Tuesday 5 March 2024

A world of words

From the moment we’re born, how we relate to each other and to the world around us depends so so much on what we hear and what and how we say it. The sounds we make as children and how we relate them to our parents for example shows a striking commonality the world over. The evolution of language for a person and even a species stretches so far beyond back... back beyond our knowing, beyond our remembering and it is of course intriguing. The striking similarities of sounds that we make in early infancy that offer us comfort (the m and d sounds of mum and dad) are shared by a multitude of highly diverse cultures across the globe.

The development of our social bonds helped determine the accompanying development of our language. How we speak and what we say has always mattered, to bind us, as family groups, tribes and peoples. So that arc of language development and creativity takes us from prehistory right through to today. The nuance of the noises we make and the ideas we transmit within them is more ancient than any history. 

The ancient inhabitants of this island have been finding ways to speak locally to our immediate peers, but also more regionally to our fellow tribes for over 30 millennia. As our interactions became deeper through our ability to travel more easily, we developed more ways to communicate more diversely. And with the later formalisation of writing and reading, we strike a crucial moment in our developmental story, so much later on than our aural linguistic traditions. But we never stopped singing when we started writing.

If we think that only for some 5,000 years have we been reading and writing as a species, isn’t it astonishing the progress that we have made since? And not just the notation of words but of thoughts and ideas in the sciences as well as the arts, that describe phenomena not just of this world, but around very distant suns. 

The ancient art of writing came to Ireland long after cuneiform was developed in ancient Mesopotamia but with the development of Ogham, we not only see the emergence of writing but its interaction of music, art and intercultural connection with neighbouring lands and of course with Christianity. At the same time, on neighbouring shores, ancient Celtic languages vied with Latin and later Germanic and later still French. 

And in all this time, the words we use, the ideas we transmit, the promises we make, have become so embedded in our culture that we almost take them for granted - the promissory notes that translate to money, that has given way to the tap of a card; the bargains and contracts of handshakes and scribed onto vellum that today we enter into every time we click “accept” on our smartphones. 

The sheer weight of words now that we encounter everywhere, everyday can be overwhelming. The Internet contains trillions upon trillions of words, in the mechanics of the software and the screeds of communications. But in all this, there are words that we recognise universally that mean more to all of us, that we have written about for aeons, that reverberate through our own lives and the lives of all people since the dawn of civilisation: Love, Peace, Freedom, Truth and Home. These central ideas continue to hold the most profoundly important place in our writings. They underpin so much of what makes us all who we are. They make up the vast bulk of our writings, ancient and modern. They are the ideas behind the words that have drawn writers to offer their thoughts, poets to offer their verse and philosophers to provide insight, down through the ages. And they continue to be so utterly part and parcel of who we are and how far we’ve come. 

 So this week, if you happen to be celebrating World Book Day along with millions of others, don’t just revel in the diversity of books and the joy our children derive from them; but instead take a moment to recognise the power of creativity, evolution, history and ideals that has forged our human development until this moment and to celebrate the good fortune to enjoy those core themes of Love, Peace, Freedom, Truth and Home if we can, and then recognise the plight of so many across the world who cannot in these immensely troubled times. 



(Dedicated to David George Turkington RIP) 

Monday 5 February 2024

Spring into Action

 
As February begins, opportunities must be seized. As we note a hopeful change in the seasons and the arrival of our newest government executive, Spring may well be the time of plans and projects, but we all know spring weather is never consistent.  (I've come over all Chance the Gardener* it seems.)

Our individual and collective creative endeavours must be tended to and stewarded carefully over the months and indeed years ahead. So, the DUPs Gordon Lyons now carries much of the high level responsibility for that stewardship as he becomes minister in charge of the Department for Communities, which in turn of course, has statutory responsibility for arts, culture and heritage in our corner of the world.
 
