A touch of grouchiness for a Monday morning.
Ammo reckons Birmingham’s arts scene is too safe and middle-aged, claiming that rather than providing art that appeals to Brummies, “a human tide of middle class professionals floods Birmingham each day from the suburban shanty towns that ring our city”:
Groomed by the local authority and a small elite of ‘tastemakers’, half-a-dozen ‘flagship’ venues and ventures in the city centre now hoover up most of the taxpayer and corporate cash. Just like the banks, they’ve become ‘too big to fail’.
More and more their programming reflects the tastes – and train timetables – of an alien clique.
Meanwhile, Stan’s Cafe remind us that, as of 1 October, city council funding for some of the smaller organisations ended (see my post with bonus hedgehog vid here):
last time I did the sums it appeared 50% of the City’s revenue funded portfolio was being cut by 100% to save 2.6% of the Arts Revenue budget. I can’t conceive how the city missed out on its last two bids to be crowned a Capital/City of Culture.
That last bit was sarcastic, btw.
Here is another few sentences of mine about the Art situation in Birmingham.
Lets have a look who are those biggest players in Art in West Midlands:
1. Councils are going first, obviously, not by the quality but by the quantity of available resources.. Judging by the quality of art installations and other primitive projects, nobody at local councils understands what the arts are and how to grow them.
We don’t have community gallery in Birmingham and we don’t have professional team who can help local artists to grow. Birmingham Museum and Art gallery is simply in hibernating state and incapable of putting good art show with resources they have(they had grown fond of Russian alcoholics so, not sure why; probably they are sponsored by local pubs and breweries who would like to glamorize street life of drunken people in order to sell more alcohol).
2. On the second place there are various educational bodies like BCU and others. There is no much to say about them, as those At School and Design School are one of the worst in the country judging by the graduation shows. Neither of them have developed close links with people who live in Birmingham and they have no impact on their lives, perception, development and judgement whatsoever. No education body has any kind of development or curatory programs for local artists. There is no team of professionals at those universities who are able to deliver one-off personal development programs for those who need help in arts. I cannot bring my artworks at the school of art and ask them for professional help.
3. On the third place there are various projects like Estside, Ikon, MAC, RBSA and others who are relying on somebodies money. In short-they are offering very simple installations and very low value for money. They are mainly used as points of cheap entertainment for busy families, rather than professional points for personal growth and personal development based on Art and Design ideas. They are closed for local artists most of the time and don’t offer them any help in showcasing new ideas on regular bases.
4. Lastly, there are local commercial artgalleries. Well, they are there for money only and nothing else can be said about them. If they cannot make money out from your art, nobody will talk to you. None of them is openly offering professional advice for local artists even for the money.
5. Local art circles. Have no power over any art matters in Birmingham or West Midlands. Slow moving, unproductive and nobody knows about them.
6. On this place we suppose to have Birmingham Association for Corporate Support of the Arts. The bad news is -we don’t have such organization!! Even so we are the second biggest city in UK.
7. And here we suppose to have names of well known Art collectors from West Midlands who suppose to have their own circle and willingly suppose to help local artists with advice and share personal views on Art.
the issue is the within the factors that people want to be entertained ( and here i make reference to the point of the arts scene being accused of safe ). I know of many many local visionary artists who get ignored as their work does not entertain.
Work gets selected by funding processes governed by taste based upon people who are out of touch with current practice. ( this is a massive generalisation so don’t get offended)
Funders have an expectancy built on an “understanding” of audience. This is where it goes wrong. PLaces Like Vivid, Stan’s Cafe etc try to operate out of this as they understand the audience, as do the artists who they work with.
but there is many different levels in the structure of the problem, the worse being apathy , instead of pointing the finger or indeed giving the finger is it not better to ignore these big institutions, form a collective of understanding bodies and create?
I think saying that the birmingham arts scene is safe and middleaged comes from some one who may see it as such because in all honesty maybe that is what they want but never would admit it?
In my opinion the last fourteen years saw our arts funding given out to people for ‘special favours’ not great art.
Say, the lone artist who got £29,000 when a theatre group for disabled youth received £5,000 for the same time period. Maybe they wouldn’t play ball. The lone artist’s work certainly didn’t merit that sort of money and wasn’t involved in a project involving others, just producing the odd canvas and not very imaginatively at that.
I think it’s run by criminal types for people who don’t mind what they do to get the money.
Hang W. Mids Arts I say – sod ’em!
