Category: issues

Report: Here Are The Cities That Spend The Most On Culture Worldwide

It suggests that a high proportion of national culture budgets is spent on capital cities because they have large ‘sunk investments’ that create a revenue and capital legacy. By contrast, in cities in China, which have less ‘legacy’ cultural infrastructure in which to invest, “it appears that Chinese cities are placing a greater priority on investing in newer and more commercial cultural forms”.

Britain’s Labour Party Promises “Culture For All” Policy

The manifesto identifies the creative industries as “the envy of the world, a source of national pride, a driver of inward investment and tourism and a symbol of the kind of country we are now and aspire to be in the future”. As Britain prepares to leave the EU, it states that Labour will “put our world-class creative sector at the heart of our negotiations and future industrial strategy”.

How Can Performing Arts Organizations Engage Gen Y And Millennials? Here Are A Few Ideas

There’s definitely hope for doing so, argues Olivia Carr: “Both [groups are] united in that they find value in experiences rather than material possessions. Live entertainment is a commodity that the latest long-form TV series cannot compete with, and is something that young people will continue to seek out.” First, though, she has a warning: “More than other generations, young people are hyper-aware of being sold to, and quickly zone out in the face of one-way sales messages.”

You’d Rather See/Read/Listen To “Junk” Culture Than Art Culture? Don’t Feel Bad…

A critical consensus forms and then is eventually replaced by a new one. What matters in the end is whether you are moved by something or not – it’s the only mark of quality that you can be sure of. To argue for the binning of established canons to make way for the lionisation of, say, Dumb and Dumber and 90210 would be absurd, yet it is just as daft to deny that “low” culture can have a powerful, and therefore equally valid, effect on us.

Leisure And Arts In North Korea (Yes, They Do Have Them, More Or Less)

Reporter Laya Maheshwari: “I travelled to North Korea in September last year [and] attended the state’s showpiece film festival in Pyongyang, and visited a pizzeria, a water park and a pub, as well as other destinations in and around the capital. In many societies, lights going out in an auditorium induces a sense of anonymity and spontaneity. Sure enough, the hours I spent in a North Korean cinema provided my most natural encounters with locals.”

Is Athens Becoming The Next Berlin?

Thanks to the still-struggling Greek economy, rents are low and there’s plenty of vacant space. Artists love those things, and they’ve started arriving in Athens from elsewhere in Europe. What’s more, Documenta is holding part of this year’s events there, the first time the festival has left Kassel in Germany. On the other hand, there’s not much of a contemporary art culture there yet, and few collectors. Alastair Sooke pays the city a visit.

Science’s “Facts” Problem – People Need Stories To Back Them Up

“Facts don’t speak for themselves. People like stories, whether they are factual doesn’t really matter, but scientists can make stories about science, including evidence and uncertainties… If there’s a weather disaster, public opinion swings. The 2003 heatwave convinced many Europeans that climate change is real. In the wake of those events people are receptive, and they want to know what happened.”