.) development of ripped photo as a Gateway sculpture. We are not directly
selling. To a certain extent it is about presenting
commissioning individual works or individual
variant 41 | SPrinG 2011 | 5
productions. What we will do is take a more series of conversations which say ‘What more could
strategic look at the sort of whole cultural ecology. you do in delivering our objectives in Scotland?’
So we’ve had a programme called Flexible And some of that could be artistically, some of that
Funding, funding a lot of galleries and a lot might be geographically, filling some of those gaps.
of theatre companies, an awful lot of theatre There isn’t a strong enough small scale visual arts
companies. Flexible Funding, by its very nature touring network. Could we find one of the visual
was very competitive, 139 organisations bid arts organisations to take that role on?
and there ended up being 60 grants for 2-year
DJ: There is a certain way in which you want to take on
programmes of work and everything being
decisions-making in which you bring the different art
supported is really high quality because it was the
forms, different sectors in helping you make decisions
kind of cream of the crop and fantastic proposals.
where the blockages may be in… in the career paths and
The trouble is we haven’t decided how much
how this could be developed?
of one thing we wanted and how much of another
thing we wanted so we could have ended up AD: What I kind of understand is that there aren’t
these… stations, these places… if you look at
funding 60 theatre companies just because they
printmaking, that is fine. There are – if you look
were the best applications. We could actually,
technically, fund 60 theatre companies in Glasgow something… what this is, is basically four people’s at Glasgow, Edinburgh, Inverness, Dundee –
just because they were the best applications. We’re careers. This is actually our job. This is CS’s role: to fantastic facilities. The sculpture workshops are
going to get rid of that programme, it takes… We get people onto the career track of working in the great in Glasgow and Edinburgh. If you look at
are very committed to what we are supporting but visual arts or theatre or film in Scotland. To find certain other forms, there are limitations as to
we are going to get rid of it in two years time. the talent, the hopes, the places where you really the resource base or the places where people can
But gradually, what we are going to be doing is add value if you get them an exhibition at the go and take their work on to a next stage. So it is
take a strategic look at different sectors. So we will Print Studio in Glasgow and you’re a printmaker. about us having that conversation with the sector
take a look at visual arts and say, actually… there’s They’ve got a thing on at the moment, four about where there are gaps. Also about where
the national galleries, there’s our Foundation one-week exhibitions of members’ and student there are strengths, I use theatre for an example.
Organisations that we fund, The Fruitmarket printmaking. They have added something to the We have a real strength in children’s theatre in
Gallery, various centres, what are the gaps on the CV of those artists and present an opportunity to Scotland and you want to build on that strength.
map? What are the organisations, not just on the present their work in a way that they couldn’t have Likewise there is a strength in GI as a festival
geographical map but the visual arts maps? [DJ: in the past. They are an important platform or but it is only scratching the surface of what it can
Map of provision?] Do we need an organisation station in this thing. really do if it were given more resources to make
things happen.
that is actually delivering on curatorial training
or international export of the visual arts or We are getting rid of all the DJ: I want to talk a bit more about these various
supporting artist careers as well as putting things approaches to resourcing. You said at the start that
on the walls in galleries? We would define four art form silos… There will Creative Scotland is much more than a funding body and
or five franchises that we’d then advertise and that that is what differentiates it from its predecessor
invite proposals to come forward. Instead of then be no art form budgets…we organisations. The literature talks about grants, loans
supporting maybe individual organisations we’d and then, there is also in some of the documents, talk
hope we’d might get collaborations. will have generic budgets about corporate investments, venture capital and so on
So we might get CCA in Glasgow plus the unlocking commercial investment. I imagine that when
International Festival and someone else coming that are more strategic, loans are talked about these are non-commercial loans,
forward to deliver a package of work or a the recuperation of an investment at declining terms of
programme of work. As we define those strategic much more planned and on profit. But is there, I am wondering, if there is a distinction
commissions, we would have an eye to the that is clear, a definition about that kind of loan and
geography of Scotland because there is fantastic a larger scale commercial investment?
work – that we’re very proud of because they are
AD: I think it is fair to say that at the moment
our strengths – in Glasgow and Edinburgh but
we are not even at first base in terms of those
there are huge tracts in Scotland where there isn’t So I am kind of using this as an almost
new forms of finance in terms of loans. We
quite the opportunity or there isn’t the production conceptual way of describing our role. We need to
do... effectively you’re doing loans when you’re
base that there needs to be. So, you get the drift? find ways of supporting them get onto this track,
investing in films, you just don’t expect to get
We describe it in our corporate planning in terms of identifying the platforms and then say: you’ve
much of it back. There is a recoupment clause in
of theatre but you can describe anything really. got that really great platform over there at the
the contract, so with the Last King of Scotland we
Fruitmarket, what else could it do? What more
DJ: So it’s going to be very much a question of identifying could that organisation do to meet our objectives got a cheque back of $60,000 but we are interested
those gaps in provision and commission organisations in… Are there ways in which different types of
which are investing in talent, investing in the
to deliver in those areas? [AD: Yes]. In terms of the finance can be made to help artists to deliver what
cultural economy, investing in quality production,
identification of those gaps, that is then the strategic role they want to achieve? To kind of capitalise things?
investing in access?
of CS? There are bits of really interesting work in the
DJ: So is it about giving organisations new targets within US, and I never like to use the US as an example
their existing funds? Is it about redefining their targets? for the arts because funding-wise it’s terrible,
There will however be the
AD: It is about inviting them… we’re going through but it actually has done some really interesting
things that we want to a review of our Foundation Organisations at things with artists, artists-space and loans, money,
the moment. We’re pretty happy about what’s housing and studios. I think there are kinds of
achieve, that is about the there and we’ve talked about building our strong loans that we can learn from them. So we want to
foundations which was a very good message to explore that territory.
kind of creative identity of put across when we were bidding for our money It is easy for us to invest in an agency like
from the government and we’ve meant it because WASPS and that has been true for a certain kind
culture in Scotland. they are strong foundations. Once you’ve got of investment, where the British Arts Council,
foundations, you want to ask: what else can you quite visionary, put £3million on the table for five
build on top of them? Could you make them even arts projects in five places. It was terribly flexible
AD: Yes. We would do that with the sector. We stronger? Are there things that they could do that as to how the money was spent. Ultimately, it was
would do these reviews with the theatre sector, the are outside their buildings? Fruitmarket Gallery about an asset base for WASPS that enables them
music sector and the visual arts sector, including has done some great education projects with Air to operate very sustainably as an organisation to
national companies, things like RSAMD if you Iomlaid (On Exchange), a visual arts project linking offer cheaper and better quality accommodation
talk about music, college of arts if you’re talking school children in Skye and Edinburgh. They for artists and creative people. Can you actually do
about Visual Arts. So there will be a much broader had internships and trainee curators. Could they that for individuals, for individual artists? Could
conversation about where the gaps are. Let me kind of do more in terms of trainee curators? At you create an artist mortgage? Could you create
show you this: This was a theatre show that I the moment they are operating with a grant and some way of supporting people that isn’t just about
went to see at the Fringe, Plan B (the Highland- they do their x number of exhibitions a year and a grant? We’re starting to explore that territory.
