Airey slams racism in the arts in first speech as ACE chair
Dawn Airey, the new chair of Arts Council England, has chosen her inaugural speech in post to point the finger at racism and Islamophobia in the arts in Britain.
Airey, who succeeded Nicholas Serota in August, was speaking on the 50th anniversary of the publication of the watershed report The Arts Britain Ignores by cultural historian and activist Naseem Khan which challenged Britain's cultural establishment to confront the exclusion and marginalisation of Black artists and culturally diverse communities.
Khan’s was the first major study highlighting the integral part played in UK culture by black and Asian artists. Airey said she had exposed and challenged a prominent gap between the richness of Britain's diverse cultural life and the failure of institutions to recognise it. "The establishment had thought diversity was something to be encouraged. Khan made clear it was already there. It didn't need encouragement. It needed recognition” said Airey, speaking at the Serendipity Institute for Black Arts and Heritage in Leicester yesterday where Khan’s report was launched in 1976.
But, said Airey, the issues had not receded despite the welcome the Khan report had received. Questions of equity, investment, leadership and whose histories are valued remain.
Racism, Islamophobia and antisemitism are part of daily life for too many people in our sector: sometimes in crude and obvious ways, sometimes in subtle and deniable ones, but constantly there” she said.
“Those of us who don't experience this – and I include myself – have a responsibility to stand with you: to stand up for the work you want to make, and to back that with action, not just words.”
The Leicester event brought together artists, cultural leaders, academics and policymakers to reflect on five decades of progress in cultural policy, representation, investment and leadership, while examining the challenges that remain and setting a path forward.
Airey pledged that ACE would recharge its efforts to ensure at all levels of arts funding. "The current levels of investment in diverse-led organisations cannot – and must not – be a high-water mark. Of course, we commit to sustaining those levels. But we won't just protect them or sustain them. We will build on them and grow them."
Portrait of Dawn Airey by Jonathan Phang