Funding of elitist art

A more or less dated opinion on funding of the arts, written by Allan Gregg, one of Canada’s most recognized and respected senior research professionals and social commentators.

The author argues that art is for everyone and therefore elitist art should not be funded by the government but support ventures that unite audiences.

The whole article can be found here:
http://allangregg.com/?p=22

However, I don't think that his ideas would offer a long-term solution but rather decrease people's understanding of the arts in general.

Exploit your audience honestly...

Exploitation films used to give audiences things they could never get from mainstream cinema. (That's not the case these days, as most of today's blockbusters are little more than B-movies with wads of cash thrown at them and all the fun sucked out.) It's a shame that the art of selling these movies didn't also make the jump to the multiplexes. Modern trailers are constructed to show you a truncated version of the film they're hawking...

To read the whole article, click here:
http://arts.guardian.co.uk/filmandmusic/story/0,,2173126,00.html

Sales Promotions

After further research, I found that sales promotions are an important aspect to public relations as they augment the product and create more value for the customer. The audience feel they get 'something for nothing' which again takes the risk off the purchase (for instance of a theatre ticket), especially for those visitors with lower incomes. This is a short term tactical tool that plays an important role in long term promotional strategy.

Sales promotions encourage trial, attract new customers and disseminate information. Again, sales promotions have to be communicated with the media in order for them to be succesful. With the right tactics, such as reduced price offers, contests or cross promotions, it is easy to target possible audiences and unsavy audiences (who assume that an art institution and its existing members are elitist)

Here is a link to the V&A's promotional strategy for the current year:
http://www.vam.ac.uk/about_va/marketing/index.html

Press Coverage for Unilever Series

For all of you who did not manage do see last years fantastic Unilever Series by Carsten Höller, check out the video and coverage:



http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/markets/europe/article1288772.ece

Here is some press coverage for the current exhibition:

http://arts.guardian.co.uk/art/visualart/story/0,,2186965,00.html

http://entertainment.timesonline.co.uk/tol/arts_and_entertainment/visual_arts/article2615055.ece

Unilever Series

The Tate Modern exhibition `Unilever Series` by Carsten Höller managed to get extensive press coverage. The Museum enhanced its popularity even more by showing that visitors actually can have fun in a museum and that being in a gallery with impressive external and internal architecture does not necessarily mean that strict rituals of museum behaviour have to be obeyed. As a result of publicity and increased awareness, these exhibitions are a step towards gaining a broader audience and widening accessibility by demonstrating that there is nothing elitist about the arts organisation.

Recently, the museum unveiled a new project to this series, Doris Salcedo's Shibboleth, the first work to intervene directly in the fabric of the Turbine Hall. Rather than fill this iconic space with a conventional sculpture or installation, Salcedo has created a subterranean chasm that stretches the length of the Turbine Hall. In particular, Salcedo is addressing a long legacy of racism and colonialism that underlies the modern world. With this exhibition, again, the Tate Modern succeeds in targeting a broader audience, especially ethnic minorities and gained extensive press coverage.

The exhibition is on until the 6th April, I definitely recommend it to everyone

http://www.tate.org.uk/modern/exhibitions/dorissalcedo/default.shtm

Celebrity Endorsement

PR is about maintaining a favourable public image and is essential to image building and image management. Good public relations manage to get targeted press coverage about performances and exhibitions, bring people together on special occasions and bond them to the arts organisation. Public relations often use opinion formers and celebrity endorsers to change attitudes and perceptions of audiences. If an arts institution can be linked with an appropriate celebrity, the effects on the new targeted audience can be immense.

The art experience

To my opinion, one possibility to change people's perceptions is to shift the art experience in Maslow's hierarchy of needs (http://www.businessballs.com/maslow.htm) from art being a need for self actualisation to a social need, so the artistic product is perceived as vital to social live.

As mentioned in a previous post, blockbuster exhibitions help to achieve this as they are very popular with the general public and people simply have to see it in order to be able to participate in social discourses.

It should be also made clear, that art and cultural experiences are not premium priced, but affordable nowadays and the organisations' PR departments simply must communicate about various discounts and special offers. Transport for London (http://www.tfl.gov.uk/) works together closely with various museums, galleries and West End shows and offers great discounts.

To check out current oyster card promotions to current attractions, click here:
http://www.tfl.gov.uk/microsites/oysteroffers/

Importance of public appearances...

This is really funny. James Purnell had 'faked' an important photocall and had been photoshopped into a picture.

See yourselves:

Another interesting article

The Department for Culture, Media and Sport is about to publish a review of public arts funding put together by Sir Brian McMaster, chairman of the National Opera Studio and a former director of the Edinburgh festival. Brimming with optimism, McMaster talks about a "new renaissance" - it hopes to usher in a new era in which the logic underlying public subsidy moves from "measurement to judgment", and the pursuit of targets (as seen in a long-standing focus on the arts appealing to certain social categories) is superseded by a new emphasis on "excellence".

Thanks Victoria!

http://arts.guardian.co.uk/theatre/news/story/0,,2236656,00.html

Guardian

There were two interesting articles in the Guardian.The first one talks about tha fact that Britain may be about to produce "the greatest art yet created", ushering in a "new Renaissance" comparable with that in 15th century Italy, according to a policy review to be published by the government next Thursday.