based dance and theatre performance company). education programme. Actually, if you gave them a DJ: There are a couple of things in terms of how Creative
Basically, instead of the programme having the bit more resources, what else could they do? Scotland is acting. Is it acting to administrate funds that
CVs of the actors they had this organigram, they We are not doing directioning and saying we are borrowed commercially? Is it...
have the artwork, they have footballers, art and want to give you targets. We are entering into a
6 | variant 41 | SPrinG 2011
AD: Not at the moment. Our income is primarily that, that is able to do that, and with social AD: I can maybe show you the building blocks
at the moment Scottish Government, Lottery entrepreneurs. I met a guy from Glasgow on budget. It can show you how little the creative
and some trusts and foundations. It is not Monday, you know they’ve got the studio down by industries is in the context of our own…. You
inconceivable in the future that we might stimulate the railway arches and they are gradually taking know, we’re not… we’ve got a co-ordination
private investment into creative industries, into a lease on some of those railway arches. Very little role but we’re not in a primary investment
sort of the more commercial end I suppose more of public money has gone into it but he’s just an role. Architecture is classed within the creative
likely in the creative industries. But the only areas entrepreneur… [pauses] … social. industries but we’d not be leading on investing in
we have really got into, this is actually quite an architecture in a big way. Commercial publishing
DJ: You mentioned the recoupment through film, e.g., of
interesting example, is Own Art. is part of it, we may engage with publishing as
loans. ...there is an argument that says that for some film
I was chairman of the board of Own Art when a cultural product but we are not going to be
funding, for non-commercial cultural films, sometimes
it was set up. Own Art is just a very clever scheme involved in commercial publishing. What we do
that the model of funding for film funding for UK Film
but all it does is pay the interest on the purchase have a role to do is to ensure that there are the
Councils, Northern Ireland Screen, Scottish Screen, that
of an artwork by a member of the public. It uses mechanisms there to support people developing in
because it applied an industrial model to the whole
relatively little money and the benefit goes to the those sectors and industries. We will often devolve
area it was sometimes difficult for a cultural film to be
commercial gallery in terms of its sale, in terms of our responsibilities.
made because it couldn’t recoup that money, and so it
the artist [who] gets the money upfront, and the That’s one of the general things where we’re
was already ineligible. First of all, do you think this is an
member of the public gets the benefit because different. We are not going to be trying to do
issue? But also, that there is no desire in part of Creative
they’re buying a work and spreading the cost over everything from here. If we’ve got an agency we
Scotland to move people who have been funded through
10 or 12 months. can devolve money to, to manage on our behalf,
grants into a kind of recoupable structure? In other words,
Now, you can take that principle and use it on we will. If they are better placed to take decisions
there is not going to be any imperative on people to be
other things..In England they have already used than we are, either because of a specialism or
trying to marketise something which isn’t already?
it to allow the public to buy musical instruments. because of critical mass of what they are doing.
Take the same principle and use it to buy artist Let me just show you this – every block is £1
We are very committed to
equipment, and if an artist is having to hire million – this is the budget as is going into our
equipment on a regular basis, why can’t we do a corporate plan so that everyone can see so that it
what we are supporting
loan on the buy and a repayment plan. Then we is very transparent. So £18 million is Foundation
are able to recycle the money but essentially we do Organisations, £8 millions is Flexibly Funded
but we are going to get
some deal with the bank where the bank manager Organisations more or less, a little bit out of
does the process for us. So we want to explore that there, a little bit out of Lottery. We’ve got about
rid of [Flexible Funding] in
territory. £1.7 million of cross-cutting agencies, things like
Federation of Scottish Theatre, VAGA (Visual Arts
DJ: But that is not in the intention of replacing… two years time.
and Galleries Association) and different agencies,
AD: No, no that is as well as. There are other our overheads to run the organisation. £3 million
interesting sources of cultural financing that are AD: There will always be a range. I mean there are of our Treasury funding that we have chosen to
starting to emerge. There is the whole area of very few films that seriously recoup money other invest in Talent. That is the primary thing that
crowdsourcing, kind of online choices about which than to their primary major investors. We are we’re investing in from our Treasury funding.
projects to fund and online giving to seize the small-scale investors, with £300,000 in a £5millions There is no creative industries in there. Down
public appetite to put money into things. To a budget. So our share back could never be great, here there is money that we’ve got for particular
certain extent Central Station have done it with but it is right: if we do have a success and the purposes from the Government. £10 million to
their small grants that they are doing online, not British Film Council is having a huge success with use for a particular music initiative, £0.66 million
in raising the money but in allocating choices. The King’s Speech, we get our share back in. We for Cash Back for Communities, £2 million for
That, again, is territory we will explore because can then re-invest it, perhaps back into the same Edinburgh Festival’s Expo Fund and then £1.25
if we just use our resources in straight grants we company. million Innovation Fund – so that is the Creative
are not getting the most out of them. To tell a story We’re quite interested in investing in companies Industries, at £1.25 million it seems relatively
of when I worked in Northern Arts. We funded a and if they are successful, the equity is re- small in the scheme of the budget. What we are
residency in Grizedale, in the forest there, and invested in them rather than us because we can’t developing up here, and this is still to be agreed
it was a craft agency and it was £20,000 per year. budget, you can’t realistically budget to say we and I can’t give you the figures, we’re developing
It was hugely popular, we would have 70 artists are supporting twelve films next year and we a Lottery programme in bigger blocks. I can’t give
a year apply for it. It was a six months residency, will get a £1million income off them. That would you the figure, but there will be a £3 million block
fantastic, you got an exhibition, produce some be unrealistic. What you can do is to set up a for film, TV production. There will be a block for
work, left the work behind. There would be 59 programme where Ecosse Films or Sigma Films festivals and events, there will be some investment
artists that we totally hacked off because they (who’ve recently released You Instead, recently in the cultural economy work but that will be
didn’t get in and there was one that got it. It was premiered at Glasgow Film Festival and in the sustainability and environmental sustainability in
a great residency, it had good profile and looked the cultural sector.
good on the CV. We used the same £20,000 when We would define four or Again, there is not a big chunk of money that
the residency programme finished and put it into says creative industries, loans. The vast majority of
a public art agency in Cumbria, partnered up five franchises that we’d what we are doing is grant investment.
with some money from Sustrans3 and from the
local authority. Within a year it had generated £1 then advertise and invite DJ: We wanted to ask you something about what has
million worth of artist commissions. Which was the been called ‘single-purpose government’, the idea of
best way to use the £20,000? The answer is there proposals to come forward. all government agencies face in the same direction
is no right answer but both have a kind of validity and drive for the same purpose. [...] but, there can be
and if part of our role is to expand the cultural US at SxSW, and who have just signed a new productive tensions and that is surely where democratic
economy then we have to look at mechanisms to do distribution deal with Icon Films) if they are space is. There might be useful social tensions where one
that sort of leverage. successful part of the deal is that we continue to department, one area, fights for what it believes to be
get the credits but that we re-invest the profits important for its area.