After two years lacking very much progress on the latest programme for government (around the arts or anything else) and a dozen years and more, where the only constant was standing still, this new incumbent will have a lot in his intray as political commentators are apt to quip. If we are relying on old adminsitrative metaphors, to the exclusion of digital efficiencies, then I hope we don’t regress any further given the debate about our postal services...
 
The years of funding our arts to a standstill and then watch them wither, serves no one’s interests. And when a corollary to this underinvestment is the impact on the young to actually engage in the arts, something is badly wrong. Last week, the celebrated culture magus, Melvyn Bragg, drew the House of Lords attention to the fact that education is key to change and "can lead us to a new state of the arts" but that uptake in GCSE music has dropped from 50,000 entrants in 2009 to 29,000 in 2022. Can a contemporary society afford to see its creative future reduce by half and still expect to cultural and creative output not to suffer? The Creative Industries of the UK are reaping the rewards for a generation of earlier investment by a previous UK government. And here, we surely have even more reason to see beyond the immediate and imagine a creative, collaborative future of diversity and dynamism, rather than dysfunction, deminishment and decay.  If this place, half way into the second decade of the 21st century cannot see what so much of the world has seen, that arts, culture and heritage actually mean more to people than trophies, symbolism and codification and matter far more to our physical, mental and emotional health and wellbeing and to carving out new futures filled with flourishing careers and creative ambition, how can we make it clearer? I suspect only by repeating our arguments, year after year and pointing to the abundant evidence - and of course, telling the stories of how the arts transform peoples lives.

So, with that in mind and with a few months still to go, the Arts Council of Northern Ireland is seeking consultative responses to its strategy to support those creative benefits and that ambition. 
It’s a rather muted document, carefully tempering expectation with the experience of the last dozen years still reverberating, but also ever-hopeful the seedlings that we so prize do indeed find fertile ground. But given, by its own (I’d say conservative) calculation ACNI reckons we need an additional £23m pa to support the sector and align us to our closest budgetary counterparts in these islands ( ie Wales, where each citizen receives £5.28 more than we do per capita every year) , anticipating anything like that from this new “Assembly Spring” may well be far too optimistic, even for those whose careers are to make the imagined become real (I'm referring to artists here, not politicians obviously). As the chair and chief executive of ACNI opine in unison, "it is a regrettable truth that government investment in the arts sector in Northern Ireland has not always matched the incredible potential and impact it holds".
 
Still, the strategy represents a future for the arts. I'd urge you, if it merits your support or you think it’s deserves some further spade-work, just follow the link here and respond. https://artscouncil-ni.org/resources/strategy-2024-2034

Further opportunities spring

 

And, a word for the Anne O’Donoghue award (hosted by CAP and funded by the aforementioned Arts Council of Northern Ireland) which closes applications this week. If any arts manager or administrator in the community/health/youth or participatory arts sector can carve out the headspace for making an application to this award, it may well be incredibly worthwhile. With a maximum award of £5k on offer;

  • is there a project that can be dreamed up where you're mentored by some arts guru with practical and inspirational thoughts and ideas to help re-potentialise your career? 
  • Is your organisation in transition (is there an organisation that isn’t?) where real in-depth advice and guidance would prove to be invaluable?; 
  • are there areas of development where you’d really appreciate a deeper understanding or a helping hand?; 
  • Is there a programme or two out there, in the big wide world, with which you’d love to work to extend your own ideas but just never afforded yourself the time, headspace or indeed, the cash? 
If you can answer yes to any or all these questions, then you need to get familiar with the guidance and get writing this application right away. The link is here and it closes on Friday, 9th February - ie this Friday

So, while Hope may not spring eternal here, at least Spring does indeed offer opportunities ... it’s time to start digging again. 
 
 
 
*if you havent seen 'Being There" or read the book, I suggest you enjoy this timeless classic.

Tuesday 2 January 2024

2024 - a legacy year in the making

It is utterly amazing and perplexing how the time flies. It seems like only yesterday that I was doing songwriting workshops in various locations in Belfast for an organisation wanting to support real change in my home city - New Belfast Community Arts Initiative. 

