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Dateline: 23rd February, 2003 Ambitions for the Arts Arts Council England's Manifesto 2003- 2006 Arts Council England is the national development agency for the arts. Between 2003 and 2006 we will invest £2 billion of public funds in the arts in England, including funding from the National Lottery.
Our focus is on growth in the arts. Since 2000, we have won significant new funding for the arts from the Government and we have carried out a radical reform of our organisation. Now we are ready to take the initiative and embark upon a new era of expansion for the arts in England.
Our central belief is in the transforming power of the arts: power to change the lives of people throughout the country.
Our ambition is no less than to place the arts at the heart of national life, reflecting the country’s rich and diverse cultural identity as only the arts can.
We want people throughout England to experience arts activities of the highest quality. We believe that access to the arts goes hand in hand with excellence.
To achieve this, Arts Council England will:
We will:
Our headlines for investment
Arts organisations that receive regular investment from us are the foundation of the arts in this country. They lead in artistic innovation and experimentation, and many achieve world-class standards. They must also demonstrate the highest standards of management and governance. We will help them develop a highly skilled and motivated workforce and bring on the talented arts managers of the future.
Cultural diversity is at the heart of England’s identity as a nation in the early 21st century and is central to our work. We are increasing our funding for culturally diverse arts and taking positive steps to change the employment profile, governance and activities of both the Arts Council and the arts organisations we fund, so that we and they embody diversity.
Young people are a priority for us. Creative Partnerships is our major initiative to introduce young people to professional arts activities at school and to reinforce and celebrate the value of creativity in learning. We will turn this successful pilot into a mainstream, long-term activity.
Growth for the arts is our major ambition. As the national body for the arts in England, our voice will be strong and clear. The arts are packed with ‘good news’ stories and it is our task to make sure they are heard. We will ‘grow’ our people, improve our facilities, strengthen and broaden our existing partnerships and identify new resources for the arts. We will market the arts so that the case for increased public funding for the arts in future is even stronger.
The financial case for the arts is being won with Government. Now we have the investment we need to turn our ambitions into action We will take a contemporary, international approach to the arts. We will promote our artists internationally, encourage international exchange and co-production, and do all we can to ensure that audiences and artists in this country benefit from the best of the arts from outside the UK. We will argue that being involved with the arts can have a lasting and transforming effect on many aspects of people's lives. This is true not just for individuals, but also for neighbourhoods, communities, regions and entire generations, whose sense of identity and purpose can be changed through art. We will create more opportunities for people to experience and take part in life-changing artistic experiences, through:
We believe that access to the arts goes hand in hand with artistic excellence. Participation, contribution and engagement in the arts are the bridge between access and excellence. That bridge is especially crucial in a society which is itself subject to ongoing change: more culturally and ethnically diverse; more educated and informed but also more distracted and cacophonous. Placing artists at the centre We can do this indirectly through training, legislative change, or in stimulating the economy for artists. Or we might provide direct assistance through more funding, or help with spaces to work, with equipment, time, or travel and opportunities for international exchanges. We believe artists, at times, need the chance to dream, without having to produce. We will establish ways to spot new talent; we will find ways to help talent develop; we will encourage artists working at the cutting edge; we will encourage radical thought and action, and opportunities for artists to change direction and find new inspiration. Our relationship with arts organisations We are looking for a new, grown-up relationship with arts organisations; one that is based on trust, not dependency. We will expect hopes, aspirations and problems to be shared openly with us. We consider this new relationship to be fundamentally important to the future of the subsidised arts. Arts organisations provide the foundation for the arts in this country. Because of this, these organisations must play a leadership role in terms of artistic innovation and experimentation, as well as in how they are managed and governed. They are crucial to all our priorities and we will ask them to make a major contribution to our ambitions in cultural diversity. At the same time, we will not ask them to take on any agendas that are not consistent with their fundamental purpose and ambition. We want to lighten rather than add to their burden. We want a new relationship with arts organisations based on mutual trust. We have changed, and will change more, but they must also. We will be fair in what we expect of organisations. We will help provide training for their employees and we will help to produce more cultural managers and leaders for the future. We will help organisations make the most of their capacity, but we will not ask them to do more than their funding allows. In return, we expect arts organisations to be open and clear in their
dealings with us. We expect them to be well managed and to deliver using
our investment. We want them to thrive and not just survive. But we
will exercise the right to withdraw our investment from those who repeatedly
mismanage or fail to deliver. Cultural diversity We want cultural diversity to be a central value in our work, running through all our programmes and relationships. The term 'cultural diversity' can be interpreted in many different ways. We will take the broadest interpretation - as meaning the full range and diversity of the culture of this country - but with a particular focus on race and ethnic background. We can achieve much in cultural diversity through persuasion, illustration and by identifying and sharing good practice. But we also need to take positive action if we are to share our riches and achieve greater equality of opportunity. We will at the very least make more funding available specifically for culturally diverse arts. We will also take steps to change the employment profile, governance and activities of both the Arts Council and the funded arts sector. The arts and young people Creative Partnerships can bring about profound change in how education relates to the arts and vice versa. We will give it a very high priority, evaluate it thoroughly and we will do all we can to turn it from a pilot into a mainstream activity. We want to see the same principle - putting people and high quality artists and art together to create transforming experiences - applied to other sectors and ages. Given the significant growth in the population in the 50-plus age group in the next decade, we would like to explore initiatives that apply the Creative Partnerships principle to that age group. Growth in resources for the arts Without compromising our main purpose - the arts - we will make the most of growth by establishing healthy and effective partnerships with a range of national, regional and local organisations. Nationally, these include government departments for health, education, trade & industry, and the Home Office as well as agencies such as the Youth Justice Board and national broadcasters. Regionally and locally, these include regional development agencies, regional government, regional government offices, local strategic partnerships, regeneration agencies and, of course, local authorities. We will draw up a plan for growth nationally and regionally, with some clear and challenging targets. We will place added emphasis on marketing and communicating the value of the arts. This will include marketing of the 'transforming power' of the arts - all the arts, not just the arts we fund - and more specific marketing, for example, in relation to new opportunities to raise extra resources for the arts. A modern, dynamic Arts Council We will form project teams to drive forward new programmes with clear goals, drawing on people across the organisation. Overall, we will improve our operational performance and responsiveness, for example through our much simplified grants for the arts. In summary, we believe that the new Arts Council will be able to:
Arts Council England will be bold and set ambitious targets in order to maximise these advantages. Where there are major gains to be made, we will take risks and encourage the arts community to take risks. In the past, the Arts Council had many policies and strategies. Now we have this manifesto. It states clearly what we want to do and replaces other general policy statements. Now is the time for action. How we will measure our success
We invite artists, organisations, partners and colleagues to join us in this bold adventure.
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