DJ: I suppose there is one danger of if the agency itself
back into the next project. I think that is a great AD: I mean what I am setting out, you know, I’ve
becomes involved in quite a lot of that, of the agency
incentive. got my outcomes in front of me, it’s in the plan,
becoming exposed to quite a lot of liability for interest to
but: do we want to create a more successful
commercial banks, presumably at commercial rates. DJ: Is there not any pressure from Creative Scotland
country? Yes! With opportunities for people to
AD: Yes, I mean we would set up partnerships that or perhaps from the Scottish Government to expand engage in the arts? Yes. Do we want to achieve
would limit the risk to ourselves and limit the risks that model out to other areas in other words: the non- sustainable economic growth? Yes. These are
to our partners, but also: we could be prepared commercial forms, whoever it is, performance arts, the all part of the Government’s mission. There will
to take those risks. You don’t really get creativity free cultural publishers. Is there no pressure to marketise however be the things that we want to achieve,
unless you take risks. So we’ve got to be prepared them? that is about the kind of creative identity of
– not to gamble but to trust the cultural sector a AD: If you ask if there is any Government pressure culture in Scotland. Often actually arts and culture
bit more. on – no. The Government is interested in Creative sets the agenda for Government to take up – I
Scotland playing a role in co-ordinating the genuinely believe that the whole kind of climate
DJ: Maybe then, slightly linked to this…
development of the creative industries and helping change, environmental thing had… cultural
AD: Can I tell you another angle, because Scotland’s overall ambitions to be a sustainable organisations were there first. They were there
sometimes it can give you a better sense of our and successful country. But there is no pressure doing stuff, Cape Farewell4, cultural projects,
thinking. There is an artist in Newcastle who came that says we’ve got to apply all our resources into
artists that were looking at this years ago. So it is
to us for a grant for £3,000 for a studio, he’s 26. that commercial activity. In fact we’re not! At our
quite important to use culture to create debate
We gave him a grant for £3,000 for a studio and he heart we are a charitable organisation that is about
around issues.We’re doing some really interesting
came back and says ‘Actually, I found a building. access, opportunity and taking cultural activity to
work.
I can put 12 studios in here but I’d need £30,000. the Scottish population and hopefully exporting a
We’ve been doing some interesting work about
If I get £30,000 off you I could get £90,000 off the bit, reaching the people of Scotland. Our primary
inspiring communities in prison. It has been a mix
city.’ We backed him. He was 26 years old, he had stakeholder is the Scottish population.
of National Galleries, Scottish Opera, Glasgow
never owned a building in his life. He made great
furniture, he was a great cabinet maker and he DJ: I suppose the reason for some of the uncertainty Citizens Theatre – really quite intensive work in
now is running something like 70 artist workspaces around these areas is because of the breadth of the remit. five prisons but really pushing the boundaries of
in Newcastle. He’s got three buildings. It covers from the most commercially exploitable, as parts the question that if people really did have that
We’ve got to be able to spot the talent like of the creative industries, as we’re calling them, software kind of opportunity to engage with something
development and so on, to… cultural and creative, would it have an impact on
variant 41 | SPrinG 2011 | 7
their reoffending rates when they come out or DJ: Still, it always depends on there being sensible Scotland as a place to learn. I think it’s a huge
their behaviour whilst their are in. That isn’t in partners in the commercial sector. You are talking about strength. If you add together GSA, RSAMD,
the book of our purpose for us to do that, yes, we it being common sense but at the same time in these Abertay, Aberdeen. That collective picture of this
want a safer country and all that, but that is us kinds of regeneration developments there should be a is a place to learn, the roles that festivals can play
working with Motherwell College and a whole set consideration of the broader ecology in terms of arts and as platforms for new work, not just the Edinburgh
of cultural organisations. culture but until now… festivals but 280 festivals across Scotland, there is
I think an organisation like Creative Scotland a real strength there. So we would get behind that.
AD: I knew we got it in the Northeast when a
will always be looking at where those cultural We would also get behind things like developing
fire station approached us for a commissioning
strengths are because the cultural strengths… more incubator space, more artist workspace,
programme for the new fire station and they
we don’t have the cultural strengths in children’s which we do with WASPS but equally universities
wanted digital video art rather than anything
theatre because it was in the book of our priorities are very well placed to work in that territory and
structural. You know, you can create that sort of
but we have those strengths there because we had we want to do that collectively across Scotland.
movement and sense of… and this work with the
the artists there who created really brilliant work
prisons is really interesting. The research has just
for kids.
gone and you can see if we… we will do some I think there are kinds
DJ: ...we can put the question this way: in the last three further developments with this and you can see,
years something has come up quite dramatically since suddenly the penny drops that investing in artists’ of loans that we can
the start of the crash and the recession – not only is there work in prisons has a cost benefit that is huge.
a potential conflict between business and public interest You know, it costs a £1,000 a week to keep a learn from. So we want
but that there can be a conflict if Government policy tries person in prison. If we were investing in cultural
to fold business interest and public interest into the same projects in prisons, we could reduce their bill. But to explore that territory.
thing; if it’s always presumed that we are all pursuing the that is a movement and so it’s about creating that
same goal, then it’s the public benefit that comes second. sense that art can change things. … Could you create an
Yes, you can point to ways in which cultural actors in
DJ: The Act gives you a duty to protect diversity, access
artist mortgage? Could
society are leading the way in all kinds of things, different
and participation. Is there, arising out of that, a diversity
areas of discussion and debates. But within society at
of cultural and political expression? Is there a duty,
you create some way of
the moment, within the UK at the moment we are all
as far as you see it, to protect that kind of breadth of
experiencing massive social cuts, public cuts and cuts that
expression?
supporting people that
are to the detriment of the public benefit mainly because
AD: I don’t think that that is what that particular
of the conflict between public interest and business
phrase of the Act means which was about isn’t just about a grant?
interest. You’ve got both within your remit [...]
