A series of lectures started with the visiting lecturer Lee Corner, who has many years and much experience in almost all the commercial aspects of contemporary art practice in the United Kingdom today, but also on an international level too.
The idea of these lectures will be to equip students with sufficient information to provide choices for them to enable them to learn and earn a living through creative endeavours.
A quick discussion about the arts Council, together with the structure of the Dept of culture media and sport. In 1997 there was a significant shift in the way that British art was funded, when it was realised that there is a huge economic benefit to having art accessible to the masses. It was therefore decided to create the Dept of culture media and sport (DCMS), within the United Kingdom government. This department is an arms length ability to provide funding, which is centrally located within the government, to be then granted to the British arts Council (in other words, the people who actually decide where funding money is going to be spent upon), which means that independent decisions that are not politically driven can be taken.
Therefore, the DCM S is closer to the government in terms of getting the original funding, but it is the arts Council that divides the money up into its various causes. This means that there should be access for all funding. It also allows the arts Council to get its own funding from any other place to for example.
Currently, there is much dispute regarding British arts Council funding and how it fits with the mainstream of education in the United Kingdom. In educational terms, the science, technology, engineering and mathematics subjects have been seen as the most critical to deliver. These are sometimes known as the Stem subjects (STEM). However, it is clear that there is a need to turn this selection of subjects to include the arts, therefore, the Stem subjects will turn into steam subjects, (STEAM), in order to continue the economic benefits provided by arts practice.
Another of the focus areas that the British arts Council encourages is to develop every four years within the UK city of culture. Next year in 2016. The city of culture will be Hull.
The arts Council is based in London, but it has five regional areas which includes the North Midlands, the South London, Scotland and Wales, however, Scotland and Wales come under separate council leadership. Therefore within England. The three regions of London, North Midlands and South will be discussed here. Our lecturer Lee Corner sits on the northern area Council. £1.9 billion worth of public money is spent by the arts Council, and of this amount, £1.1 billion is from the National Lottery. Money is also taken from taxation in the United Kingdom, where 14p per week per person is paid into the arts Council through direct taxation. The idea of "creative capital" is our very own British most essential ingredient to our success in the future.
The arts Council has direct influence over so many cultural matters that often it is overlooked, for example in Huddersfield in the nearby village of Onley, there is an arts access program, known as "we do" which brings arts to all people in that area.
The arts Council also provides a structure for one-off project funded exhibitions and projects. This is together with national portfolio organisations also known as (NPO).
In essence, the arts Council will fund any project when an est artist can share their creativity to put something into the public's domain for the welfare and for the benefit of the public interest. An example of this might be the work of James Norton, who was sponsored to provide an exhibition at Bolton art gallery in 2014. In this work, or exhibition James Norton pulled together the work of an artist who went to America 100 years before, and that was Thomas Moran. By exhibiting brands work James Norton was able to show the impact of time and historical content, which compared a body of work for public exhibition. In Norton's application for a grant from the arts Council, they immediately saw the public benefit and were prepared to take the risk, "but what happens if" question and assessed all the benefits of how the new artworks could be then developed further.
There are also many trusts and foundations to support the arts, which then provides funding front for themselves again. Many of these rely on bequeathments and philanthropy, for the love of humanity.
Other sources of income can be taken from corporate social responsibility (CSR) budgets from large corporations.
A more recent vehicle to raise money has been through crowdfunding using the Internet, such as www.kickstart.com and also www.patreon.com, the latter of which is particularly aimed at individuals providing short amounts of money in order for them to become patrons of the arts.
Unfortunately, there is a huge level of scrutiny by the government at the moment on general arts funding and it is possible that Kirklees in Huddersfield and the creative Kirklees project may be under threat of losing 100% of its funding this year. This seems to be such a shortsighted loss, as for example in the new city of culture, in whole, the massive engineering company Siemens relocated to the city as a result of the city winning it city of culture status, the engineering firm being highly influenced through the government's pledge of £1.5 million, which has already been made to refurbish the Ferrensby Gallery in Hull.
In the United States. Most galleries and funding comes from public subscription, this innocence is a flip back to how things used to happen prior to the welfare state being set up after the Second World War. In the 1940s. It appears that the United Kingdom may eventually have to adopt this public subscription method. If the arts Council is not going to continue.
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