Via The Stage, what arts funding should have priority? The (UK) All-Party Parliamentary Group on Wellbeing Economics has released a report recommending that changes in the wellbeing of individuals ought to be the central concern of policy, beyond calculations of narrower economic measures such as are at the core of standard cost-benefit analysis. They have striking recommendations for arts policy.
First, about wellbeing economics. In essence, the leading economic indicators we see reported most commonly have obvious effects on wellbeing. We are better off with employment and stable income than being unemployed and in poverty. But there are many aspects of wellbeing not captured in the headline statistics: health, social connection, political empowerment, the beauty of the natural and built environment. Sometimes the headline number matters more than is reported: long-term unemployment has many negative effects on wellbeing beyond the loss of income, for example. Finally, and importantly, measuring gross income or unemployment rates fails to capture the effects of inequality, most pointedly because extra income going to the poor matters much more for total wellbeing than the same amount of extra income going to the already well-off.
What are the findings for arts policy? Two important ones. First, arts participation – actually doing something – matters much more for happiness and wellbeing than simply being a member of an audience. Taking 100 people to a dance matters more for wellbeing than taking 100 people to the theatre. Second, arts participation has a larger effect in poorer, isolated areas than when directed at the well-off. Overall, the Report calls for much more targeted expenditures, and the report as a whole asks all government departments to report on how they believe spending initiatives will affect well-being.
The Report is well-presented, avoiding overreach or grandiose claims about the benefits of arts participation, which is so often about people simply enjoying themselves.
What about ‘art for art’s sake’? There is no such thing. Art is for people, and the question at hand is ‘which people?’ There are art forms whose main impact is on other artists, on elites, on larger audiences, on small audiences who might be rich or poor but who have a special connection to the genre, or on future generations (when it comes to conservation of objects and traditions). But it is always about somebody, and public funding of the arts always has to begin with a good sense of who that ‘somebody’ is.
To anticipate a response: would this mean the end of public funding for opera? Not necessarily. But it does force the question of the desired outcome of the spending – who is it for, and how do they benefit? Arts policy cannot avoid the question.
Personal footnote: My parents are Scottish. I was raised in Vancouver, where they had emigrated, and I grew up listening to Jimmy Shand records. They told me when they themselves were teenagers they would go to dances in their home (small) towns many nights a week. They said those were very happy times, and in Canada they would host parties where their Scottish friends would come over, they would dance to the records until all hours, and in the morning would lament that we reserved Canadians did not know how to have fun. Funny what memories come to mind after reading a Parliamentary report!
Michael, Historically, the term “art for art’s sake” or it’s original “”L’art pour l’art” never referred to an absence of people or the question of WHO is art for. It;s not about art being for elitists as opposed to the general public. Rather it refers to WHAT art is about. It was a slogan to rally against the belief that art needed to server religion or politics or some didactic reasoning. Saying that art was for art’s sake was a way to say that art was free from past constraints. Artists are free to be what ever they want to be, free to reach new heights and go places people before never dreamed of. And the public benefits the most when artists are free to create the new and the unique.
Saying that art now has to follow the directives dictated by funding sources seems to be a step backward for art. It’s saying that art can no longer be about the intrinsic values of art but now must serve the needs of what someone else dictates. That’s not good.
Richard, Thank you for your comment, your point on the meaning of ‘art for art’s sake’ is well taken.
I do not believe art must follow the directives of funding sources. But *funded* art is different – when any arts council makes a grant to an organization or for a one-off project it will, rightly, be asking whether the funds are going to something that has been identified as contributing to the goals of the council and the people it represents. Different funding bodies in different places, at different times, will have different ideas about what those goals ought to be, and we can see the variety across the landscape of public arts councils, foundations, and private donors. Sometimes the priority will be based upon the excellence of the art as art, and sometimes there will be social goals, which themselves comprise a variety of possibilities. We can debate what those priorities and goals ought to be. Directing public funds to organizations and artists on the sole criterion of artistic excellence as judged by peers in the art world is a possible way to go, but those who support such a direction need to be prepared to defend it with more rigour than I often see.
Well good luck finding a federal, state, or major foundational funding source today who isn’t requiring the directives of engagement or economic placemaking or prescribed community involvement.
Well-being and its causes are far too complex for us to make simple conclusions about how to fund the arts. The difficulty is that we might assume that the relationship between art and well-being is based on natural law. Natural law determines our fondness for sweets, bacon, and comfortable clothing, but the reception of art is far more complicated. The ways art affects our well-being derives from social constructs created by countless factors of our communal environment.
The best-selling classical music CD last week sold 278 copies. Meanwhile, country starlet Taylor Swift’s album “Red” sold 3.1 million copies in just 10 weeks in 2012 – one million in the first week alone.
Is Ms. Swift appealing to natural laws of well-being? Or does she benefit from a massive industry that shapes our tastes and sense of well-being with the objective of profit? What role does marketing play in our sense of what well-being is? Are education and intelligent behavior factors in well-being? If so, would arts education also play a role in well-being?
The form of music known as the blues is deeply profound. Did black people create and listen to the blues because they were happy? Is it possible that our ideas about the creation and reception of art and well-being might end up being simplistic and reductive?
Hi Michael,
thanks for this post–and for the revelations of the Shand variety! I love the idea that 100 people at a dance has a greater impact than 100 at the theatre–does raise embodiment for me as a musicologist as well as the more straightforward value of participation. Also, how do we measure belonging? Any thoughts? Thanks for the blog, keep up the interesting work
all the best,
Simon McKerrell.
Hi Simon, Thank you for reading and for your kind words. Measuring belonging, or well-being in general, is done subjectively, i.e. most studies simply ask people about whether their lives are going well, about how many friends they talk to or see regularly, getting together with others, and the like – this was the essence of the wave of interest in Robert Putnam’s book ‘Bowling Alone’ some years ago, that social isolation led to many bad outcomes, in terms of unhappiness, higher crime, and worse politics (people who engage with others regularly are also more likely to care about politics and take part). I’m not an expert in this, though many good sociologists are, and look forward to reading more along these lines.
A very interesting post, and issue. One of my students last year suggested that the best way to support artists was to have a guaranteed minimum annual income; his theory was that artists would take the opportunity to make art, and that even slackers would get bored of slacking after a few months and would then turn their attention to doing — something, anything — which would likely help the society. And, in theory, crime would drop due to less desperation. “Wellbeing” seems consonant with that.
On another portion of your post: I’m increasingly uncomfortable with the notion that public funding means benefit to some imagined public as a whole. We are putting art and arts organizations to tests of popularity that are wholly inappropriate to advancing anything artistically. If publicly funded art has to serve “the taxpayers” (often the crankiest of these), and privately funded art serves the interest of corporations and wealthy donors, where’s the avenue for art that dares? Pre-culture wars, organizations proudly sent the NEA their most daring projects; today, the reverse is likely true. I think we’re feeling the effects of this in artistic stagnation on a lot of fronts.