population access. In fact, we have actually used
AD: Yes but I mean we are hardly a bank. We’re not a similar phraseology around our production base
there to overtly shore financial purposes. We’re and getting the diversity of cultural production Protecting HE is pretty important but in the end
there to serve a public and that is where our focus and cultural ideas because we don’t just want 10 of the day we’re not going to be the agency that
is. So I don’t think that there is any chance of us theatre companies doing the same show at the changes UK government policy. What we can do
being diverted by having an economic purpose Tron. We want a variety and diversity of work, and is to convince our colleagues in Scotland and
in there. For me, you know, growing the cultural the same in the visual arts. We’ve got to ensure Scottish Government that they have got a real
economy is about creating jobs, employment and that… success story on their hands when they have 20
opportunities for artists and it’s about creating Visual arts is my background, I was heavily people applying for every one place at GSA, this is
more work that reaches more people. If we start involved in the Year of Visual Arts in 1996 and not something that is going out of fashion.
moving into territory that is about cultural export,
lots of public art programmes and other stuff, and
taking artists to Venice, showcase Scotland at the DJ: Okay. I’ll better let you get on...
one of the things I’ve done over the years is to go
festivals, eh… sorry, showcase Scotland at the
to lots of art colleges and lots of degree shows.
Celtic Connections festival, then it’s actually about
You go into a lot of art colleges and there is a Andrew Dixon kindly offered to follow up on Daniel’s
creating more work and promoting the artists that
homogeneity about them. It’s almost the artists are conversation by taking some additional questions
we have got in Scotland. I don’t see that as any
kind of soaking up the genre of the key pieces. [...] from Variant via email:
conflict with that core role of delivering public
What is quite interesting, I went around the
benefit. The other big story for us is of course, we art colleges in Scotland and I didn’t get that Flexible Funding
haven’t had cuts. The Government in Scotland has
feel. You got a feel that there was that kind of V: You have said that although Creative Scotland is very
chosen to prioritise investing in Creative Scotland
diversity in there, particularly GSA and Duncan committed to supporting the organisations it has funded
and we’re fortunate that we will see some Lottery
of Jordanstone and actually, Gray’s as well, where in this way, Creative Scotland will get rid of Flexible
income coming back after the Olympics and we are
there seemed more freedom of expression of Funding in two years time. As you say, this was a very
obviously planning a growth budget.
student work, more difference, actually a broader competitive scheme with 139 organisations bidding
DJ: Yes. I suppose the things is, artists are the vanguard of cross section of programmes running. I think against each other this year and less than half receiving
casualised labour. An artist does about 10 different jobs that is quite healthy. So I think we’re helped in funding for their programmes.
in order to do their one job. If anything, that situation is trying to achieve that by what is coming out of the From what you say we can only see a large scale
worse. The situation of the artist has become more and education sector. plan for the future which fails to provide secure space
more precarious. I am not just talking about Scotland but for small organisations. Indeed, it would appear that
DJ: There are threats to the future of arts and humanities
generally. The evidence is there if you look at average you intend larger organisations to fill the ‘gaps’ that will
in HE and in terms of the foundations of this knowledge
earnings of artists, if you look at lifetime earnings of be created by getting rid of swaths of activity currently
economy, creative economy and so on, that is a very
artists, career opportunities and so on and what artists conducted by Flexible Funded organisations. Moreover,
real threat in terms of even being there as viable sectors
actually make, what percentage of their income comes in your description of the future there doesn’t seem to
for you to be supporting in the future. You talk about
through practising their art. Is Creative Scotland then be anything between big organisations and individuals
promoting, advocating, encouraging and supporting
about improving that situation and addressing that except for your mention of ‘franchises’. Could you please
access, so: is there a role for Creative Scotland in getting
situation? elaborate on your ideas in this respect?
involved in promoting, advocating, supporting, and
AD: Yes, we actually… I did a talk at Sabhal Mòr protecting the arts at that level, at HE level? AD: Our plans for strategic commissioning are
Ostaig, the Gaelic College, saying, as long as the not intended to ‘get rid’ of swathes of activity,
AD: Yes. There is actually a conference in Glasgow
average visual artist’s salary is still under £5k per but are instead about getting the right expertise
on Monday on HE and Creative Industries and
year we cannot be criticised for investing directly to deliver work. The cultural ecology in Scotland
we are contributing to a report that has been
in individuals and doing residencies and doing is complex and we want to ensure that our
produced about the role of the university sector
artists’ showcases that give artists bottles to take investment is directed at the areas where it will
in Scotland for supporting creative industries.
to the party and a chance to develop things on make most impact. This could include, for example,
Again, Scotland is in a slightly better role than
their own terms, but ultimately the change to smaller organisations collaborating on bigger
in England, just as it is in culture so in HE and
that earning capacity is not just about us giving projects, rather than investing in solely in bigger
the value that has been attached to culture in
grants it is about growing the economy as well, our organisations.
the curriculum and the pride almost raised in
festivals being more successful, the private sector Before we move to the commissioning model,
places like GSA and the track record in places
commissioning art, it is about getting different there will be a rolling programme of reviews, with
like Dundee. Yeah, we would want to lobby. As
partners to recognise the value of the cultural the sectors involved playing a key role, to inform
someone said to me the other day: what is Creative
sector. our needs for different sectors. The process for
Scotland’s position on the closure of libraries?
I did a lot of work in public art in the Northeast commissioning will be introduced in stages with
Well, the position is that we don’t want them to
of England and it almost became a movement. selected delivery partners replacing FXOs as each
close. We’re not going to stand there with placards
There wasn’t a building put up without a major franchise becomes operational. This would start
saying ‘Don’t close the library’, but literature is
commissions programme and I am not talking in 2011 with reviews of performing arts, visual
important to our...
about three little stained windows in a front door. arts and crafts. It will be followed in 2012 with
I am talking Paolozzi outside and some really DJ: So, what’s the language? reviews of film, digital media and festivals. In 2013
significant programmes. That was just about AD: Likewise with colleges, we would not want we will review literature agencies, publishing and
creating an environment in which it was seen as there to be a wholesale closure of cultural equalities.