But of course, one cursory glance in a mirror and the realisation that indeed that was almost a quarter of a century ago is all too vivid. 

But, the time I believe (and indeed, the evaluations show) has indeed been well-lived.

24 years ago, on December 22nd 1999, our patron Martin Lynch established this organisation as the Belfast child of the Community Arts Forum. Of course in 2011 through the merger of CAF and New Belfast, a new organisation was born... Community Arts Partnership that now serves the whole region and indeed beyond.
 
Over the course of all those years there have been many trials and tribulations, not least the untimely loss of our good friend and music champion Geoff Harden in 2006, to whom we have dedicated our music studios. We have seen other friends and colleagues battle hard against disease, some winning and some unfortunatly losing that battle. Ill-health can be so hard to endure and so indiscriminate in its impact. And of course, for many of those we serve, their health status has left them more vulnerable to a society that more and more only seems to care for winners. The relationship between poverty and ill-health is so clear and well-documented and yet, for so many in N Ireland, we see public support for the vulberable and the disadvantaged constantly reduce over the last 25 years. Now, we see public services under almost daily existential threat. The harsh Darwinian realities of life are all too often too real today - where has the social contract to protect the weakest and most vulnerable gone, amidst all the squabbling and wrangling, the pettiness and hubris? 

But, some organisations have managed to survive the turmoil of constant cuts to arts and cultural funding over the last 15 or so years, and these surviving organisations, like the people they support, may yet have a longer timeframe to realise their strengths, pursue their dreams, and leave a legacy. And these reflections offer us greater freedom to be who one wants to be, express oneself, and choose what is personally meaningful. Will you support us to take advantage of new possibilities for leading a more fulfilling life?... because engaging in community arts can do just that.

As we enter our 25th year of operation, we renew our offer hope and ambition for better days ahead, through connecting community and creativity. 

I never dreamt that in encouraging community groups and individuals to write songs and express their innermost dreams that I would be here, directing this orgainsation almost 25 years later. And in this year of renewal and celebration, we will herald new strategic developments for this organisation; to not only recognise the legacy of those 25 years, but to build upon it and renew the basis for taking community arts forward into the next quarter of a century. We will be making a series of ground-breaking announcements and opening new possibilities over the weeks and months ahead. Do stay tuned.
 
 
So, I pay tribute (again) to all trustees, staff and freelance artists, volunteers and facilitators who have helped us reach this point and also to all our community hosts and partner organisations and centres of learning, thank you for the ongoing support and participation.
 
To you and all of them, to all our funders, especially our principal supporter, the Arts Council of Northern Ireland and to Belfast City Council with whom we have been a multi-annual client for over 20 of those years and indeed to all our colleagues and friends, we wish you a happy and healthy 2024 and we at CAP look forward to working with you and supporting you through dedicated community arts practice, advocacy and delivery for this year and the years ahead.
 
Mind yourselves
Conor
ceo CAP

 

 



    

    


Wednesday 22 December 2021

Happy birthday to us and a Merry Christmas and seasons greetings to you

22 years ago today, Martin Lynch established this organisation as the Belfast child of the Community Arts Forum. Of course in 2011 through the merger of CAF and New Belfast, a new organisation was born... Community Arts Partnership that now serves the whole region and indeed beyond.
 
Over the course of all those years there have been many trials and tribulations, not least the untimely loss of our good friend and music champion Geoff Harden in 2006, to whom we have dedicated our music studios. But these past couple of years have probably been among the most difficult for CAP and of course, for so many people across our sector and indeed our world. 
 
