Artsfest in Birmingham happened 12-14th September 2008. Yes indeed – the free festival where freeness is greatness (according to Birmingham City Council!). What can be a negative when you have a city council promoting the arts in Birmingham (and surrounding areas)…..It all seems such a good idea! Birmingham City Council provide the stalls (not sure if they are free?), the marketing and promotion, pay the technicians, logistically managers, security, PA, mainstage, no doubt, some venues and special things..etc…It all sounds great, really good. So good…..Just one thing folks…..Artists come along to promote themselves, all their good work, all their community activity….and NO FEES are ISSUED to the majority of the local artistic citizens that come art in hand! I REPEAT – no money as fees go the artists that promote THE CITY OF (aspiring)CULTURE (as previously shortlisted…and Liverpool got it as we all know…). Question, what messages does this send out to the artistic community in Birmingham? Perhaps it means that artists are not (financially) valued, that they need Birmingham City Council’s help!? Such arrogance. We are equal citizens in this city and we are to be equally treated. It’s OK for BCC to look for the every emerging touting of a cultural city – a tourist destination of art and artists under one big festival (sounds a little like the last blog doesn’t it!???) – to promote greatness and diversity of culture. Sure, many with logos attached to their organisation or company feel oblidged to attend and partake (incase the purse strings get pulled)….a soft form of coercion and not necessarily about mutuality…??
So I thought it would be fitting to have a little revised promo for the Artsfest, changing Artsfest to ArtsFeast – You cook it! We’ll eat it! Mainstream culture never had it so good!
Love to hear you comments…ones that aren’t all in favour…I’ve heard all of them c/o the arts departments and spammers etc….
So I thought it would be fitting to have a little revised promo for the Artsfest, changing Artsfest to ArtsFeast – You cook it! We’ll eat it! Mainstream culture never had it so good!
Love to hear you comments…ones that aren’t all in favour…I’ve heard all of them c/o the arts departments and spammers etc….
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7 comments:
Les?
Comrade Blimey?
Wow this is thoughtful stuff. Such arrogance that the council thinks artists need their help? Such arrogance to suggest that artists (probably yourself, I sense there is a chip on your shoulder) deserve payment for their contribution more like. Going on your writing I suspect your conribution at artsfest is as about was about as valuable as the opinions presented in your blog. Has it occurred to you that not all creative groups involved in Artsfest are there for financial gain? Many are pleased to be able to show their work or promote their group in a busy city centre environment. There is ample opportunity for those who wish to make money for themselves at Artfest too eg paintings on the railings and the designer maker fair. Basically artists, musicians and groups make artsfest choose how artsfest can work for them. Some make money and are appreciative of the opportunity, some take on new members, some are just happy to have an audience. There is money to be made in creative industries in Birmingham, but as a (struggling) professional creative I am sick of hearing people complain they are undervalued. If you really want financial rewards for your efforts, try doing something that people want or need, as you won't get them by being 'counterculture' and slapping the mainstream in the face. Really it's time many of your lot realised your ideas aren't based on counterculture but on immaturity. By 'your lot' I'm imagining a bunch of naive skater, hip hop, graffiti types who never actually set foot in any arts education establishment and thus overestimating their own abilities and ideas whilst patting eachother on the back down the custard factory. Grow up.
To the anonymouse below - many artists are quite happy to be involved in Artsfest for free however should that be the expectation? Should many of the artists be expected to get involved for gratis?
Artfest and the city makes a lot of money on the back of the free participation of the many artists. Having spoke with many artists they had an issue of getting no funding for their project within the festival. They also became disheartened when their event was poorly attended because it was so badly promoted.
So where is the money going if not on the artists... or on decent festival promotion?
Nice generalisation by the way - and you talk about immaturity.
Well done to this site for actually questioning the cities funding and exposing those who live off the funding.
In my opinion Artsfest was a cultural black hole let down by seriously poor promotion.
a fing i dont like is having my email address passed on without my permission when the passer had previously agreed not to do so
yers
jzponaijq, ..., which is i name i use to help prevent spam on this site
There is a wider cultural issue here around the way arts and culture are valued. Yes, if you have 'product' there are ways you can sell it at Artsfest, but many artists create work that doesn't have an obvious monetary value - so how do we support them? I'm all for supporting culture in the city and I understand that Artsfest is an attempt to showcase work, which it does well, allowing many citizens to access art for free that they might not in the normal run of things. But it is often at the cost (financial, physical and often emotional) of the artists they exploit to do this. I'm sure some kind of happy medium could be come to, where contributors could at least have their expenses sorted, or at least get bought a pint by the Artsfest team! Whilst larger cultural institutions absolutely should open their doors to the public (after all, many of them are in receipt of large subsidies that we pay for), why should unsupported artists and organisations do the same?
I do believe many people will now be enjoying a very nice glass of bubbly at the opening of Eastside Projects. I trust that they will be ushering in a confident cultural era to aid Birmingham in the new mellenia and that this will be satisfactory. Post hangovers, we shall see!
Oh yes, publicity wise, I wonder who got an invite? Was it those that I might suspect? I'm reminded of the clever opening of Tate Modern many years ago, when they got black cab drivers to attend. It not only meant that they all knew where the gallery was, but that they were extremely satisfied to have been guests of honour and spoke very highly of the place of course. That's good promotion. Anything like that happened at Eastside projects? By the way, where is it exactly?
And no, I'm not upset about attending.
The Eastside Projects invites went out by mail and email to as wide a range of people as possible and last night over 300 people came through the doors - if thats an elitist, closed circle its a pretty big one. It is not run by 'the old self service group' (who selfishly put on a series of public events which again were open to anyone who wanted to come) though two of the Eastside founders were involved in that project too. Call me conventional but maybe you should actually see what it is before you start slagging it off and if its not something you are interested in go do something that you are yourself.
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