C102
Article
Bridge over troubled water
Troubled
times may have set an unruly background to arts funding
in Northern Ireland over the past decades, but so
too have official attitudes. Brian Ferran sketches
the history, problems and
possibilities.
|
|
|
Ormeau
Bath Gallery, interior view; courtesy OBG
|
Throughout the civilized
world, endorsement of artists and arts activity is
deemed essential for the health, well-being and self-esteem
of any community. Citizens can, in various ways, show
their approval of and support for the arts but the
greatest responsibility for arts provision is vested
in elected representatives. Commitment is expressed
in spending levels and unfortunately the arts budget
in Northern Ireland has never merited priority in
public spending. During the past thirty years of political
turbulence it was inevitable that housing, job creation,
upgrading the infrastructure, education, health and
security were priorities. The arts rarely figured
on the list. Despite this, much has been achieved
with modest budgets by a determined Arts Council which,
of necessity, looked to the 'long-haul'.
Since 1943, the Council for
the Encouragement of Music and the Arts and its successor
the Arts Council of Northern Ireland have been the
government conduits for delivery of finance to artists
and arts organisations. For almost sixty years, with
diligence and care, both distributed resources which
have been consistently inadequate to meet genuine
community needs and entitlements. Positioned between
the arts community and government, it has resulted
in accusations of unfairly treating clients. These
allegations were inevitable when demand for resources
so outstripped supply. The resulting acrimonious public
exchanges have regrettably retarded realisation of
many aspirations of the arts community. In the years
before the formation of the Forum for Local Government
and the Arts in the 1990s, the Arts Council operated
through a network of volunteers in each local community,
and in the 1960s and early 1970s local authorities
were numerous. These voluntary local enthusiasts represented
each of the main art disciplines - music, drama and
the performing arts - and spearheaded resistance to
prevailing philistinism. Most local district and borough
councils made only token contributions to the coffers
of the arts and some made no contribution at all.
At the time, debates in local council chambers on
the subject of contributing money or facilities to
the arts were hostile.
|
|
|
Brian
Ferran: To every cow, acrylic and sand
on canvas; courtesy the artist
|
Against this background the Arts
Council was compelled to move cautiously, perhaps
because many members and advisors were recruited from
local authorities. Arts developments were mainly initiated
after local consultation by the Arts Council. Typically,
when publicly owned or other historic buildings had
outlived the use for which they were designed and
needed new tenants, the arts were considered. Such
buildings were often of architectural importance,
so arts use was invoked to provide a justification
for conservation.
By contrast, sport and physical
recreation were differently treated, and for thirty
years from the mid-1960s to the mid-1990s, new sport
and physical-recreation facilities were constructed.
Building, maintaining and running these facilities
placed heavy demands on local rates and central tax
revenues, reducing resources for arts provision. It
came as no surprise when, in his 1994/95 analysis
of the Arts and the Northern Ireland Economy, John
Myerscough revealed that the population was underperforming
in its attendance and participation in the arts.
|
|
|
Sophie
Aghajanian: untitled, 1992;
courtesy Arts Council of Northern Ireland
|
In the1960s, government grant
aid was substantially below the UK per-capita average
and in earlier years it was even lower. Only once
in its sixty-year history did the grant to the Arts
Council of Northern Ireland reach the UK average.
Throughout the Arts Council's existence the arts have
been underfunded by government. Local authorities
have also consistently deprived the arts of vital
support. So, in this period, substantial and essential
investment in the arts was lost. Despite the recommendations
of three major independent reports commissioned by
government departments over a period of more than
twenty years, Northern Ireland remains the only region
of the British Isles without a dedicated art gallery
designed to show the community's historical and contemporary
art collections, host major touring exhibitions and
facilitate the needs of a growing local community
of practising visual artists and interested citizens.
In the early 1960s a Stormont
Minister of Finance dismissed approaches for the construction
of a dedicated art gallery on the basis that, in his
view, there was nothing of sufficient worth in public
ownership to justify such investment. While the arts
were never adequately funded by the Stormont administration,
they gained little when Westminster assumed control.
The difference between Labour and Conservative administrations
was negligible. In the late 1970s Lord Melchett, the
Labour Minister responsible at the Northern Ireland
Office, made a special allocation of £100,000 for
community arts with a promise of more to come. The
Arts Council embarked optimistically on a programme,
but no more money arrived. Expectations were raised
and dashed. This disappointment coincided with the
Arts Council's acquisition and restoration of the
Belfast Grand Opera House. Ownership and renewal was
achieved through special government grants totalling
£3 million made for the purpose of saving the Grand
Opera House. Re-opening was scheduled for September
1980. Earlier that year the De Lorean Motor Company
encountered financial difficulties and needed a government
bale-out. Before embarking on the proposal, Government
had commissioned an evaluation from Arthur Anderson
Consultants. So the Arts Council was required to hand
back £150,000 from its meagre budget. This amount
was allocated to run the Grand Opera House programme
for a year. Budget cuts were applied across all art
forms and the Opera House opened as planned and subsequently
became a revitalizing force in Belfast's city centre.
The De Lorean Motor Company collapsed.
|
|
|
Lucy
Tumer, Bye bye blackbird III, 1996;
courtesy Arts Council of Northern Ireland
|
The Conservatives came to
power and amongst the best disposed to the Arts was
the Belfast-born Education Minister Dr Brian Mawhinney.
He brought the budget for the first and only time
in 1989/90 to per-capita parity with the UK. Nevertheless
it was still substantially below both Scotland and
Wales. He also introduced a special budget to promote
a cultural profile of Northern Ireland in North America.
His motives were questioned by some, but it brought
optimism and new money to the arts. It was an enlightened
strategy. Shortly after Mawhinney's departure, the
Department of Education for Northern Ireland terminated
the cultural-profile-abroad allocation.
Since its introduction. the
Arts Lottery has made a significant difference to
the entire arts environment. It has delivered four
times the amount of money initially expected by government
and has brought hitherto unimaginable benefit to the
arts building programme, like the new theatres in
Derry and Armagh and the Burnavon Arts Centre in Cookstown.
In the construction of an arts infrastructure we have
come a long way since the 1960s, when outside of Belfast,
Armagh and Derry, exhibitions, for example, were presented
on temporary display screens mounted upstairs in small
town halls. However we still have a long way to go
to catch up with Glasgow, Dublin, Liverpool, Cardiff
and numerous cities and regions elsewhere.
Brian Ferran is an
artist; he was formerly Director of the Arts Council
of Northern Ireland.
