Guest post: "What culture? Whose Culture?", by Farai Mpfunya (Zimbabwe)

I met Farai Mpfunya a year ago at the Kennedy Center and had the pleasure of sharing the seminar room, and some lunch breaks, with him in two consecutive summers. What I appreciated the most in our conversations or listening to Farai´s comments in class, was his solid knowledge of the cultural sector in Zimbabwe and abroad, as well as his well-thought and balanced opinions. Farai speaks when he has really something to say and I feel very fortunate to have met him. mv

Mai Musodzi Cinema Hall, Mbare (Photo: Farai Mpfunya)

Mbare, suburb in Harare, Zimbabwe. 

Most little boys and girls growing up in this neighbourhood in the 1970s were five minutes away from a cinema, library, sports centre, church and school. A rich educational and cultural environment for the little ones to grow up in, you would say. To top it up, it was one of the most cultural diverse multi-ethnic communities. Many from all over the country and from across the border wanted to live in the thriving capital city of a rich small country. While the local residents had brought these amazingly rich cultures and their arts, the city infrastructure imposed an urban Culture and encouraged certain types of Arts.

What Culture? Whose Culture? 

Before Zimbabwe’s independence from British rule in 1980, Mbare was an area where black people lived. No white people lived there, except the occasional Catholic parish priest. The white police officers and local authority superintendents only came in the morning to work and left in the evening. They lived in the white suburbs or neighbourhoods buffered by the industrial and commercial areas.

A couple of main roads connected the neighbourhood to the rest of the world and these roads could be sealed off by police when the little children’s parents started making noise about human rights and conditions of living in the area. Judging from the way the police carried themselves, the sporadic episodes of them chasing black people with dogs, motor bikes and anti-riot vehicles sometimes seemed like a big-people game to the children. It was all part of the urban cultural landscape. A small white community of European descent had ruled Zimbabwe since 1896 and had ‘built’ a new ‘nation’ called Rhodesia, culture included.

What Culture? Whose Culture? 

In the 70s, little ones in Mbare had fun at the cinemas. They watched James Bond’s Gold Finger and James Coburn in A Man Called Flint and played guns and spies after. They watched cowboys and Indians and hunted down Indians in the neighbourhood after the film. They watched Bruce Lee’s Enter The Dragon and fancied themselves martial arts experts.

In the local library, some read Shakespeare. At school they were recited Christopher Columbus and David Livingstone’s journeys of discovery of new worlds and cultures. At home they were told that Livingstone had discovered and named the mighty Victoria Falls in honour of his own queen. The same falls were their own heritage and known at home as Mosi-oa-Tunya (Tokaleya Tonga: the Smoke that Thunders). Black teachers taught new history and culture while parents and grandparents taught the old history and culture.

In the 70s, the little ones in Mbare had fun in the public swimming pool named after one of the early European settlers who had moved their ancestors off their land. In the chlorinated swimming pool they dreamt and trained to become the 1972 seven-times gold medalist and American, Mark Spitz,.... together with the Speedo swimming trunks! They played football and gave one another new names like Pele and Socrates after the football giants of Brazil. They embraced global culture before global became trendy.

What Culture? Whose Culture? 

Mbare Municipal Library (Photo: Farai Mpfunya)

Zimbabwe held harmonised elections in July 2013, as it does every five years or so. These elections were declared peaceful by the whole world. Many Zimbabweans had prayed for peace to prevail, partly because, the last time round, elections got violent in some areas and development stood still. Zimbabweans also have a genuine culture of peace. While the ruling party, ZANU (FP), was obviously over the moon with the results of the elections, because they won overwhelmingly, some were surprised and others angered. Nonetheless, the morning after, life in Zimbabwe continued as peaceful as it had started before electioneering. The will of the diverse people of Zimbabwe had been expressed. End of story, right?

Not so for my country. The result was dissected for its fairness and credibility. Internally, the major opposition party contested both the fairness and credibility of the process and result. African regional and continental political bodies that had sent monitoring observers on the ground were quick to endorse the results as a credible representation of the will of the people, while some powerful western countries, who had not been allowed to send official monitoring observers on the ground, were quick to hold their judgment on the credibility of the result as a true representation of the will of the people.....of Zimbabwe.

The culture of voting in Zimbabwe had not impressed them. 

National Gallery Visual Arts School, Mbare Department (Photo: farai Mpfunya)

The sitting President of Zimbabwe, a hero of the war of liberation against colonial rule, has had a decade of diplomatic fights with western countries. They put him under targeted sanctions together with about a hundred of his comrades, also heroes of the war of liberation against colonial rule. While all this was going on, the little ones in Mbare played their new games in not-so-looked after spaces. They blame the sanctions. While a new culture of poverty pervades the landscape, deep resilience reigns.

Undeterred by his critics, the President claimed victory in the harmonised elections, was inaugurated into power by the Chief Justice and proceeded to appoint a new cabinet and form a new government. Government ministries where reduced, a new Ministry of Sports, Arts and Culture was announced. Many in the Arts and Culture sector who had lobbied for a separate ministry for years were surprised. They got more than they had expected, though they have to figure out what to do with their sporty sisters.