At this time of reflection as one year closes and another opens, the turbulence that we find in our lives has never been greater. On this, literally the darkest day of the year, we can only look forward to brighter days. We are anxious about our health in the face of a devastating global pandemic. We are concerned for our family, our friends, our jobs. We’ve missed so many opportunities and we’ve experienced terrible loss, made worse by restrictions designed to protect us all. We've seen anger and confusion turn to toxicity. We've seen division grow around questions of identity and belief. And amidst all this, amid the lockdowns and circuit breaks and pings on our phone, somehow we have struggled through. But we have all been changed for better or worse by the experience. The struggle for freelance artists and performers has been so acute - their world has been turned upside down and for many it has unbearable. As a creative community based organisation, we understand this and we've seen the wider impacts too... we have seen them reflected back to us in poetry, images and music. We have also seen how our sensitive and professional artist/facilitators have supported host groups and schools express their experience and the hope and ambition for better days ahead.
 
 CAP has radically altered the way we work in the past 22 months, how we engage with our community organisations and schools right across Northern Ireland and into the South and we have relied as ever on the good graces, the wisdom, the generosity and the creativity of our poets, our artists,  our filmmakers, project coordinators and host organisations that have done their level best to maintain creativity within our communities. Thank you each and every one of you.
 
I really want to express my gratitude to the CAP team, Gordon, Steven and Josh, taking turns to be in the office and keep information services and programmes open ; our board of trustees too who have met via zoom or conference call and kept the governance of the organisation going; all the project coordinators: Sally, Heather, Tracey, Carole and Shelley who have kept the projects moving.
 
To you and all of them, to all our funders, especially our principal supporter, the Arts Council of Northern Ireland and all our colleagues and friends, we wish you a happy and healthy holiday and look forward to working with you and supporting you through dedicated community arts practice, advocacy and delivery in 2022.
 
Stay safe
Conor
ceo CAP

 

 







Tuesday 22 December 2020

Birthday celebrations and thanks

Back in 1999 when the thing that people feared the most was the Millennium Bug which only was thought to affect our computers (but of course was seen as a doomsday scenario) who could’ve thought that 21 years later the whole world would have been so convulsed in such turmoil through a global coronavirus pandemic. When we think of those heady innocent millennial days when Martin Lynch had the clear sightedness to develop a community arts initiative that would link communities right across Belfast in fundamentally creative ways. Now, 21 years later, Community Arts Partnership is not so much celebrating its birthday as recognising the resilience of the artists and communities we serve, for whom these 2 decades have been far from easy. And today, we pay tribute to hundreds of thousands of people across our towns and cities, our villages and townlands, who are struggling against this massive upheaval and coping with pain, loss, loneliness and fear.

Everyone in our community has suffered in different ways; many have heard the plea from the arts sector but the community sector and indeed the organisations and populations that it supports, has been equally devastated. Of course, many industries have been decimated and many lives have been changed forever. Many friendships have struggled to be maintained against the divisive backdrop of coronavirus and the restrictions to contain it. And old divisions have surfaced, with anger and intolerance. But we have seen the Black Lives Matter movement address one of those fault lines in our world and we all hope for better days, beyond racism and sectarianism and fear. It was never acceptable for sectarianism, racism, sexism and hate to become so casual and pervasive. Just a few weeks ago, in a public forum, I experienced the casual sexism of others for the first time in this sector. A leader of another organisation threw a brickbat charged with sexist language without any remorse or apology. If this society is to grow, move on and build, especially in the difficult centenary year of 2021, then such causal dismissals of our neighbours need to stop. We need to focus on the real enemy in our midst – poverty, injustice and inequality and not waste our energy on the careless and the spiteful.

For now though, our thoughts are with the present struggles.

If life is to get back to normal and we all hope that this vaccine allows something like normality at least for a little while (before the next winter of COVID19 arrives) then we must re-dedicate ourselves to healing the divisions in our society: not just those between the two main traditions here but also the wide gulf between the powerful and the weak; between the wealthy and the impoverished; between the physically able and the disabled; between the young and the old. A vaccine will not change those determinedly entrenched difficulties in our society that have only been made worse through the pandemic but it will give us a platform to go out and re-engage and to actively address the problems that face our society and hopeful correct the course of our shared journey.