commercially sensible to invest in artists when programmes in colleges but we’re not going to Each review will inform the shape and nature
you’re developing property. I don’t think that stand there with a placard but we are going to of the franchises to be offered through strategic
happened to the same extent in Scotland but I work strategically with universities and colleges commissioning. Our expectation is that many
think there are ways that you can stimulate that to say how can we advocate the strengths of what organisations will look for partners to bid for
sort of thing to happen. you do? How can we tell a collective picture of franchises, so collaboration will be stimulated,
8 | variant 41 | SPrinG 2011
as will innovation. Sustainability and resilience it does cite impacts on inmates’ learning and on culture, and no doubt you will be aware of the weight
will be fundamental to the survival of creative their relationships with their families. Ultimately, of cultural philosophy which argues that commercial
organisations ex-offenders will be released into communities exchange values are forever at odds with the very
everywhere in Scotland – initiatives such as complex use values which underpin artistic quality
Cuts Inspiring Change, or the Cashback for Communities and general cultural wellbeing. Yet, from its founding
projects are about improving the lives of statements, it has been clear that Creative Scotland’s
V: You said that “the big story for us is of course, we
neighbourhoods and communities through the mission is to try and reconcile these contradictory
haven’t had cuts.” However, the consultant Ann Bonnar
provision of cultural and creative activities. movements. We are not going to resolve the arguments
doesn’t tell the same story. As she points out, savings
on these pages, but it should be no surprise to anyone
were made in the first place by abolishing the Scottish
Unesco that where you see public money “adding value” to
Arts Council and Scottish Screen and forming Creative
Scotland in their stead. She has said, “the overall cut to V: The Scottish Arts Council was not set up to be an culture in Scotland others may regard the dynamic very
the culture budget is 10%, which is higher than the 6.9% instrumental force in the market in the way you describe differently and see public money being diverted, in too
John Swinney cited as the standard cut applied to non Creative Scotland. The interventions the new organisation many instances, to the cause of inflating exchange values
ring-fenced services. So it’s the next installments which has made to promote what you’ve called “home grown and private profits, and ultimately extracting value
will shape the story”.5 Bonnar also points out that the culture” are already controversial. It seems important to through an ever increasing range of methods. From that
Scottish Local Authorities, which you are keen to work in remember that these interventions are sanctioned by perspective, the inflated public spending on such things as
partnership with, “are facing the same challenges as in the Unesco Convention on the Protection and Promotion corporate logos, public relations and consultancy fees are
England with large cuts to absorb and neither a statutory of the Diversity of Cultural Expressions which came into all examples of an entrepreneurial culture inured to the
responsibility for the arts nor an agreement to support force in 2007. As Minister of Culture and Constitutional plundering of the public sector. What are your thoughts
culture”.6 So the issue here seems to be complicated by Affairs Mike Russell saw no difficulty in reconciling the on this situation?
compound cuts and stand still budgets in real terms, now anti-free market meaning of the Unesco treaty with AD: We have recently published Investing in Our
and beyond the forthcoming election. his vision for Creative Scotland as an entrepreneurial Creative Future, Creative Scotland’s first plan,
AD: For clarity, Creative Scotland’s 2011-2012 organisation. Yet the interventions you make as an which sets out our ambition to see Scotland
budget has been maintained at £35.5 million, economic development agency concerned with our recognised as one of the world’s most creative
the same figure as 2010-2011. By reducing our ‘cultural ecology’ are also distortions of the market. nations and as a place of choice to live, learn and
overheads and streamlining our services, we Given the complaints of small independent television work as an artist. Our five objectives – investing in
have saved resources and reinvested almost producers about Creative Scotland’s patronage of STV at talent, quality production, audiences and access,
£1 m of savings back into the creative sector. the indies’ expense8, for instance, how is Creative Scotland place and the cultural economy – aim to increase
Creative Scotland recognises the challenges local going to deal with the underlying business issues of the recognition, profile and influence of Scotland’s
authorities face during the coming year, however, cultural protectionism? How is Creative Scotland going talented creative practitioners and to increase
we have been in close discussions with a range of to avoid becoming a bastion of publicly funded cultural the audiences that value their work. We will use
authorities that recognise the contribution that nationalism? a range of strategic investment programmes to
achieve this: these are now published, alongside
culture makes to the lives of their communities AD: Creative Scotland has been thoroughly
our plan;
and are looking to maintain the value of their transparent in its aim to boost independent
investment in culture and creativity. Our corporate television production generated in Scotland and www.creativescotland.com/about/our-plans/
plan, Investing in our Creative Future, includes a also that we would use a range of tools to build corporate-plan
£1million programme to invest in the contribution sustainable businesses. The good news is that
that ‘places’ across the country make to a creative this will offer excellent opportunities ahead for Notes
Scotland. independent writers, directors and other talent to 1 March 2nd 2011.
produce work that inspires audiences nationally 2 [Eds.] “The List, an entertainment and lifestyle guide
V: In arguing for the formation of Creative Scotland
and internationally. for Glasgow and Edinburgh, is reducing its frequency.
different Culture Ministers, Labour and Nationalist
From 2nd March the magazine will move from a
alike, assured the public that they were committed fortnightly frequency to monthly.” CISION, Media
Life in a Promotional Culture
to the arms length principle. Going by what you say, Updates - UK - 10th February 2011
these assurances have been misleading. The idea of V: Our experience of working in the cultural sector is http://uk.cision.com/Resources/media-updates/Media-
Updates---UK---10-February-2011/
the public service which you speak of seems virtually rather at odds with the benign picture you painted
indistinguishable from developing the political notion in conversation. What we find is that the ‘economic 3 A primarily publicly funded charity, including: Big
Lottery Fund, the Landfill Tax Credit Scheme, local
of Scotland PLC under the auspices of Creative Scotland. agenda’ you talk about is inextricably bound up with
and central government (including the devolved
So to what extent do you think your future budget is a now widespread promotional attitude to culture. governments in Wales and Scotland and government
dependent on the organisation being a function of what, You’ve said that Creative Scotland is to operate “generic departments in Northern Ireland), Non-Departmental
in contemporary civil service language, is called “single budgets that are more strategic, much more planned Public Bodies, and the European Union.
purpose government”? and on a larger scale and able to punch the weight.” We 4 http://www.capefarewell.com/art/exhibitions/past-
welcome pluralism and greater scope, but your language exhibitions/art-and-climate-change.html
AD: Creative Scotland is a non-departmental
here also points to the new business ethos which we 5 http://annebonnar.wordpress.com/2010/11/17/the-impact-
public body and as such is part of the wider
of-scotlands-budget-for-culture-wont-be-felt-until-the-
find threatening. In practice it is the same promotional
delivery landscape of Scottish public services next-instalments/
ethos that we see overriding local democracy and
which includes local and regional government. 6 http://annebonnar.wordpress.com/2010/12/21/how-
accountability, for example when Variant was effectively
Promotion of, and advocating for, Scotland’s statistics-about-arts-cuts-are-used-creatively-to-make-
talented creative sector benefits both the sector censored by Culture Sport Glasgow for, among other political-points/
itself and contributes to the rich creative life of things, allegedly showing Glasgow in a bad light. Or 7 http://www.scotland.gov.uk/
Scotland’s communities. This role is enshrined in even more worryingly, when the Aberdeen City Council Publications/2006/01/13110743/0
the legislation that established Creative Scotland bowed to commercial lobbying and supported Ian Wood’s 8 http://www.heraldscotland.com:80/news/home-news/tv-
costly and, by the Council’s own findings, unpopular indies-slam-creative-scotland-s-stv-cash-1.1090123
and it continues to operate within the arms’ length
plans to build over Union Street Gardens. In that case it 9 http://www.gopetition.com/petitions/save-the-new-
principle.