The little boys and girls of Mbare are anxious that their run down facilities, following years of targeted sanctions, will be refurbished, their neighbourhood will be regenerated. New energy will certainly return in their cultures.....Facebook, Twitter............

What Culture? Whose Culture? 

Farai Mpfunya is the founding and executive Director of the Culture Fund of Zimbabwe Trust, the biggest local funding organisation in Zimbabwe’s Arts and Culture sector.  Farai Mpfunya served on the Arterial Network’s Cultural Policy Task Group that created a framework for enabling African governments in cultural policy making. Educated in Zimbabwe, France and England, he started his professional career in the public and then corporate sectors, having studied electronics engineering and then business administration (MBA) before career shifting to filmmaking and then arts and culture administration. Farai is a Chevening Scholar, a fellow of the Salzburg Global Seminar (Session 490) and DeVos Institute of Arts Management at the Kennedy Center.

Opera and the City

Musical journey in 5 acts, hommage to Maria Callas (Source: Lifo)

In early 2011, the debt of the National Opera of Greece (NOG) was over 17 million Euro and there was a serious threat of closure. When two weeks ago the NOG artistic director Myron Michaelides gave a press conference presenting the 2013-2014 season, the picture was quite different:

Guest post: "Where there is a will, there will be a well", by Sunil Vishnu (Índia)

Sunil Vishnu is the young man who went after his dream: to make theatre. Together with a friend from university he founded EVAM in 2003 in the city of Chennai, India. As an independent arts organization, EVAM is facing a number of challenges in order to survive, to grow and to maintain the quality of its work. What does this mean exactly for a theatre company in India, where governement funding is extremely low, arts philanthropy almost inexistent and there´s a general lack of interest in the arts? Well, Sunil was surprised to find out that there was a ‘well’ of interest, care and money right there for EVAM. He shares this experience and his learnings with us. mv

The EVAM team

As I started writing this piece and looked for a title I thought this inspired by original proverb line would be perfect because, for me, it describes the state of art makers today in the world. The proverb talks about the human will – the only thing which keeps an artist going, despite all the challenges he faces - and the ‘well’ – the means which enable him to create art and share it with the audience, that is funding and resources. Over the years, the will has remained the same, but the wells have eventually dried up. The latest solution is not to dig deeper in the well or find new ones, but to go to every other person in the village who has water and ask them to share it with you, in return for sharing the ownership of the dream with him. This is what the world calls crowdfunding and it’s in this context that I write this article.

So how do the independent artists and arts organizations survive and grow? Let’s look at my organization, EVAM. EVAM is a thriving arts organization with the mission of making a positive impact in the lives of people using the medium of theatre through live performances, managing artistic events and art education. As we turn 10 this year and have successfully evaded the threat of being closed down, I look at the various sources of funding we have had over the years. We started by investing our own money (2 Lakhs – 3000 USD) back in 2003. Six months later, we got our first sponsor (a private bank HSBC) and thought of adopting the advertising-driven model, where brands would look at EVAM as a means to reach out to their potential customers. Ticketing revenue and sponsorship sustained us until 2004. That year we decided to perform shows for other organizations at a given fee and also co-launched the Hindu MetroPlus Theatre Fest, the managing of live art events/fests becoming the next revenue generator. By 2009 we were into education, doing workshops and adding another source of income. All this without approaching the government - their support for the arts being weak, anyway. This was an option. Call it ego, self-esteem or fool hardiness, we wanted to make it on our own terms, never compromising the artistic output.

Then, we realized.our dreams were getting bigger, but the well was becoming dry. We  looked for different wells, but other fellow artists doing the same. It was around that time that I started my arts management fellowship at the Kennedy Center in Washington. The first big learning was arts philanthropy. India didn’t have a culture or appetite for it. There is a general apathy towards the arts and the educational system itself dubs the arts among the least preferred subjects. Nevertheless, I knew we had a ‘family’ of audiences and important people in the society who would want to contribute financially and to be part of our organization’s journey, not as a full-time investor or sponsor, but more like a ‘special appearance’ actor in a film.

That’s when the learning from the fellowship (dream big - concentrate on great art - share the dream with your family - make them part of it) came to the forefront: my family members could not sponsor a show of mine, but they could give some money as individuals for a specific project if they believed in it. It was at that time, in 2012, that an NGO called Nalandaway launched a new online crowdfunding portal, Orange Street, which offered artists a platform to put up projects related to a cause and seek funding. Initially, I was sceptical about it. Why would an audience member, who currently spends  1000 Rupees (16 USD) a year to watch my plays, give me money to create something if they could give directly to the cause? But we went ahead and made a video explaining what we were doing and why we were seeking funds. Our project was the creation of a play, Shekinah Jacob’s The long way home, which we would perform across India, spreading awareness about child trafficking.