And of course there is no better way for our communities to repair, to respond, recover and renew themselves than through the expressive ability of the arts. Whether it’s coming up with a new plan for an area; reopening a community centre or a nursing home to visitors; a school that has been decimated through absence and sickness or a community that has seen too much loss over this past nine months, our ability to creatively build back and solves problems will see us through.

I would like to thank all those people who have been careful, sensitive, supportive and indeed perhaps even angry about just what is going on around Covid19 and its management here. We will need to question why certain things were done and what wasn’t but for now we can take some measure of consolation at Christmas, even though for many it will be an isolated, lonely time. Still, we know who our friends and family are and we are thankful that at least, we can talk to each other and see each other, albeit electronically.

21 years of New Belfast/Community Arts Partnership – 2021 also heralds the 36th anniversary of Community Arts Forum as well. I really want to thank the CAP team, Gordon and Steven who are taking turns to be in the office and keep information services and access open, our board of trustees too (Happy Birthday Carole) who have met via zoom or conference call and kept the governance of the organisation going; all the project coordinators: Sally, Heather, Tracey, Shelley who have kept the wheels turning on the creativity bus and Josh Schultz for his enthusiasm and energy in securing opportunities for the organisation.

I especially want to thank all those community groups and schools that are working as hard as they can developing creatively their skills and imaginations as we conclude 2020 and look forward to a happier, healthier 2021

I also want to thank the Arts Council of Northern Ireland, Belfast City Council, the Department for Communities, Social Enterprise Northern Ireland the Enkalon Foundation Northern Ireland for their consistent generosity and determination to support our mission and this sector through its darkest times. And I wish every artists and arts worker applying to the second round of the Emergency Funding for Individuals every success in securing some monies that might just soften the blow of a years lost earnings.

So, happy birthday New Belfast Community Arts Initiative and CAP and may I wish all our readers, participants, artists and volunteers, a safe and healthy holiday season and the happiest New Year that we can make it. Here’s to our future.

Take care

Stay safe

Get Creative.

Tuesday 15 September 2020

'The Scream' for resources from the arts

If anyone has ever looked at Munch's painting or a print of The Scream, they will understand that it communicates so much. The image conveys the depth of fear and anxiety and sheer incomprehension that the strange almost skeletal figure struggles with, while with standing starkly and forlornly in the foreground, on a platform jutting out from land, alone, bar two people with their back towards him. It is a picture that resonates with the immediacy of a threat, the anguish of the moment and the inadequacy of understanding how to respond to it.  For a great many people at this minute, in this crisis, we are screaming!

 

The arts community for so long has suffered an existential anxiety ("will we even survive?") but nothing at this level created by COVID-19 and the consequent necessity to close doors and shut up shop. But of course, exactly the same goes for the community that we serve. Not only the public, nor audiences, nor artists and workers, but the great bulk of small, local organisations, groups and schools that the arts, and in particular community arts, strive to support in creative and expressive ways year after year.  We are all experiencing a whole range of challenging circumstances and indeed ongoing anxiety and uncertainty. 

Much is consistently said about the resilience of the arts sector. Of course that's because for decades we have toiled without adequate investment and worked in a perilously underfunded area of the creative industries. That insecurity has impacted on many within the sector, but today, that anxiety is amplified to deafening levels, across so many organisations and their staff and freelance workers. This cannot be sustainable either on a personal nor indeed, organisational nor strategic level. And we have still have a long way to go before any optimistic notion of normality, never mind "new normal" emerges.  

This is an emergency not only for the arts but for our society as a whole. In terms of financial support, we have all understood that we have had an ongoing crisis in the arts, due to historical under-investment, but Covid 19 has further undermined our collective viability. Much has been made of how resilient the sector is but it has to be said again and again, that resilience comes from being exposed to challenges that are not overwhelming but with which we can actually cope. However, for a great many within our corner of the sector, the additional burdens and challenges related to the multi-layered impacts of Covid 19 pandemic may mean that this period of upheaval may overwhelm us all. 