was Peacock Arts who found themselves at the centre contemporary-art-centre-in-union-terrace-gardens.html
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/scotland/north_east/8682430.
of a storm created by different values in commerce and
The Social Agenda stm
culture.9
http://www.pressandjournal.co.uk/Article.aspx/1752022
V: The 2006 Scottish government commissioned study, There are many other examples which we could give
‘Quality of Life and Well-Being; Measuring the Benefits of
of the problematic relationship between commerce and
Culture and Sport’7, shows how weak the evidence base
is which underpins idealistic connections between the
Plan B Company,
arts and the solving of social ills. However, the volume of
performer
research done in this area has not moderated the political
biographies,
appetite for making such claims.
taken from the
You have talked about “doing some interesting work
programme for
about inspiring communities in prison”. Some readers
A Wee home
will be surprised to see you describing people who have
from home, 2010,
been incarcerated as “communities” in quite such rose
reproduced
tinted terms. Of course the arts have long been offered
in ‘Investing
to prisoners as one aspect of their generally humane
In Scotland’s
treatment in accordance with human rights. What is new
Creative Future’,
is an emphasis on the impact of the arts on reducing
Creative
crime. But what if the arts have little or no impact on
Scotland
reducing re-offending rates? After all, the much stronger
Corporate Plan
correlation is between crime and inequality. So are you
2011–2014
perhaps guilty of overplaying instrumental benefits in
line with contemporary neoliberal governments that
normally play down the stronger correlation and play up
what are in fact tokenistic policies?
AD: The Inspiring Change project, led by
Motherwell College, has completed an early stage
evaluation which is, as I said, interesting. Given
the short lifespan of the project, the evaluation
makes no claim to reducing re-offending, however,
variant 41 | SPrinG 2011 | 9
1. ‘The Demonstrators’ left), we can identify three broad groups.
There are middle-class students and recent
As is well known and lamented, trade union
graduates (many unemployed), from various
membership has declined in the last three
institutional backgrounds, recently mobilised
decades. It was at 51% in 1975. At the end of 2006
by the 2010 student demonstrations. This
union membership was 28.4%. Trade unionism
category might be further subdivided to include
hasn’t declined only because the private sector
middle-class students at elite Higher Education
now makes up a larger proportion of the British
institutions, working-class students at ‘post-
economy, rather this diminution of membership
1992 ex-polytechnics, liberal activist graduates,
is common to all sectors. Union culture in the UK
anarchist organisers, Trotskyist students, and so
is moribund. During the University and College
on. Second, there are school students, again of
Union strike, workers picketing the doors of
multifarious class positions, political dispositions
university buildings found that their first task was
and educations; finally there are committed,
to explain to students what a strike is. Repeatedly
ideological anarchists, of various persuasions, all
those students warmly declared their support as
or none of whom may be school and university
they crossed the lines to buy a Caesar salad or use
students, and separately employed, wageless,
the wireless internet. Even some of the members
unionised, or otherwise. This is just to say that
of the union seemed puzzled to hear that they
the categories are complex, imbricated, and in
ought not to be crossing pickets.
no sense discrete. For this reason, no one should
Knowing that the lives of its membership will be
expect all of these groups to assent to a common
mutilated by fiscal tightening, the TUC organises
programme, and least of all that set out by the
in the knowledge of its own social marginality.
TUC.
The bland pastel colours and sugar-paper lettering
Yet those engaging in black bloc tactics are
of its promotional materials are the livid and
no more the vital core of the movement than
desperate register of the organisation’s social
the small entrepreneurs whom the Labour party
insignificance. The abstract entities to which its
and the TUC so incompetently seduce. Thus the
slogans appeal (“everyone”, “all of us”) are a tacit
separation of the TUC’s march from the more
acknowledgement of the real diminution of trade
radical direct action reproduced the separation
union membership. All those soothing images and
Marching for Whose Alternative?
of production and consumption in the economy
grandly empty pronouns are a kind of self-denial:
Escalate, April 2011 the more the TUC strains to come across as a at large. The black bloc runs up Oxford Street
smashing windows screaming “pay your taxes”.
We are not storming heaven, but being marched division of Mothercare, the more plainly it gives
It thereby expresses the contradictions of a life
precariously close to the precipice. The Trade voice to the dissipation of traditional bases of
lived solely in the ghostly realm of consumption.
Union Congress is not our tool for emancipation – working-class power.
Anarchism became the negation of shopping.
and neither can it be. Why are we being so skilfully The TUC no doubt believes that it must reach
Meanwhile, production plodded towards Hyde
pacified by ‘our’ institutions? We should see clearly out to the middle-classes if it is to direct a strong
Park – and was duly placated by the confirmation
how Brendan Barber, Ed Miliband and friends anti-austerity campaign. But since it isn’t willing
from senior politicians that its passivity would be
have steered us so neatly toward the cliff-edge. to state this expressly, it instead tries to prove that
rewarded.
We might crash onto the rocks below, and in the the effects of austerity are ‘universal’. It therefore
waters that roil about them the TUC, transfixed, (like the Labour party before it) avers to the
might capture a glimpse of its own continued monumentally pernicious equation of a (partly 3. Direct Action
social relevance. Such a shattering fall will surely fictitious) middle-class with the populace as a Direct action cannot always prefigure harmony.
tear us from our fond illusions. We would hope, whole. Class is suppressed in favour of a specious While we would like to have an activism which
however, that we can awake of our own accord. It universalism. Under the sign of the unification creates a positive politics directly, more often than
is time to throw aside the TUC’s terrifying rattle of trade unionists and the ‘middle classes’, the not we find ourselves defensively engaged. Even
of ‘jobs, growth and justice’. It is a rattle which TUC subscribes to a thoroughly bourgeois hatred when the palaces of consumerism are temporarily
never belonged to us in the first place, nor is it of social disruption. The ‘alternative’ – even at the transformed into crèches and health centres (as in
something we actually seek. level of rhetoric – becomes comfortable passivity. the manner of UK Uncut), the ultimate intention
What happened on March 26? The official Just like its propaganda, the TUC’s announced is not to force a permanent change of the space.