We needed 5 lakhs (8000 USD) to do the project. Within hours from putting it up on the platform, someone invested  5000 Rupees (80 USD) and we were awestruck. Within one day we got 7500 Rupees (120 USD) from people we didn´t even know! At the same time, we started an internal campaign: we started calling, sending e-mails or texting all our stakeholders, people we knew, audience members; we also put an ad on Facebook, Twitter and our website. Slowly and steadily contributions increased, this was actually possible!

But the time came when we had made every possible contact and the well seemed to be drying once again. My staff was busy creating this show and doing many other things and had no more time to run this campaign. The momentum dipped and we thought “OK, maybe this is all we can do”. 

That’s when a music band,  Jersey Rhythms, called us from New Jersey and said: “Hey, we want to contribute, we´ll do a charity show for you!”.  We were stupefied! A group from Jersey who we didn’t know us, was actually following our campaign in India and wanted to contribute! Suddenly, my organization realized that this movement was bigger than just the 9 of us in this office. We picked up once again and made sure this fundraising campaign became part of our daily rigour: we had a bell in the office ringing every time a new donation would come in. In the following 2 months Jersey Rhythms raised more than 75000 Rupees (1200 USD). The long way home was created and performed across India, managing to raise awareness regarding the cause it aimed to support.

We had found a new source of energy, enthusiasm and funds. Our family (namely the audience, partnering organizations, individuals who care for us, sponsors, etc.) was willing to invest in our projects in their own small way, if we were open to sharing our dream with them. A year later, in 2013 and once again through crowdfunding, we were able to send 150 underprivileged children to a summer arts camp. Our aim for 2014 is to launch a crowdfunded film and play which will be purely ‘art for art’s sake and not art for a cause’. This will be a true trust of the theory that maybe crowdfunding is the first big step in the direction of arts philanthropy in India.

In the meanwhile, here are a few of my learnings on this journey:

If you want to create projects based on crowdfunding

a) Create a genuine project – put it on a genuine site, don’t phaff! (people can see right through a fake project);

b) Create a strong ASK – what’s the project, who does it impact and how, why are you doing it and where are funds going to be utilized, and hence why should anyone donate for the project;

c) Always have a limited time frame for the fundraising – depending on the size of the amount to be raised (3 months to 1 year); also, be specific about what you´re asking (egg. “Please invest 500 Ruppess for the project by 15^th Jan 2013”);

d) Don’t make this the only source of funding for your project;

e) Use the equity of the platform (the site) to generate more awareness;

f) Note down the names of people who invest and follow up with them, thanking them. Make them part of the project in the way they prefer to (could be as simple as sending e-mail updates to as much as coming and doing backstage for free!);

g) Don’t be ashamed to ask for money – you are asking people to share your dream, it´s an investment they are making; actually they are as good as co-producers of the project;

h) People have a need to feel ‘connected’ and ‘counted’ – make sure you give the people both through this relationship;

i) Create a communications plan and rope in various key game-changers who can endorse your project; celebrities are welcome…;

j) Internally, keep your team motivated, give them incentives to run; reward them, acknowledge them – it’s quite a thankless job otherwise!

People will contribute when:

a) They love you as a person and want to be part of your journey;

b) They love your organization and its mission;

c) They believe in the impact your project will create on people;

d) They can’t do what you do – hence they want to live your life vicariously!

As I said earlier, where there is a will, there is a well.  Go and keep digging wells, but don’t forget the rivers and streams and ponds and seas which are the people around us. Invite your family to be part of your journey, you will be surprised with the love and trust they will shower on you!

Sunil Vishnu K is co-founder, CEO and artistic director of  EVAM, an award-winning theatre entrepreneurship. Founded in 2003 by Sunil and Karthik Kumar, EVAM is today a 10-year-young thriving arts business which performs plays, manages live art events and works in arts education. Sunil receveid the Performing Arts Entrepreneur Award from the British Council in 2010 and completed the Summer Arts Management Fellowship at Devos Institute of Arts Management at the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in 2013.

The reconquest

Wolf Trap National Park for the Performing Arts, Washington DC (Photo: bigbirdz on Flickr)

In Ancient Greece, drama was part of what, nowadays, one would call pop or mass culture. Ancient Greeks would fill their theatres in the thousands. They would bring food with them, as they would spend the whole day at the amphitheatre. They would eat during performances and they would throw food or shout at the actors if they didn´t like what was being presented. They would also intervene, ask questions or express opinions regarding the plot.

Guest post: "Art under siege", by Chaymaa Ramzy El Dessouky (Egypt)

There is a special type of Alexandrian woman: one that is determined, opinionated, confident, full of energy, ideas and dreams and has got an amazing working capacity. Chaymaa Ramzy is that type of Alexandrian. Given all these characteristics, she´s not a person who will step back when encountering difficulties or facing controversy. Among the various projects she´s involved in, one that has really captured her heart is Marsam 301, a project based in Bethlehem, Palestine, involving people from various arab countries and one whose headquarters she´s not able to set her eyes on. For the time being... mv

Street events (Photo: Marsam 301)

“I don't remember when exactly I read my first comic book, but I do remember exactly how liberated and subversive I felt as a result.”