There’s plenty of art happening all over the area and not one is anything to do with these dark forces…although if they pay someone to come after ME again I wonder who they’ll bribe with our taxes next. We’ll have to see.
Unfortunately, we cannot ignore big institutions. We live in this area, and we as artists who understand matters better than ignorant crowd, must voice our opinion about all those who are in artpower in Birmingham. Who else will tell hem the truth ? Arts council is pretty much useless in their efforts to bring the level of ART in West Midlands at least to the acceptable level.
Many people are reading such blogs and if somebody open their eyes to these problems they would see things differently!
Edinburgh Council spent millions of pounds (more than 80 millions) to establish Art fair. Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery cannot accommodate even one Open Call exhibition per year for local artists. The level of ignorance of big art institutions in Birmingham is just unbelievable!!
Just for the sake of balance, some of the best art I’ve seen in Birmingham has been publicly funded and ‘criminal types’ would be out of order if it wasn’t so amusing (let’s keep things civil and constructive, please).
Justin – I’m not sure to what extent Vivid and Stan’s operate outside of the funding structure (the latter’s certainly in the new ACE portfolio) and Ammo doesn’t strike me as someone who wants to be safe and middle aged.
Incidentally, the theatre group for disabled youth in Bonnie’s comment is presumably The Cuckoo’s Nest Theatre Company (£5,000 in 09/10). Not sure who the individual who received £29k is unless it’s Arlene Burnett (for the Rea Garden residencies, also in 09/10) but that did involve others and the end product wasn’t just a canvas, so it doesn’t match the description. (All the info on grants is here: http://www.artscouncil.org.uk/funding/grants-arts/grants-arts-awards/)
Chris
“some of the best art I’ve seen in Birmingham has been publicly funded”
Could you please be more specific? Otherwise it is very difficult to figure out what exactly do you mean. I could say something like “the worst art in Birmingham I’ve seen has been publicly funded”. Can you be more civil in your expression without using emotional statements so everybody can see the reference materials your opinions based upon? Thank you.
Sure thing. To pick three off the top of my head, I very much enjoyed BRB’s E=MC2, Birmingham Opera’s Othello and Stan’s Cafe’s Of All The People In All The World. I haven’t checked, but I’m pretty certain they all had public funding.
I’m sure it’s also true that some of the worst art I’ve seen around here has been publicly funded. That’s fine with me (in moderation).
Well….
BRB’s E=MC2-is ENTERTAINMENT, and not ART.
“Birmingham Opera’s Othello” is ENTERTAINMENT, and not ART.
“Of All The People In All The World (UK) uses grains of rice to bring formally abstract statistics to startling and powerful life. ” I’m sorry to say that, but such banal acts of expressions are not ART. And Russian alcoholics in Birmingham Museum are not Art either. It is very cheap entertainment and nothing else.
Nope, I was there – definitely all art.
Ok.it WAS ART. What did get from that ART? Tell us about your personal experience. All I got from those cheap installations was very primitive and abused stories, nothing new and nothing exciting. Chris, you are using very primitive arguments. Your behavior is very similar to those people who don’t have any clue about real ART but they want to get some money out of laymem.
I’m not going into my personal experiences here – no offence meant, but I’ve no idea who you are and I’ve got other things I need to do this evening.
Do you have a blog (or other such online outlet) of your own? If you do, could you send me a link? I’d be interested in subscribing.
2 Chris Unitt
We are not discussing our personal merits. We are here just to voice our personal opinions about At in Birmingham. Please get your priorities right. Do you want to know about me? I’m ready to showcase my Art with your Art if you like at the same exhibition. and I can face the crowd.
I think we have to compile the list of influential people in Birmingham who are behind all those important decisions in Art and Design. Surely managers of IKON, MAC,Estside projects ,Birmingham Museum and Custard Factory are just small pawns in this big game and they will do only what they’ve been told to do. .Situation in Art reflects the state of the mind of those who are in real power. It seems to me they are not real intellectuals and all those cheap art installations just prove that. So the only way for local artists is to go together in order to survive in such hostile climate. Anybody willing to setup full time independent artist gallery in Birmingham?
So, the “Jo Plymouth Challenge” goes unanswered?
The only answer I’ve got from EastsideProject, CustardFactory, IKOn,MAC and some others is “If you don’t like it,-just go and live on Mars”!
