Arts Council England has announced the last details of the new structure that will save £6.5m a year, meeting the government’s requirement of 15% of savings by the end of tine financial year.
The principal changes include:
· an overall reduction in staff numbers across the organisation of 21 per cent
· nine streamlined regional offices grouped in four areas – North; Midlands and South West; East and South East; London
· a smaller head office, which will also co-locate with the London regional office
· a smaller executive board – nine members instead of 14
· a centralised grants for the arts process based in Manchester.
Changes will begin immediately with the new structure fully in place by April 2010.
The proposals were announced in February and approved by the national council last week. They will allow the sharing of resources and knowledge more flexibly across the organisation and simplified processes. Regional staff will be focused on customer-facing activities, while the streamlined head office and smaller executive board will be more strategic.
“This is no mere tinkering” said chief executive Alan Davey. “It is about transforming the way we work and requires a significant change in our culture. I have confidence in our people’s ability to step up to that challenge – to operate as one organisation, with responsibility and openness, to achieve our mission of great art for everyone.”
News focusRedmond plan to copy Liverpool get go-ahead
The government is to go ahead with plans for a UK City of Culture every four years, with the first in 2013, the year after the London Olympics.
But culture secretary Ben Bradshaw warned that there will be no extra funding for the scheme. Costs will have to be met from existing resources.
TV producer Phil Redmond, cultural director for Liverpool’s year as European Capital of Culture in 2008, originally suggested the idea, and the decision to proceed follows a feasibility study by Redmond.
He said the successful cities could expect to see economic and social benefits flow in, as Liverpool had, leaving a lasting legacy.
But the successful bidders need not be cities, Bradshaw said. Bids would also be welcome from closely linked urban areas, provided there is a clear central focus to the area. London, or any part of London, need not apply, at least for 2013.
“Culture is something that we are incredibly good at in the UK. But excellence and innovation in the arts does not begin and end inside the M25 and I believe we have been too London-centric for too long in our cultural life. So this competition aims to find a city or area outside London that has the wow factor, with exciting and credible plans to make a step change in its cultural life and engage the whole country.
“Liverpool’s success last year brought pride, confidence and real economic regeneration to the area. Their triumphant year shows that the title of City of Culture will be a prize very much worth having, with a huge amount to play for.”
A selections committee has yet to be appointed, but Redmond said he was prepared to be its chairman, but he said success of the scheme would much depend on the support of the media, the BBC and local TV and radio stations. What had helped Liverpool last year was high profile media events such as the Turner Prize, the Brits and the Stirling Prize being shifted there from London.
“Liverpool benefited tremendously in 2008, from simply having a badge of authority that allowed people to work collaboratively together to enhance and maximize every event throughout the city” he said. “It also acted as a focal point for every cultural economic and social agenda – including permission to enjoy themselves.
“Culture is not an amorphous concept: it is at the heart of everything we do. To bring about any step change you need to bring about cultural shift and that is where cultural practitioners can help by introducing new ideas and new ways of doing things.”
How it will work
Bidders for the mark have until October 16 to submit outline applications online, with December 11 as the deadline for initial bids. A shortlist will be announced dearly next year, with final detailed plans for the short-listed submitted by May 28. The Secretary of State will announce the winner later in 2010.
Bids will be expected from partnerships from a city or area, including local authorities with a lead organisation to channel communication during the process.
The definition of “city” will be loose, the requirement being that a substantial programme can be delivered to lead a step change in an area.
The only area precluded for 2013 is London, partly because the Olympics will have occurred there the year before.
The criteria the panel will judge by are:
A high quality cultural programme appealing to a variety of audiences
Evidence of culture being used as a tool for lasting regeneration
A demonstrably significant economic impact to come from the programme
Credibility and track record, evidenced by key partners
An approach that maximises legacy and the ability to evaluate impact
Bath has retained its status as a World Heritage Site status, despite concern about development in the city. A team from the UN’s cultural body Unesco has given Bath the thumbs-up following an inspection last November. The inspection came after complaints that a major riverside development would damage Bath’s historic centre. Unesco said the historic sites of Bath were “very well managed” and its major buildings are in a “very good state of conservation and closely monitored”. It said the first phase of the riverside development would not affect the historic heart of Bath but suggested improvements to subsequent phases. Councillor Francine Haeberling, of Bath and North East Somerset Council, said Unesco’s report was “very positive”.
• Unesco has also added the Pontcysyllte aqueduct near Wrexham to the list of World Heritage Sites. The structure, built by Thomas Telford and William Jessop, is the longest and highest aqueduct in Britain.
Creative Scotland, which will take over from the Scottish Arts Council next year will lose more than £300,000 because it has not been granted charitable status.
Scotland’s culture minister Michael Russell admitted that the new body to be formed from the merger of SAC and Scottish Screen has fallen foul of new rules governing charitable status.
It means that Creative Scotland will immediately lose £300,000 that would have come with exemptions from taxes and other regulations.
Ewan Brown, told a conference of arts delegates that “It’s money being mischannelled out of our system. I think it’s nutty that we are in this position, and it’s an absolutely unintended consequence.”
It’s another blow for the new body, whose creation has been held up by a series of mishaps since it was first mooted four years ago. Creative Scotland is scheduled to launch next spring after the passing of the Public Services Reform Bill.