― Edward W. Said, Palestine

How do we define ‘siege’? Is it a physical siege, or rather a psychological one? Are we able as simple people to overcome its boundaries? Is a siege a boundary? Or it is just a limitation to some lands and spaces that we should continuously dream to fly high over?

Questions that may have different answers, which each one of us can interpret according to his or her own situation, place or style of living.

Palestine: The people, the territory, the country and the Holy Land. The experience that everyone is looking forward to. Some of us can and many can’t. One can dream of the beauty of its alleys, the kindness of its people and enjoy the non-ending stories of its houses and streets.

When Monther Jawabreh, a prominent visual artist from Bethlehem, first started thinking about founding a new cultural space, “Marsam 301” (Studio 301), he did not think about promoting art in its traditional spaces, but in different ones, where one can be touched by a story, listen to a local dialect, hear life loudly in spaces like houses, schools, hospitals and maybe prisons.

Marsam 301 is an independent cultural space, located in the city of Bethlehem, Palestine. A place that stresses the empowerment of the Palestinian visual artist and the promotion of the Palestinian visual art in the Arab region and probably in the world! A vision shared with other artists, cultural managers and supporters from Palestine and other neighbour Arab countries.

The name “301” derives from the checkpoint Kabr Rahil (Rahil’s Tomb), which is located between Jerusalem and Bethlehem. An Israeli checkpoint known as ‘Barrier 300’ (Stand/Stop for inspection) prevents the crossing of the Palestinians to and from Jerusalem.  Marsam 301 is 2 kilometers away from the checkpoint, right in the center of the city of Bethlehem. So Marsam 301 took this name in order to be the second barrier that will force the Palestinians to Stand/ Stop to see art. 301 is also the number of the building.

Marsam 301, the space (Photo: Marsam 301)

“Raiding houses, kidnapping people, bombing cafés” might sound dangerous! But when you hear it from the Marsam 301 team you understand their mission and eagerness to raid houses with Art, to kidnap people and keep them long in art galleries and to bomb all the cafés of the alley with colors. A vision that is derived from their social surrounding and their daily dialect, to transform the current social and political siege into a sense of happiness and appreciation of the arts.  A vision that would liberate minds and would raise awareness about a true relationship that should exist between the artist and his community.

Marsam 301´s three main programmes include at this stage the promotion of the Palestinian visual art and the capacity building of young Palestinian artists. Another important programme aims to bring arts to the streets and to the non-traditional spaces, even to create art in its non- traditional forms. Finally, an artistic residency hosts other artists who are willing to live the Palestinian art exchange experience, whether from the Arab region or from any part of the world.

Through these three programmes, Marsam 301 team wishes to play an important role in the Palestinian art scene by linking a large number of young emerging artists with other prominent and well based ones. Also, to build a new relationship between these two types of artists that might benefit at this stage from sharing experiences and debating certain topics. An idea that has been confirmed and appreciated by Tamam Al Akhal, a prominent Palestinian visual artist, during the team´s last meeting in Amman, Jordan. Al Akhal strongly shares Marsam 301´s vision and goals.

The team met recently in Amman, Jordan. (Photo: Marsam 301)

This extraordinary experience which, in my opinion (being proudly one of its founders, together with Iman Bachir from Lebanon and Ahed Izhiman from Palestine), will contribute to the Palestinian art scene greatly, with a rich impact on the people and the community. It will allow for access to the arts at any place and at any time. By providing an insight into the arts that reflect the reality of the country and expressing people’s views, opinions and emotions to the outer. An experience that places the artists in the heart of the society.

Marsam 301 will continue with its strategy to help develop the Palestinian community, hoping that, one day, people will draw their own freedom and will never stand or feel under siege!

To contact Marsam 301 please write to marsam301(at)gmail.com or visit us on Facebook.

Chaymaa Ramzy El Dessouky is the Program Officer at the Anna Lindh Foundation (ALF) in Alexandria, Egypt; an International Fellow of Arts Management at the Kennedy Center for Performing Arts, Washington DC; founding member of Marsam 301 in Bethlehem, Palestine. Born in Alexandria, she graduated from the Faculty of Commerce - Alexandria University with a Bachelor degree in Business Administration and Strategic Marketing. With her experience as a trainer, she provides strategic support to civil society organizations and emerging bodies in the Arab region, helping them to create strategies that enhance their capacity in marketing, advertising and strategic planning. She brings people together using her networking skills and wide circle of contacts within the Euromed region. Through her fellowship at the Kennedy Center, she wishes to focus on developing a marketing plan that will help engage the press and incorporate social media platforms to empower local events in Egypt. Chaymaa organizes the Alexandria ‘s Annual Intercultural Festival “Farah El Bahr” with the Anna Lindh Foundation. She is also involved in creating the strategic plan for Marsam 301 in Bethlehem, Palestine, being part of a regional team of people from different Arab countries.

Contacts:
Chaymaa.ramzy(at)gmail.com
Chaymaa.ramzy(at)bibalex.org

Elitism for all

Eszter Szabó, Our Lady, 2012 (Photo: Maria Vlachou)

And suddenly, in less than a week, there were three different posts on Facebook, written by three different people, referring to three different situations, but with a common underlying question: cultural elitism.