In my opinion, the abject failure of an enterprise culture within the arts, predicated on growth and outputs, with only narrow notions of outcomes-focused research and output-focused accounting, has meant we are less able to meet the contemporary challenges of the impact of this pandemic. This has been remarkable and devastating. In the Republic of Ireland, a value for money argument is/was applied to paying artists during the pandemic, even though they could/can not actually carry out the work contracted for. It's understood that maintaining arts workers' incomes is strategically and structurally so important to the notion of 'national good' that it was mandated by funders, principally the southern Arts Council. In the North, I've heard such interventions written off immediately as 'welfare', insinuating that approach as wholly inappropriate to the prevailing government funding model. But what could be more appropriate than recognising the welfare of our arts community and its ability, if maintained, to continue to serve the public good? 

We need a new, radical focus for the narrative around the work that we do; ditching the old assumptions of competition, productivity and endless growth as currently (and perhaps always) bankrupt and instead focus on the production of development, health and wellbeing and mutual interdependence. This approach would allow us to embrace environmental and ecological benefit, see care as a positive feature of our economy, and recognise voluntarism as a powerful and valuable resource. For example, many feminist economists argue economics should be focused less on mechanisms like income and neo-liberal policies that constantly look to extract wealth and resource, and instead look to more emphasis on wellbeing and a multidimensional concept embracing income, health, education, empowerment and social status. Indeed, the arts do try (and should be encouraged further) to actively explore the direction of cultural, social and material dynamics of well-being much more deeply, amplifying the benefit of active participation in the arts (whether as a creative or participant) and more the more passive benefits of audiences. Government still doesn't get it. That has to change. Perhaps this is the moment?

And of course, much has been made of the eco-system of the arts here. Seen positively the creative ecology model does move away from industrial, discipline- centred understandings of the work of artists and arts organisations and instead places focus on the system of relationships and interdependent need present within and across the widest community. Such ecological thinking is currently being applied in many sectors as part of the search for more effective ways of analysing and responding to a context of rapid change and disruption, such as our current global pandemic.

And as such, an ecological response (or emergency measures) cannot be Darwinian, instead should focus on nurture and sensitive management, relating to the interconnectedness of our fragile eco-system in the arts. Ecology particularly seeks to learn about and understand the symbiosis within natural systems, as a mutual exchange of benefits that draws nutrients and energy from the environment while at the same time helping to sustain it in the process. Therefore creative ecology should be understood as an emerging concept in cultural policy that places the arts and creativity within a more including, holistic worldview and reveals interdependencies with economic, social, cultural and environmental systems, where society as a whole then benefits. Whatever quantum of emergency support the Assembly grants us, we should recognise this creative ecology as an active collective concept, not just a descriptor of people and organisations all working in a similar "field". If we are to build back better, we must understand and celebrate the different approaches, not just say our need is greater because we have lost more money!

I know many thoughtful people in the arts may well share these positive convictions, but we still work within a constrained template that has hardly altered in decades. This is not the fault of funders, far from it, but of our government's failure to understand us and support research and development in the arts to inform and embrace change. In a risk-averse policy culture, as we toil within here, the creativity of the arts can therefore undoubtedly be stifled. The bean counting culture misses the depth and breadth of what we do and how we do it.  

In the midst of this pandemic, it is clear that we all must adjust and improvise to survive. It is also abundantly clear that the losses incurred by shutting down our operational capacity to work has created a huge economic and cultural deficit that cannot be allowed to continue. That's why the emergency funding of £33m is so crucial - not just to plug the losses, but to give all of us a necessary platform to renew our range of practice and enable our community during this hour of need.

Of course, many, many arts organisations have leapt to digital solutions which offer some modicum of contact and can be used to present a range of work but it's just not the same. The restrictions of social distancing may seem at odds sometimes for theatres compared to bars and restaurants or private clubs. If the government has shut down so many sections of the arts, the government must protect them as result. As other industries have seen furloughs etc, but many artistic processes and performances shut down first and are still closed down and desperately need support. 