answer is clear: hundreds of thousands of ‘people political programme of ‘universal’ benefit by It is to halt the smooth destruction of the welfare
from all walks of life’ marched for an ‘alternative’. Keynesian deficit spending is calculated to state, of pay and working conditions. In other
Who in fact were they, and what are their suppress basic social antagonisms. It does so words, direct action can (and often should) be a
interests? And what material recourse do they by synthesising for its audience a vision of means – not an end. To expand: the direct action
have against their managed impoverishment? ‘jobs, growth and justice’ where ‘we’ all benefit undertaken by anti-cuts groups is of a different
Among all the cloddish asininities emblazoned – whether ‘we’ happen to be workers or the character to their modes of self-organisation. When
in grim edible pinks across a million A6 flyers, capitalists who exploit them. And yet not only we organise in those groups we try to prefigure
not once does the TUC mention class. Its current does this image of universal harmony through the world we want to see in our forms of co-
agenda is one of banal inclusivity. It assumes the state stimulated growth spirit away the basic operation – we have consensus-based meetings,
necessity of this programme (though of course it antagonism between capital and labour, it also we adopt specific vocabulary, we work to avoid
makes no public argument for it) on the grounds presents the promise of a state-administered accidental subordination of participants. Our
that it must build the largest possible coalition recovery. All the masses need do is come out direct action, however, is of a different sort: we
against state-led austerity. The official slogan is on the streets and mindlessly drool the slogans, don’t want to live in a world of smashed glass and
“All Together For Public Services”. and our benevolent fathers in the state and the burning barricades, but these are necessary means
The public relations exercise conducted by union bureaucracies will do the rest. The TUC’s for political advance. The trashing of Soho is our
the TUC and its institutional supporters has propaganda is infantilising; but in this respect it is ‘transitional demand’, not our utopic end-goal.
been intended to convince us that opposition to the mirror image of its political programme, which This is the source of a strategic problem which
the cuts does not entail opposition to the groups is paternalist. Both are fetters on the development has to be addressed and made relevant to those
who benefit from their implementation. Such of an autonomous working-class struggle against engaged in the anti-austerity struggle of which we
opposition is difficult and antagonistic. The TUC capital – one which is for itself, not merely a are ‘all’, it would seem, a part. The problem is this:
urges us to forget it. charade. for too long we have been losing, perhaps to the
The media divides us as ‘trade unionists’ and For anti-cuts groups, effective politics will extent that we have forgotten what it would mean
‘anarchists’. Some enthusiasts on the left have be won by refusing to agitate for a void called to win.
declared that the ‘political’ task we now face is ‘everyone’. That void will ultimately always be It wasn’t difficult to sense this on March 26th.
the active unification of these groups, as if by the substantiated as a middle-class impassioned Certainly the property destruction was on the
passion of our demand for unity we might solder only by the slumber of stable exploitation and whole politically well-targeted: we will never
together the broken halves of a mass opposition. routinised debasement. Where for working- mourn for shattered glass in The Ritz. What is
But there are not ‘two halves’: the fractions class activists there is the potential for an nevertheless clear is that the scale of what faces
opposed to ‘the cuts’ are more various than that; intensification and victory in an ongoing social us will not be overcome by 100 or 100,000 well-
and they are divided not only by the form of their war, the bourgeoisie raises its flag to civil stability. intentioned individuals, or by forever pretending
politics, but also by their content. ‘Unification’ will The TUC salutes; the extortion of profit continues that our ultimate objective is a ‘just’ and well-
be useless so long as it involves the subordination unchecked. functioning taxation policy. Inspired heroes cannot
save us; ‘jobs, growth and justice’ by the abolition
of all political fractions to the ‘middle classes’. At
bottom, the pre-eminence of middle-class ‘values’ 2. ‘The Anarchists’ of tax loopholes is fatuous. Capital’s supremacy
will not be dented by the symbolism of giant-
is the pre-eminence of bourgeois property rights. Among those designated ‘anarchists’ by the
puppets, or the fetishization of other struggles’
bourgeois media (or ‘autonomists’ by the Leninist
10 | variant 41 | SPrinG 2011
sites of resistance, whether Petrograd or Tahrir admission that 500,000 trade unionists on the thousands of people, who deliberately broke
Square. streets was merely a media spectacle. On their away from the agreed route of the march, became
We talk not only of overcoming austerity, command, workers perform some perverse conscious of their own freedom and did exactly the
but of overcoming capital altogether. Capital is waggledance to the buzzing B-flats of a vuvuzela, same.
social and exists on a mass scale: our resistance and genuflect before the queen bee, Brendan
must be likewise. Our strategies must be for total Barber. When protest is so instrumentalised, 6. Criminality
generalization. This is in no way an argument marching becomes servitude. When the inestimable Commander Bob
against radical action: it is an attempt to open a Broadhurst says of the black bloc and other
discussion about the exact form it is to take, and 5. Political Freedom, Rights and Liberalism hoards of malefactors that he “wouldn’t call them
to understand the extent to which is can be taken. The TUC, the media and our political rulers are protesters… [because they]… are engaging in
This means reconfiguring our categories of peace the retailers of particular conceptions of what criminal activities for their own ends” he provides
and disruption, and being prepared not to mourn political resistance and freedom are. The TUC for us a summary definition. Politics is articulated
the welfare state, but to physically resist the knows it cannot upset too many consumers of the as action that occurs within the parameters
attempts made to privatise it. bourgeois media; and the bourgeois media knows defined by a state’s system of jurisprudence.
exactly how far this march can and should go According to Bob Broadhurst and his functional
4. Media and Liberalism before it crosses the line of appropriateness for equivalents and media outlets, criminals may only
Mainstream media or web-based social media, justified grievances. Protest is permitted so long act ‘for their own ends,’ because otherwise we
the message is almost always the same: damn the as does not precipitate change. We are allowed our might be forced to accept that criminality is often
violent, praise the peaceful. In the bourgeois press, ‘right to protest’ only to the extent that it doesn’t enough a political reflex to social conditions of
blame takes on a domino effect: the reactionaries infringe those other, more pressing civil rights: extraordinary depravity.
say that the TUC are a minority; then the TUC first of which is the right of capital to accumulate. The reality is that direct action has always been
say the activists are a minority; then the liberal A snapshot is in order. The rights of people in criminal. When in the 1960s radical historians
non-violent protesters say that the black bloc central London not to have their day disturbed; re-evaluated the Luddite movement, they had
are a minority. Some in the black bloc condemn the rights of shops in Oxford Street to remain open to overturn an enormous weight of reactionary
throwing paint at McDonalds while children were every minute of the yearly 364 day trading cycle, historical dogma. According to that dogma, the
inside. Are these lines in the sand, or tiresomely according to the interests of their shareholders; Luddites were not ‘doing politics’; they were acting
voluble attempts at self-exculpation from a the rights of consumers to continue consuming in defence of their next meal. Because in capitalist
collective failure? unhindered; the rights of motorists not to be societies politics is done by very well fed men who
Meanwhile, everyone from Ed Miliband to UK discomfited on their journey through town; the obey the laws that have always redounded to their
Uncut name drops the Civil Rights movement rights of businesses to keep their glass fronts current accounts, the idea that actions performed
as a bastion of perfect protest – despite the pristinely intact; and the rights of everyone either illegally or out of desperate need are
history of these movements being a history of looking on from the street or their armchair not to political is imperiously refuted.