First, cultural programmer António Pinto Ribeiro criticized poet Herberto Helder's publisher who announced that the poet's latest book would be a unique and limited edition. He considered this to be an offensive marketing campaign, an arrogant decision, little dignifying for all those involved. Someone commented that this was probably the poet's option – feeling uncomfortable for becoming very fashionable and wishing to turn his books into less accessible objects. António Pinto Ribeiro reaffirmed his criticism (read the post here).

Guest post: "'The Fairy Queen' in South Africa", by Shirley Apthorp

I met Shirley Aprthorp a few months ago in a conference in Lisbon. At that time, I heard her speak about young people in South Africa filling a 6000-seat venue in order to participate in a national opera contest (a “dying” art form, some say…). After that, we stayed in touch through Facebook, and there I could follow all the preparations for the presentation of Purcell´s The Fairy Queen in Johannesburg and Cape Town. In this post, Shirley writes about the love for opera among South African school children; about Umculo, the music organization she founded; and about her conviction that South Africa has a huge role to play in the future of opera as a meaningful artform for the whole world. mv

The Fairy Queen, Umculo 2012/2013 (Photo: Neil Baynes)

Setting the table

Netherlands Architecture Institute (Photo: Maria Vlachou)

How complicated can it be to set a table for a meal? Probably more than you think and not for the reasons you might think. A few years ago I visited the Netherlands Architecture Institute in Rotterdam and one of the ‘installations’ particularly drew my attention. A table was set for a meal and visitors were informed that the mayor had invited for lunch people who lived in the city but were born in other countries (half of Rotterdam´s population belongs to an immigrant community). Setting the table meant that a number of cultural issues had to be taken into consideration. “Sharing food with strangers”, one read on a panel, “can be as complicated as living together in a multicultural city.” Sitting around a table for a meal, as such; men and women together; sharing food with people from other religions; cooking for people with different dietary requirements; these were all issues the hosts had to think about. I was left thinking how rich, and possibly also transformative, this simple exprerience of having a meal together would be for those directly involved, but also for those following the event. How many things one can learn about the ‘other’ just by accepting this invitation, by being together, by being introduced to the ‘other’.  How many things one can learn when the opportunity is given and taken.

Netherlands Architecture Institute (Photo: Maria Vlachou)

Gender, colour, ethnicity, religion, sexual orientation, physical and mental or financial capacities, are just some of the characterirstics that make another human being the ‘other’. First we see the characteriristic, after (and not always) the actual human being. They constitute barriers which, allied to ignorance, may cause detachment, incomprehension, fear, discomfort, rage, leading to discrimination or racism.

Last summer, my son and I watched many transmissions of the Paralympic Games. I didn´t want to influence him as to how he should look at the athletes, what he should think or feel. We screamed, we applauded, we celebrated with the winners. Yet, I could feel that he was not totally comfortable. One day he came to me and said: “I feel a bit sad for them.” There, it had come out. I told him that I knew, that some times I felt sad too, but that I would look at them and see how happy and proud they were of their results and the sadness would go away. I told him that they live their lives in a different way, but that it´s not a sad life because of that, it´s just different in some aspects.

Paralympic Games, London 2012 (Image taken from the newspaper The Telegraph; photo Lefteris  Pitarakis /AP)

There was a lot of discussion at the time, in the media and in other informal forums, regarding the effect the transmission of the Paralympic Games would have on the way we all perceive disability. Journalists in different countries referred to the athletes as heroes, to their efforts as superhuman. I kept thinking if this was the right way to portray disabled athletes or if we should look at them as people with different abilities making the same enormous effort to obtain good results as any other athlete; in their way. I believed that this should be exactly the result we should expect from the transmission of the Games in what concerns changing the public´s perceptions. Look at the people behind the disability, not to highlight it and let it define them.

And then, I came across an article entitled Disabled people are notyour inspiration.  Written by S.E. Smith, it made me feel that my thinking was not very far from the thinking of (at least some) disabled people. She wrote about the emotion she felt when watching the opening ceremony and how the whole thing – watching disabled athletes parade, disabled artists perform, asking “those who are able” to stand for the national anthem - made her feel ‘normal’ for a change. At the same time, she expressed her frustration with the fact that disabled athletes where being seen as “amazing”, “moving”, an “inspiration” for others. Quoting another disabled person, she stated: “The whole idea that we’re inspiring is grounded in the ‘assumption that [disabled] people have terrible lives and that it takes some extra kind of pluck or courage to live them.’”

When I started working with disabled people in the cultural sector, my aim when promoting events was to highlight the disability. I believed that that´s what truly differentiated the offer, that´s what would catch people´s attention and curiosity, that´s what would make them feel surprised and impressed and create the wish to attend. In the meantime, I learned two things: that people do feel impressed and amazed, but they tend to consider the offer as of lower artistic quality and they don´t necessarily wish to attend; and that disabled artists don´t wish to be seen firstly as disabled, they wish to be seen as artists.