We have several big things coming in ART calendar in Birmingham. One of them is http://www.ec-arts.com/2011/07/48-sheet-3/
It is an art exhibition on billboards, on 100 of them!! So lets think logically, shall we?
Birmingham doesn’t have any art fair, doesn’t have any independent art exhibition(apart from the small group exhibitions nobody knows about), but there are money for such cheap massive entertainment as showing art on billboards!! Imagine you are coming from the pub late at knight, and you have nicely lit billboards full of art everywhere;wouldn’t it be nice to combine driving and art, waiting for a bus and art, talking on the phone and art, digging up the roads and admiring art? It is nice, isn’t it??Or not exactly?
Obviously, you can make love to your boyfriend or a girlfriend on the Victoria Square, but that would be rather the act of pornography, and not the real love, which requires solitude, nice lighting, no-rush attitude, clean and pleasant surroundings. So why we are forced to have pornographic act of deriving the weird please from the art on billboards in Birmingham? I’m sure those money would be much wiser to spend on bringing the real art to hospitals and schools. Working artists are completely disconnected from young people, and nobody cares about it!
Please correct me if I’m wrong. Maybe I just have to go and live on Mars at the end….
Jo Plymouth #loony
anon, here is a link for you on how to present your opinions:
http://homeworktips.about.com/od/essaywriting/a/opinion.htm
If you study it carefully, maybe one day you will be able to present not just your naked emotions like kids often do to amuse themselves and others, but rather intelligent description of your thoughts about the problem other people trying to solve. If you have nothing to say on the subject matter, it is generally advisable to keep at least quite, and in that way you may look more intelligent.
Jo Plymouth #stillloony
Jo Plymouth – I would LOVE to look at your work – do you have a website?
This website has 1252 RSS subscribers and 4593 Twitter followers. And it looks like only Jo Plymouth wants to change the tragic situation in arts which engulfed the Birmingham thanks to the pathetic art ideas from people responsible for artfunds in West Midlands.
Banton, -why don’t you ask anon to show his artworks? At least you can see my thoughts on the problem. And why don’t you ask Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery about Open Call?I just got the conformation that Herbert Museum in Coventry is planning one for 2012(information will be very soon on its website), but Birmingham museum and art Gallery don’t, so It seems to me that you are asking wrong people wrong kind of questions. I would really LOVE to read your constructive comments or the subject matter we all came to discuss on this blog.
Give Jo Plymouth the IKON budget, and you will see what he can do with it:
1.TWO ART FAIRS FOR LOCAL ARTISTS A YEAR IN BIRMINGHAM VICTORIA SQUARE
2. EACH MONTH WEEKLONG EXHIBITION OF NEW ARTWORKS FROM LOCAL ARTISTS
3. EACH ARTIST IN BIRMINGHAM WILL HAVE A CHANCE TO EXHIBIT HIS BEST ARTWORKS AT IKON DURING A YEAR
4. I WILL ORGANIZE FOR BEST INDEPENDENT ARTISTS FROM BIRMINGHAM A STAND AT AFFORDABLE ART FAIR IN LONDON
And if you would like any help in developing ARTS in Birmingham, I will be more than happy to assist you.
We are not discussing personal merits of Jo Plymouth, we are discussing ART IN BIRMINGHAM, or rather its absence.
I understand shear frustration of people like anon who get use to live in the permanent state of artapathy for decades and cannot tolerate any truth about such unprofessional state of Birmingham Art scene. And surely the only way out for them is to turn this discussion into a farce.
Birmingham is already 20 years behind London on art development.
Ignorance, apathy and bad attitude towards Art like in the case of anon is very welcoming for artpolicymakers in Birmingham,-in that way they will be creating more smokescreen artinstallations just to cover up their luck of ideas, luck of creativity and luck of willingness to bring something more substantial than just Russian alcoholics to BMAG, antcurate to MAC or art-on-billboards. All those cheap ideas are turning ART into FARCE.
anon and the likes are afraid to demand more for their money.and voice their opinions and probably it wouldn’t be very polite for me to change their state of permanent arthibernation. Probably I have to apologize even for trying!!
Spellchecker would be a helpful addition to this argument.
Spellchecker is a last resort for those, who don’t have arguments and honest opinions. So it is generally advisable for open web-conversations to leave as many mistakes in the text as possible without losing the idea; so those without arguments will be able to find spelling mistakes and that will make them very happy!
“without losing the idea” I think you lost a lot of people a long time ago. Best of luck with your idea, whatever it was.