To read the article, click here:
http://arts.guardian.co.uk/art/news/story/0,,2235752,00.html

The secon article talks about art, funding and excellence in rural areas.

To read the article, click here:
http://arts.guardian.co.uk/art/news/story/0,,2236537,00.html

Blockbuster exhibitions

To target the market segment that perceives art as elitist, it is helpful to carry out 'blockbuster' exhibitions. These will appeal to the masses and will also attract younger audiences. The Victoria and Albert Museum in South Kensington holds successful popular exhibitions. As seen in the past, 'Black British Style' was a major triumph that raised visitor figures by targeting ethnic minorities and youths.

Here is the link to the past V&A exhibition:

http://www.vam.ac.uk/vastatic/microsites/1341_black_british_style/

In future, the public is going to see more displays on this scale such as the 'Story of the Supremes from the Mary Wilson Collection'.

For more information of current and future exhibitions in the V&A click here:

http://www.vam.ac.uk/exhibitions/future_exhibs/index.html

Probelm of Arts Marketing in general

After researching more about this subject, i noticed that one of the most important aspects in overcoming perceived elitism is product understanding. Branding, packaging, design and quality have to be clear. The problem of arts marketing lies within the fact that the artistic product does not try to fulfil the needs of the masses and therefore marketing is product- oriented and has to target the segment that is attracted to the product. Hill et al. (2003) enumerate that the `artistic director or exhibition curator and their teams tend to be production- centred in that they will always hope to challenge and stimulate their audience by giving them something beyond their expectations.` It is difficult to find the balance between excellence and access as the ordinary customer enjoys what the highly educated participant evaluates as low in artistic content.

Here is the reference:

HILL, E., O`SULLIVAN, C. and O`SULLIVAN, T. (2003) Creative Arts Marketing. 2nd ed., Butterworth- Heinemann

Problem of exclusion in the Arts

PR can act as a cultural intermediary or system, that augments a product by giving it additional symbolic meaning and providing it with certain attributes. These days, but also as seen in history, museums, galleries, heritage sites and other cultural institutions are in the hands of professionals who are experts in their field and use appropriate academic language to communicate about certain cultural products.

This part is taken from http://www.flowerseast.com/:

'Barton makes ceramic sculpture. The incredible strength and intensity of her work has taken it beyond the realm of ceramics, firmly placing her among the most important sculptors working in the figurative field today. Her work is beautifully documented in a monograph published by Momentum Publishing, with photography by Adrian Flowers.'

Unfortunately, this sophisticated language is also used to communicate with audiences: being sent out to the public, describing performances, exhibits and symbols it may be very impressive for the inside audience but it is rather intimidating for the outside audience, people who are not that familiar with the cultural product and who are not that well educated are left out.

Good article on funding...

I have found an amazing article on arts and heritage funding. The writer, Nick Seddon discusses that 'there are a lot of people out there who resent their taxes being used to fund the arts. This much is clear from some of the more barbed comments on the Arts Council's website, where the agency is running a consultation into the future of public investment in the arts in this country. But sometimes it pays to be expedient: the Arts Council isn't going to be closed down any time soon, so let's cut our losses and try to ensure that it at least uses our money wisely. To this end, it would be good if we could come up with some sound principles on which to base public funding of the arts. Surely the underlying principle has to be quality. We might squabble about how quality is defined and, more contentiously, who defines it, but quality per se must be up there. We want good art, not bad art. We want art for art's sake...'

To read the whole article, click here:
http://blogs.guardian.co.uk/art/2007/03/quality_not_social_value_shoul.html

Youtube link

It should be working now:

Interesting

Just so you get the idea of high art... (I have not quite figured out how to add a proper video from youtube on my blog, so I can only give you the link. I will add the proper video as soon as I know how to work my blog...)

So here it is: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GbsDQL5Ym6Y

It is not too long, listen to the song, it is quite funny.

Update to last post

I forgot to give you the reference to the journal I used so here you go:

COLBERT, F., d`ASTOUS, A. and PARMENTIER, M.A. (2005) Consumer perceptions of sponsorship in the arts. International journal of cultural policy, 11 (2), pp 215-228

My first post - how exciting!!

Hi everyone!

This is my very first blog. As so many of you, I have never done this before. I am just going to start out explaining what my blog is about. One of my big passions is the arts and heritage sector, for instance galleries, the museum and heritage sites.

When thinking about which topic to chose for my blog, I thought about the difficulty for arts organisations to gain both private and public funding. I found one of the reason for this in a book published by Colbert et al. The authors state that arts and cultural products are situated on a continuum with high art at one end and popular art at the other end. The problem for arts organisations is embodied in the fact that `elitist` art appeals merely to a small market segment, comprising middle and upper classes, educated professionals and their families, therefore visitor figures, extremely important to arts organisations for public and private funding, will remain low. The meaning of `elitism` which restricted art and culture to the privileged, rich and educated has been replaced by the new elitism of understanding.

I strongly believe that public relations can tackle this problem by breaking down current judgements of the sector and by broadening accessibility.