I was recently invited to participate in a debate regarding disability and the media, organized by Fundação AFID Diferença. People representing associations for the disabled complained of the fact that there is little space for their stories in the media and that usually the media is interested in sad, tragic tales, which catch people´s attention and make them feel sorry (and probably also lucky and relieved that they are not sharing a disabled person´s ‘fate’). Happy, positive, optimistic stories involving disabled people rarely get coverage.

This is true. But at the same time, I am thinking that maybe this is not what should concern us the most. Sharing a good story through the media may, actually, help change people´s perceptions and fight certain prejudices. But will it be as effective as actually providing a space where people can be together, get to see and know each other, talk, share, coexist, interact, acknowledge the difference and not consider it a problem? For me, culture and cultural venues can do exactly that. They can provide a ‘place’ to meet the ‘other’.

When I was working at the Pavilion of Knowledge (at the time when it had a service for people with disabilities, unique in Portugal and a reference also abroad), I know there were visitors that would actually see or come close to disabled people (visitors or members of staff) for the first time. One of the first events I was involved in was the celebration of Helen Keller Day in 2001, where school children that could not see or could neither see nor hear showed other school children, who could both see and hear, that they had their own ways of communication and learning at school.

Desafinado, Grupo Dançando com a Diferença (Photo: Júlio Silva Castro)

Later on, when I worked at Lisbon´s Municipal Theatre, we organized the first sessions with interpretation of theatre plays in Portuguese Sign Language. Both hearing and non-hearing people would sit in the same room and enjoy the same performance. For some, attending a play with interpretation in PSL was an experience they had never had before; others would realize for the first time that there exist deaf people and they can actually go to the theatre; deaf people were pleased to see that they were in the same performance with hearing people, that it was not a ‘special’ session, just for them. Some time later, when we presented performances by Vo´Arte and Grupo Dançando com a Diferença or Inkomati (dis)cord by Boyzie Cekwana and Panaibra Canda in the last alkantara festival, the audience was not ‘warned’ beforehand that there were disabled dancers on stage, they came and found out for themselves. And I believe that many saw the person, the artist, first and were also pleasantly surprised with the quality of the performance.  Nobody needed to tell them a happy story, it was there, in front of them, they could see it and even talk to it.

When actor Morgan Freeman was asked “How can we fight racism”, his answer was short and clear: “Stop talking about it”. When Daniel Barenboim was asked about the impact the West-Eastern Divan Orchestra may have on the peace process between Israel and Palestine, he was quick to clarify: "The Divan is not a love story, and it is not a peace story. It has very flatteringly been described as a project for peace. It isn't. It's not going to bring peace, whether you play well or not so well. The Divan was conceived as a project against ignorance.” A way of fighting ignorance is bringing the people together, give them the chance to get to know each other, their differences and their similarities. The more encounters there are, the more we trust, the more we are willing to learn and understand, the more we respect, the more we acknowledge the richness in diversity. The more we see the person and wish to share a meal; in certain cultures, the ultimate gesture of friendship and hospitality.

Still on this blog:

Places of encounter

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The beginning and the ending of a b&w week in Vienna

A midcrisis night´s dream?

I like the word ‘campaign’, it transmits to me the feeling of an ongoing effort to promote a cause. I don´t like that much the word ‘manifesto’, I tend to associate it to a momentary action, using big abstract words and doing little after. So, I got very curious the other day when I read a subtitle in a Guardian article explaining that “What Next? campaign aims to promote public investment in the arts by making culture a ‘manifesto issue’” (nothing unusual in this, of course, it´s just my prejudice regarding the two words...).

So the article talked about a movement slowly being created by leaders of arts organisations since 2011. They´ve been meeting every Wednesday (just in London, though) and at the time the article was published, they were getting ready for their first large-scale public event. Their main goals: to get every MP involved in the work of their local arts organisations; to draw in the campaign local councillors, businessmen, school and college directors; to harness the voices of audiences, visitors, members. In the words of Alistair Spalding, artistic director of Sadler's Wells theatre, the long-term aim of What Next? is to "actually get the public to understand the value of culture, so that it becomes a manifesto issue… One of the primary aims, which the arts hasn't yet achieved, is to get the public on our side."

I saw a plan here. One that took time to build, but people (arts leaders) worked on it consistently and with a purpose. I am very interested to see how they are now going to go about meeting their goals, one of which particularly cought my attention: “to harness the voices of audiences, visitors, members”. At a time when the British government is once again aiming to pursue culture´s instrumental values (has any government ever given more money to culture because of its – proven - economic benefits?), the What Next? campaign wants to get people on their side, to harness their voices. But, there´s one issue for me here: What are the people expected to talk about? What is the value of culture the campaigners want to ‘get the public to understand’?