armed struggle, in which hundreds of bombings be too unnerved or disturbed by what they see. ‘Of Dominant classes will continue to dismiss as
took place in and around government officers, course we recognise their right to protest, but…’. ‘crime’ the occupation of their buildings, the
corporations and campuses. The sit-down tactics The qualification is a catechism. Protest must be expropriation of their goods, and the disruption of
which supposedly won the fight are raised on a limited so that other and more important rights the productive relations from which they benefit,
wave of foam to a decorative plinth. The memory might be preserved. and from which dominated classes suffer, until
of Martin Luther King is sanitised. Malcolm X We are unnerved and disturbed by 364 day such time as they are overthrown by those who
is politely ignored. The suffragettes and anti- trading cycles, perpetual shopping, streams of ‘engage in criminal activities for their own ends.’
Apartheid struggles are also mentioned as great traffic that go nowhere, and the brightly lit shop Then the tables turn and the criminals become
victories: but all these three movements have an façades that line every street. Those smashing romantic rebels, fit to be reverently invoked in
eerie commonality: they all ended in registering the windows know that the social basis is at the speeches of Ed Miliband. The actions of the
the vote for women and black citizens, while bottom two things: exploitation in perpetuity, and black bloc aren’t so different from the criminal
underlying structural inequality perdured. the construction of the homo consumer whose acts of the Algerian teenagers who rioted in the
Hypnotised by the mantras of New Labour ‘demand’ does so much to fuel it. Paris banlieues in 2005; but that’s because both
politicians, who would even recall that the anti- And yet this is the world of truly inalienable groups understand that, in the face of capitalist
Apartheid and Civil Rights movements were about rights – here dissenters must be kindly institutions designed to legitimate near universal
black resistance? Or that the Suffragettes fought accommodated, but the desire to change that impoverishment, crime is the only means of
for women? As the movement stands, the tactics of social basis is legally proscribed. The demarcated redress.
both the TUC and the more militant protesters are route from Embankment to Hyde Park can be Many of the political acts in which the
less egalitarian, radical, disruptive or violent than interpreted as a tantrum zone, where we all safely militant protesters have engaged are simply
any of the historical movements praised. cry and scream ourselves to exhaustion. If our the renaming of everyday, petty crimes. Tagging
In the days after a protest, the arguments anguish and sorrow expresses itself too clearly, becomes political sloganeering, trespass becomes
are worn thin; there is a constant back and if we totter away from the designated route – we an occupation, vandalism becomes economic
forth over definitions of property, violence, are all contained. The police know we will calm disruption. This is why the right-wing press so
thuggery, intimidation and tactics. The story-line down; but they wrongly assume we will accept that easily brands them as acts of hooligans, yobs and
is static. But what really lies thin on the ground mummy and daddy may have been right all along. vandals. But we should have no need to legitimise
is strategy. This is because the liberal discourse Increasingly, those in anti-cuts groups are our actions within the state-approved categories of
is not concerned with strategies for change but viewing political protest and resistance as a matter politics or disorder.
with spectacles of increase. A hundred thousand of freedom, not rights. Our freedom to protest Crime so defined will not on its own bring an
mooning op-eds pass for a political culture. through the streets cannot be curtailed, and will end to the wage relation, but it is already political,
True strategies for change are uninterested in not be bartered away in meetings at Congress because wherever it is performed, it opens our
contributing to the range of intellectual consumer House between the Metropolitan Police and a TUC eyes to the institutional lineaments of capitalism.
goods vended from a rack. We all know the correct stewarding operation. We won’t seek permission Close those eyes and the dream of ‘jobs, growth
strategies of resistance: the disruption of the to protest in the ways we wish to. The rights that and justice’ continues. If we are forced to choose
economy either by attack or withdrawal. But these curtail our freedom of protest are exactly those between associating ourselves with hooligans or
strategies are unsurprisingly not endorsed by the we wish to abolish, because they are the natural politics then, so long as Ed Milliband represents
bourgeois media, which, as it smears its blood accompaniment and support to the institutions we politics, we should firmly choose hooliganism.
and soil over its news and comment pages, does protest against.
more than any other social institution to promote Others have recently, and encouragingly, 7. Policing
the kind of authoritarian personality upon which demonstrated their consciousness of inherent As the glass was cracked on Oxford Street, the
fascism has historically relied. political freedom. At Town Halls across the state stepped in, in a blaze of violent glory, ready
Opening the Sunday papers, “ordinary people” country the mark of the institutionalised liberal to save our national pride, our royal grocers and
were informed that their moment to be heard had philosophy that the TUC exhibits has been on (our hearts swell with gratitude) our Olympic
been usurped. Whose fault was this? It was due to show. Councillors, when passing cuts budgets, have Clock. With tactics devised in the heat of colonial
the actions of a ‘tiny fraction’ of violent protesters. set out small seating areas, limited questions, and oppression, the police coerce, bruise, break, lie,
A small group of individuals, many of them already allotted time for people to appear before them and taunt and corner. When they cannot, they coax,
facing charges, are singled out and declared to petition their mercy. Many residents however have wheedle and arrest.
be culpable for the continued suppression of the recognised this fraudulent view of their freedom But of the 200 odd who were arrested, almost
exploited majority. Thus spake liberalism, with all and have refused to play along, in the same way three-quarters were taken for an occupation where
the reciprocity of the master baker kneading his that the black bloc did not play along on March no windows were broken, and where little stock
dough into the tray. 26th. was stolen. Why? The strategy of the police is
The TUC, meanwhile, colluded in this narrative, When, at town halls, people have found their determined principally by the interests of capital.
not only blaming the ‘violent minority’ but way blocked by nervous-looking officials, or more The protesters at Fortnum and Masons required
lamenting the loss of media attention on the frequently by the police, there has not been talk heavy treatment because the economic damage
demonstration. As if it weren’t enough that those of local people’s ‘rights’: there has been action. done to that shop was greater than a smashed
who wished to march were to do so under such Doors are banged and council chambers occupied. window (even if it took 100 people instead of one
meaningless slogans, and that they were obliged Whether storming council chambers is effective as or two). The mass arrest shows that it is not the
to accept the platitudes thrown down at them by a tactic is not the salient point. What is important protest tactic of violence or non-violence that
politicians so far removed from the twin horrors is that people come collectively to define their matters to capital, but the contours of economic
of wage labour and capitalist unemployment, entitlements, in direct refutation of the dissuasive damage.
the greatest insult was yet to come: the TUC’s invocation of economic rights. On Saturday The idea that businesses lose out significantly