And we may not return to any normality for some time as we hope for a vaccine to be developed and if successful, to be widely available. When will that happen? The reports say not until at least halfway through 2021 by which time many organisations would be faced with redundancies, layoffs and potential closure if they do not receive the life-blood of sufficient emergency support to stay alive. Bear in mind that 7,000 livelihoods are at stake, with thousands of households depending on those jobs.

So, in our conversations, we have identified a range of immediate and longer terms needs. We also have a range of proposals and propositions that enable a more collaborative sector to emerge from this crisis whenever that may be.

In the immediate term, we need financial support for our operational capacity, just to keep our organisations working and our core missions to support the communities we serve, alive. For a great many organisations, this means maintaining staff levels, enabling freelance artist/facilitators to survive this crisis, and develop the capacity of organisations, personnel and communities to access different ways of working and creating collectively for now and the future.

We also need financial assurance that we can build back from this crisis in the years ahead and to this end, there is a widespread necessity for additional funds and support in 21/22 and indeed beyond.

If we are to build back better, providing access, supporting participation, enhancing innovation, origination, authorship and creativity and ultimately ensuring the ownership by participants and the public of their creative and cultural choices and their impacts, then greater support for community arts and socially-engaged practice is essential, along with funds to ensure that all sectors of the arts survive this chaos of closed doors and financial ruin. A proactive strategy to see the £33million investment realised and to then support its on-going and necessary development and implementation is crucial to both the sector’s survival but also the necessary participation that is so unquestionably craved by communities across our region.

By the way, the artist Munch was 32 when he created 'The Scream". In his head he clearly thought he was a goner, incapable of dealing with the fear and death all around him. In fact he would live until 1944, when he turned 81. 

Long live art!

 


Tuesday 30 June 2020

The arts can build back better

Like anyone involved in the arts in the North / N Ireland, I am anxious that not only do the arts survive this pandemic, but that all associated with the arts manage to be in a position to support our community as we take two steps forward and one back around re-opening after lockdown and re-establishing ourselves and our role. Because the arts can be a formidable force for good, an incredible means of supporting a population that has been traumatised by inter-community violence for decades and was starting to come to terms with itself, this wave of Covid 19 and its horrific impact on our community will reverberate for years to come, compounding our trauma, exposing the vulnerability of our elderly and those with underlying conditions (approaching 90,000 households here) and increasing disorders like depression and anxiety in our teenagers and new mothers, etc . And this is only the first wave of this global pandemic. So, as a lot of us have done during the lockdown, we have turned to the arts for respite, release and escape. The next challenge for the arts will be to offer consolation, express fears, manage bereavement and cope with loss. If as a creative community we manage to rise to that challenge, then we will assist this society move another step toward resilience.

But among the outcry from a small group (including the actor Sean Kearns who was a brilliant advocate) representing theatre, venues and audiences last week that presented to a committee at Stormont, came the warning that the sector faced "cultural Armageddon" (although another has a survey entitled "After the Interval" which doesn't communicate much in the way of the obliterating of a sector, on the one hand, never mind offering scant sympathy or regard towards the thousands of lives lost and millions affected by the global pandemic, equating it to a theatre intermission, on the other). The catastrophist pronouncement along with the alarming insistence that all organisations in the sector "face obliteration" might make for good press coverage, but the truth is that all arts organisations have been faced with economic uncertainty as an ever-present for years and each is working hard to make sure that this is not the last battle, but unfortunately yet another challenge in a litany of setbacks, cuts, historic under-investment and lack of adequate financial protection and security. The acute emergency of having no audiences for theatre is of course a massive immediate challenge to an already weakened position.

If the last 12 years were characterised by cuts and further neo-liberal pressure to become more economically self-sustaining, the next 12 will be even harder, as we stare into the biggest recession the world has ever seen. The challenge is for our whole society to #buildbackbetter , finding ways to amplify the fantastically creative possibility that a greener, more people-centred economy might be advanced by the humanity and compassion of the arts, rather than fighting to save our place in a failing economic model, that has never embraced the arts adequately.