John Holden, in his essay Cultural value and the crisis of legitimacy, puts the essence of all this in just a few words: “The answer to the question ‘why fund culture?’ should be ‘because the public wants it’”. Are we ever going to reach this point? Maybe, if cultural professionals started listening (instead of trying to make people understand) and then got involved in a real debate, concentrating on issues that are important for both sides and speaking a language everyone understands. Most people do appreciate a form of cultural expression and they know why it is important in their lives, they know why they value it, they know why they couldn´t live without it. They also know what makes them feel uncomfortable, what is the kind of attitude that makes them feel excluded or unwelcome, what is not for them, for one reason or another.  So, let´s ask them, instead of trying to impose our views, make them understand or tell them what we think is good for them. Let´s listen and then share with them our views on why and how we think our offer meets their needs. Let´s identify our common ground, work together, campaign for something that we all value.

This makes me, inevitably, think of Portugal. In the last two or three years the cultural sector saw the emergence of a couple of so-called movements, more than one manifestos - the usual big and abstract words -, but no ‘aftermath’. There was no careful building of a campaign, no specific goals were either announced or pursued, no consistent and permanent action undertaken. What we share in public is our frustration or fury for losing public funds; our amazement at the fact that people are not coming to see our top quality performance (“don´t they get it?”); our conviction that they don´t care about culture (or rather the ’right’ culture). Is this a way of making friends...? Is this the way of establishing common ground?

Composer António Pinho Vargas wrote on Facebook one of this days (the post was re-published here) that he never uses the word ‘sustainability’ and he is obliged to hear and read it almost every day. I like to read him and I don´t disagree with the general point of his post. I don´t share his feelings and thoughts, though, regarding the word ‘sustainability’, probably because I don´t understand it the way he does: that everything has to pay for itself. And he was questioning: “Can culture be suatainable?”.

This is not what sustainability means when it comes to the cultural sector. Culture alone will never pay for itself, because it´s not a product that becomes more profitable with time (we need the same number of musicians as in the 19^th century to perform Mahler´s symphonies; a concert hall has a specific number of seats and doesn´t grow in order to sell more tickets; etc., etc.). Costs of production and performance keep growing in the cultural sector, while we need to keep the price of tickets at affordable levels. So, our efforts to be sustainable mean that we need to try and fill the always growing gap between expenditure and income (and to depend on one income source is not a good idea, it never was).

This effort has got everything to do with people, the relationship we establish and nurture with society. Sustainability is not about money in the first place; it´s about people. In order to be able to say one day that culture must be funded “because the public wants it”, we still need to work a lot on this relationship. First we need to listen and better understand what people value in their diverse cultural participations.  Following this, our attitude, choices, priorities, the way we speak should unequivocally transmit our wish and will to include them. Our mission should be clear to all, our plans transparent, our choices understandable. And we should be accountable for our actions. This relationship should be about sharing, not imposing. This relationship can only exist because of something we all value.

Still on this blog:

Ministry of Culture: Which culture? Whose culture?

We are for people. Or... are we?

So, what´s the plan?
On public value

 

Guest post: "A question of value", by Rebecca Lamoin (Australia)

More readings:
John Holden, Capturing cultural value
John Holden, Culture and Class

Guest post: "One can´t make omelets without breaking eggs - Regarding the project Temporary Occupations", by Elisa Santos (Maputo - Mindelo - Lisbon)

I enjoyed very much listening to Elisa Santos talking about the Temporary Occupations. Projects like this one, which bring people together around an idea, which look for new ways, which make things happen ‘despite’, they always draw my attention, they transmit enthusiasm to me, they remind me that a lot, so much indeed, is possible when people want to. But there is a limit and Elisa is determined to remind us of it. There is a limit that the will to do should not surpass; because we have a responsibility and because we owe respect, to the works, to the artists and to the audiences. mv 

On Jaimito´s Facebook, 24th of July Av., Maputo, 2011. A citizen is leaving a comment on artist Azagaia´s installation.  (Photo: Ocupações Temporárias)

It is a fallacy, one frequently used in these times of scarce resources, to assume that it is possible to do without means, crossdressing the argument with epithets of innovation and entrepreneurship. The whole exaltation, more or less naive, more or less politcally adjusted, that it is this “magic” that will save us, is a serious contribution towards disinformation, decapitalization and the implementation of a strategy of mediocrity, in any field. This is my firm conviction. And it is equally firm with regards to any field, but even more in what concerns the artistic and cultural field in particular.  

In 2010 I challenged a group of six Mozambican artists to make an exhibition in different molds than the ones they were used to and as an answer to a pressing issue in the city of Maputo which they themselves were proclaiming: the suffocation felt by artists, caused by the lack of spaces of presentation (the existing ones have a closed and repetitive programming) and of audiences (equally closed and repetitive). This suffocation was not related to the quantity of woks produced, but to the incentives for creation, since the spaces for critique, the opportunities for discussion, for the exchange and contact with new languages, tecniques and issues seemed to bypass the circuit of presentation of the capital of Mozambique.