Mr Russell also said that the culture department will also be preparing reports for the Scottish Parliament on the major national companies - Scottish Opera, the National Theatre of Scotland, the Scottish Chamber Orchestra, the Royal Scottish National Orchestra and Scottish Ballet. “Parliament will get a chance to see what the national companies are doing,” he said.
* The Scottish Government has also announced details of £5 million in new spending under its “Innovation Fund” for Creative Scotland. It will include £1 million for artists who create “inspirational collaborations” across art forms.
Another £1.5m is earmarked for digital media ventures, £1 million for a support programme for start-up creative entrepreneurs and the Own Art scheme of interest-free loans for art buyers has received £250,000 in funding.
New research shows that while the public values free admission to museums and galleries, free entry is not itself enough to ensure that people will visit.
A report from The Art Fund and the Work Foundation shows that free admission to galleries was important in making the public feel ownership of the nation’s art but other barriers prevented people from visiting galleries and museums. These included a lack of knowledge about the art on display and a feeling of intimidation about the buildings themselves.
Other key findings suggest that museums and galleries could increase their efforts to make art accessible, that the public should be encouraged to ask questions and interrogate decisions made on their behalf, though they were happy to leave decisions to experts.
The Art Fund survey comes after new government figures show visits to national museums and galleries, at 40.3 million, are at a record high for the third year running. Since free admission was introduced, visits to previously charging museums have more than doubled.
More than 400 members of the Public and Commercial Services Union (PCS) in English Heritage sites are being balloted on possible strike action over pay. The PCS says new pay proposals will divide staff into two classes and will lead to lower wages. Catherine Craig, PCS negotiations officer for English Heritage, said, “English Heritage is already recognised as a poor payer. Rather than raise pay rates to acceptable and fair levels across the board, the visitor operations staff are being asked to foot the bill for better pay rates for others. This is demoralising.” The ballot ends on July 10.
The PCS has also condemned the British Council’s plans to cut staff by 40% over the next two years and consider offshoring work to India. Union general secretary Mark Serwotka, “We have been given very little consultation over these proposals.”
English Heritage denied that the pay deal would lead to job cuts and said all staff would get a 2% rise. A spokesman said the other staff union, Prospect, had accepted the offer. As talks were still going on, the strike vote was “premature.”
Auntie has decided she wants a TV arts editor to stand alongside her business, economics and sports editors. No idea who’s in for it, but some obvious names will pop up – arts correspondent Razia Iqbal, of course, Nick Higham no doubt, and probably the enthusiastic Front Row anchorman John Wilson. Rumour is, though, that she wants a big name from outside the Beeb, the Guardian’s Charlotte Higgins, say, but who would want it? Another of Auntie’s underlings tells me they’d be on a hiding to nothing, ‘trailing all over the world looking for stories and then having to compete with the likes of Peston for space on Ten to get them on air – drive you bonkers’.
The artistic provenance of the new culture secretary remains a mystery. Gathering the hacks associated with his range of briefs – arts, sport, broadcasting principally – Ben Bradshaw told us how pleased he’d been when he got the call from Brown while he was in his Exeter constituency. It was quite a long conversation, it seems, and he didn’t have time to say much he said. So it wasn’t till the PM had hung up that Ben could punch the air and say “Yes! Wimbledon!”
Stephen Deuchar’s decision to leave running Tate Britain to take over as director of the Art Fund seems puzzling. He was a surprise choice when he was brought from the National Maritime Museum 12 years ago and since then he’s driven a pretty straight course through what can be a minefield of tricksy exhibitions, dodgy attributions and controversial sponsorships, and can be regarded as a bit of a catch for AF chair David Verey, who might find his new CEO less of a personal challenge than the previous one. Who could replace Deuchar at Millbank though? Nick Serota has a penchant for foreigners, but it might be the opportunity to bring Sandy Nairne back into the fold from the NPG for which he left off being Serota’s number two seven years go. Them who for the NPG? None better, you might think, than a certain David Barrie, who’s always wanted to run a national institution, to square a circle.
Critic Sebastian Scotney examines ten years of the BBC New Generation Artists Scheme
With the benefit of hindsight, the list of artists chosen in 1999 to be the first intake of BBC Radio 3 New Generation Artists now makes very impressive reading: it includes the Belcea String Quartet, cellists Natalie Clein and Alban Gerhardt, pianists Paul Lewis and Steven Osborne, and singers Christopher Maltman and Lisa Milne.
Several major careers have emerged from subsequent cohorts too, such as those of trumpeter Alison Balsom and violinist Janine Jansen. But whereas it is the artists themselves who rightly make the waves, BBC Radio 3, National Radio Station of the Year, will also be marking the success of the scheme with a three-day mini-festival within the Proms, 12 daytime concerts at Cadogan Hall. They won’t make the biggest splash of the 2009 season, but they will mark ten years of very worthwhile work.
The prime mover behind the NGA scheme since inception has been Adam Gatehouse, Editor of Live Music at Radio 3. His portfolio of responsibilities also includes lunchtime concerts in various venues nationwide, together with afternoon and through-the-night broadcasting. NGA constitutes roughly a third of his job, he says.