To all those who claim that the arts sector is part of the Creative Industries, it is time to recognise our place within this and perhaps to see ourselves somewhat apart.  TV, Gaming, Films are extremely expensive to invest in and are hugely profitable businesses - you need only look at the all-too-often mentioned TV show about swords and sandals and snow (I watched one episode and that was that!) . But the figures around the creative industries are massive because they embrace a huge swathe of economic activity that is not connected to what we do in our small arts sector - Advertising and Marketing and Architecture are part of the creative industries - and do not relate directly to anything most of the organisations in the local cultural sector are engaged in. IT, Software and Games account for over 40% of this Creative Industries catch all - accounting for £45bn in 2018 in the UK.

Music, culture and arts by comparison accounted for 8% of the GVA of the Creative Industries.  What I'm trying to get across is that by constantly associating our arts sector with one of the most profitable areas of the economy projects us in the wrong light; it says that we generate massive profits. We don't - if arts organisations break even, they are doing well. That has always been the case. Now, venues in particular are faced with losing 90% of their box office, which will be devastating. But others are quickly finding new ways to develop and present product and change will be at breakneck speed over the coming years. The new normal must offer progress, otherwise its just another empty promise.

We are the culture and arts sector, the Cinderella of any Creative Industries - left to the funding vagaries of the public purse and dependent on between 30% and 70% subvention from government or  philanthropic funds. The organisations that keep craft traditions alive, that work tirelessly with older people in residential homes (how necessary is this now???) the organisations that reach into every community centre, school, disability group, supporting newcomers and native residents , in every corner across the country, facilitating projects in film, fashion, poetry, dance, drama, sculpture, visual arts, painting, drawing, designing and offering a platform to the arts of yesterday to be maintained and grow and support us all,  as we look forward to tomorrow.

Don't confuse us with the for-profit sectors of the Creative Industries! No, no, no... this is the for-people sector of arts and culture. There will be many more struggles ahead, this is not Armageddon, the final battle. The arts will fight on.

But we do need help, badly. That reality has been recognised and has meant that an extra €25m was allocated to the arts sector in the South just two weeks ago. If we in the North, were to receive the equivalent per capita, it would be approaching £9m of 'new' money.  This is crucial - the British government must offer additional funds to our devolved Assembly, a portion of which must help save the arts, especially those that have seen their income 'fall off a cliff' to quote the overused phrase. We need our political class, not to petition our Minister to find more cash locally out of already stretched budgets (albeit the £4m June monitoring funding announced by Finance Minister Murphy may be a boon, once we understand how it's to be deployed)| but we need to direct our plea to the British Treasury and Chancellor of the Exchequer to release additional emergency funding and recognise the unforeseen circumstances that this sector finds itself in.

So far, those additional monies have not materialised yet we read everyday of the quasi-Keynsian budgetary investment being made by the Tories - but not to the arts. Scotland has tried to shore up its sector. The Arts Council of N Ireland have done their utmost to assist individual artists and organisations, offering £1.5m in emergency funds. But here, we need a Barnett Formula applied to the emergency monies being allocated in Britain and we need it right now. We need it across those sectors that assist the public to manage to impact of it all - health services, social services and the arts and cultural services. We're not seeking billions. No. It's a tenth of the money spent on an abandoned track and trace app, or one percent of the RHI overspend or 0.05% of the annual budget here.

So, as the deadly waves of Covid-19 sweep across the world, let's recognise that we all want our life to return to some type of normality. One of the fastest ways to that returned sense of well-being is to tap into the expressive power of the arts and get ourselves out of our bunkers, mentally and physically and allow the arts an opportunity to help this society process the impact of coronavirus on our lives and give us a platform to move forward and build back better.

The new normal must be better than the old one - for all our sakes.

#ArtsMatterNI
Baineann sé le tábhacht na nEalaíon sa Tuaisceart
#BuildBackBetter