Dundee Day 3 part 2

by Ruth Barker, 22 Oct 2010

I was cut off! I think my Day 3 posting was too long.

Here is the remainder.

apologies,

R.

David Harding: So why are we in this situation? How can we change the political attitude to culture generally? We can compare what’s happening today with the spending review with what happened in Sweden in the 1980s. There, even though they were in a situation of financial poverty, it would have been politically untenable to cut arts budgets. It was seen as a time to increase funding for the arts. That could not happen here.

David Harding

Edwin: Do artists have a new role to take on, as politicians? After all, the role of the artist shifts as culture as a whole shifts.

Jason: We need to think about ways to store knowledge. What is the role of the curator in public art commissioning? After all, there are very different kinds of expertise involved, as well as multiple stakeholders, who have to come together around a fantasy of something that does not yet exist.

David Harding: I think that the Royston Road project with Lucy Byatt (see Lucy’s presentation from Day 2 in posting below), is a good example of best practice.

David Watt: How was that project funded?

Graham Fagen: It received European Regeneration funding.

David Harding: Ah, because of the poisoned soil sites and so on [Nb. Please see David’s Comment below, for details of this].

Jenny Crowe: Actually the European Regeneration money went into the physical infrastructure work on site in Royston. The artists’ residencies were funded by the Scottish Arts Council.

Susan Christie: I think it’s important to come back to that idea of bad public art. We skirt around it, and avoid talking about the bad examples in enough depth to learn from them. Until we do, we’re missing a big part of the picture.

Jason: It’s interesting that Scotland is vanguarded for its artists, but it seems to fail in the public art sector. Why does anyone think this might be?

Neil: Scotland is such a small country. Instead of lobbying, we should just get involved directly in politics. We can’t be atomised. There is currently an assault on Scottish culture by a Tory government in Westminster. We should be asking the big questions about what is public life? What is public property? What is public policy?

Jason: Policies comes and go in cycles, and those cycles are determined by Government, They are party political.

Neil: We need independent people in government to represent us.

Chris Fremantle: I’ve noticed that most public art projects we hold up as good examples are ones initiated by artists – Royston Road is a notable exception. I’m aware that we’re in danger on conflating lots of different kinds of practice under one ‘public art’ heading. We need to expand our lexicon. We need to be aware that the possibilities for a project are different depending on who you are. We need to develop the specificity of our lexicon to be able to better describe and convey those possibilities.

Unknown Contributor (let me know who you were!): I’m not convinced we should concentrate on bad examples. There is an invisibility of excellence, an unawareness of the best projects. When I came into public art, from a background in gallery curating where I had far more control, I thought of my role as being one of ‘damage limitation.’
We will never get rid of bad public art because we will never get rid of bad art. The idea of public juries [as proposed by Venu] is frightening! We know what that kind of X Factor process creates. We need to lobby for excellence so that we don’t loose what we already have – a legacy of good practice that extends back to the 70s. We need to raise the level. We can’t have a hierarchical system even if artists are at the top of that hierarchy. We can’t have artists commissioning architects for example, we have to find models for experts to work together.
We have a responsibility to raise the general level of understanding around public art so that people can demand excellence from projects.

David Harding: Look at some of the projects in Gateshead as an example.

Judith (sorry, I don’t know your surname): In the northeast [of England] there are many great examples of projects, partly because there are a great many engaged and talented people, but there is also Locus+, which has been very influential.

Ross: Going back to the importance of the political landscape, we can see exactly how important art is seen to be by the way that the position of culture minister is just a revolving door that people pass through on their way down.

Ross Sinclair

David Butler: When you’re talking about the northeast as an example, you should recognise that Gateshead has a very rare legacy of a post war left wing council who saw culture as a product of the people. The area is still reaping the benefits of that uncommon heritage.

Not Sure Who: The language of public benefit is significant. How do we articulate what we’re doing in the language of public benefit?

Hilary Nicol (I think? Apologies if this wasn’t you): I get asked about public benefit all the time You have to talk about histories. The projects that survive in our memories, and in our histories of practice, are the ones that are excellent.

David Butler: Do people feel confident in saying that? Or are we, to a degree, atomised?

David Butler

Jason: But I’m not only interested in knowledge transfer. I also want to know about knowledge generation. We’re not even close to talking about wisdom yet!

David Harding: Is that question of ‘public benefit’ asked in the Netherlands as well?

Edwin: Yes, but it’s asked in a different way. Language is important because you do need to know the language of the people you’re dealing with. That’s why we need an agency, and research, and data. We have to be more savvy. But artists have better things to do than to spend their time learning these languages – they need to be making their work. That’s why it’s the role of an agency to learn these languages instead.