Meeting with artists for the 2010 edition. (Photo: Ocupações Temporárias)

To make an exhibition, or rather six exhibitions, in two months, with a coordination/production totally unknown to the local agents and possible funders, with a group of artists doing a number of other things that would guarantee their living and without an institution formally promoting it, can it be considered venture without means? It may seem like it, but it´s not. The first “version” of Temporary Occupations  - this is the project name – was discussed in meetings on a esplanade, was produced on coffee shop tables and using free public Wi-Fi; its opening date was set to coincide with the Jo’burg Art Fair, in the (perhaps naive) hope that curators, commissioners, buyers, collectors that would attend the event might become interested in Maputo, just around the corner; Facebook and a blog were the main means of promotion and communication. These were the means available. The artists themselves put their own means at the disposal of the project. The first Occupations had a financial support of 3.000USD. In our final report we accounted for the pro bono contributions (production, design and translation, for example), but we were never able to account for all the means that were made available in order to make the Occupations happen.

In 2011 we wanted to risk again. We thought that it would be easier to raise funds, because we had a file that proved our seriousness and transparency in managing the project, the involvement of the participants and the sustainability of the idea, which did not have as a base a fixed, heavy and expensive structure estructure and that, above all, there was a need, that is, it was not a commitment imposed by a calendar, but an action justified in the city´s artistic and cultural context. All arguments were acknowledged, we were praised and pointed out as an interesting case – both in what concerns the essence of the project and its management -, nevertheless, the financial resources, in particular the funds for international cooperation, are aimed at reinforcing institutions and civil society, where we did not fit because we were not a legal entity, that is, the project was not based on a formal organization, did not correspond with the calendars of funding allocations, did not guarantee its existence for the next year. Even though, we persisted and the subject chosen for the Temporary Occupations 20.11 was Precariousness.  The opening took place on the 11^th of September and we had the support of Goethe Institut in Maputo and the Swiss Embassy, in a total of €2000.

View of artist Paulo Kapela´s installation in the streets of Maputo, 2012. (Photo: Ocupações Temporárias)

The conditions for this version of the Occupations were even harder than the previous year´s, nevertheless, it mobilized the artists of 2010 and those of 2011, and once again friends, acquaintances, strangers who had seen us the year before and, once more, there was a lot of investment (also financial) on behalf of those involved. The result was very positive, but, as an international commissioner said, it had reached the limit of what was possible, of what was acceptable. Because there is a limit for the dignity (of the works, of the artists, of the audiences) assessed according to the conditions of presentation, of production and enjoyment of an exhibition.  

In 2012, the Temporary Occupations, under the theme of Foreigners, finally had what one might call “the means”, thanks to the exclusive funding of the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation, which decided to support the exhibition in Maputo and to propose and promote it in two more countries (Cape Vert and Angola) and also to schedule in 2013, in its head office in Lisbon, a documental exhibition of the whole process. Without these resources, without this support, the Occupations in Maputo wouldn´t have happened, not in the molds they did actually happen, not even in the molds of previous editions. It wouldn´t have been possible to insist on askingalways  for the support of the same people just to prove that we have the capacity to make things happen, when this capacity, although acknowledged in theory, did not get in return the support of those institutions which aim to support this kind of initiatives. Without these means, the Occupations would have terninated in 2011.

All the editions fulfilled the initial objectives: to attract the attention of different audiences that would be confronted with the works in the public space; to confront the artists with new spaces. Although it is not possible to count the number of visitors, the works have undeniably been seen by thousands if people. Another, more specific, audience - that of cultural agents, artists and arts students – also saw the Occupations and there was a lot of conversation, discussions and stands regarding the initiative. To prove this, one may consider the interest expressed regarding the dates and themes of the following edition, the ways to apply, as well as the invitations to talk or write about this initiative.

Although the Temporary Occupations were seen, since their first edition, at distance, from a number of programmers, critics, curators, gallery owners and other artists, we have not managed to gain international notoriety, to draw the attention of new markets, namely the south african one, to give national visibility to the production of contemporary art; these were very big challenges that we wouldn´t be able to reach when the big majority of promotional materials was not translated, there were no catalogues of all the editions, there was not a good technical support or good images of the works, there was not a website or a good archive, allowing to access the information and the documentation of the different exhibitions.

Installation by artist Bento Oliveira at the Porto Grande airport on S.Vicente island, Cape Vert, 2012. (Photo: Ocupações Temporárias)

The great importance of the support received for 2012 and 2013 is exactly the fact that it made available financial and other resources, that made the exhibitions and other actions possible in order to internationalize the artists and to give visibility to a new production stemming from the emergence of an artistic community with new practices, different discourses and other proposals of intervention.  

As I stated in the beginning, the praise of the lack of resources as a potential instigator of creation and production, is false, and it may even become dangerous in what concerns the quality and independence of what is being produced.  The Temporary Occupations would be different with more means, with other menas, but would have never existed, as nothing exists, without means.

The exhibition Temporary Occupations – Documents may be seen at the Gulbenkian Foundation in Lisbon until May 26. Admission is free.

Elisa Santos was an independent cultural producer until 2002, when she took the post of Director of Production at the Teatro do Campo Alegre in Oporto. She worked in projects of cooperation and development in Angola and Mozambique between 2003 and 2012. She is a consultor in the fields of volunteering and cooperation, maintaining her activity as producer in the cultural field.