[-empyre-] Art Funding and Politics in Greece and a broader context for Art Funding

[Ioannis Zannos]

Dear all, 

just after the beginning of the discussion on Art Funding and Politics has just started, a major event regarding politics and economy is taking place in Greece, following the decision to proceed to a referendum vote regarding the austerity measures and the financial policy of the government, requested by the EU and the IMF as a condition for a bailout of our national debt, which subsequently led to the formation of a new coalition interim government in Greece. In face of this, the priority of the topic of Art Funding recedes to a very low position in public discussion. So it is only fitting that the question was raised here about how current politics and economy in Greece affect the Art Funding issue. Art Funding here is not comparable to that in countries like the Netherlands, Germany, or other affluent states. For example, state funding for films exists, but the sums are very small, covering only a small fraction of art film costs, and the awards are so few that there is a long line of projects waiting for support. Recently, Lakis Lazopoulos, a well-known Greek TV-Comedian (to get an idea, think "Greek George Carlin"), co-organized an initiative to fund ultra-low, quasi DIY shoestring grass-root artists projects in a small performance festival. Scholarships for young artists exist, but they are small and extremely few, and overwhelmingly oriented towards established, traditional art genres. 

Turning from the local situation of Art Funding in Greece, I would like to comment on the situation of Art Funding in the broader context of academia, and of Education, as a related and partly overlapping field. Europe is currently experiencing severe cuts in University Education and Research funding (see repeated student protests in the UK). This is just one more turn in a downward spiral that started in Europe at least as far back as the cuts on Education and especially in the field of Arts and Humanities in the Thatcher Era. It is sad to watch the same arguments about the importance of the Humanities, Arts and Education in a society being voiced again and again, only to meet deaf ears in the face of economic realities. Yet economic reality and cultural reality are but two faces of the same coin, and work as complementary forces supporting a society. To mention an example known from film: The final minutes in the film "Charlie Wilson's War", where the US Congress refuses to spend even several million for education in the region of the former Soviet occupation in Afghanistan, while it has spent more than half a billion in arms and logistic support of the insurgents against the Soviets. We know the results: the Taliban and the current situation with terrorism. It seems that "War Against Drugs" and "War Against Terrorism" are considered more popular campaign motto's than "War Against Ignorance". In this sense, the decline of of Arts Funding could be seen as just one more sign of decline of western societies.

Admittedly, the sweeping statements above, however true, need at least further development if they are to prove of any value in funding strategies. However, associating the Arts with the Sciences and Education can in my opinion yield further and more refined candidates for argumentation, or at least point out where the differences are and where parallels may be drawn. Take for example the usual obligatory section in application proposals "Expected Benefits of the Proposed Work". Here the Art Project may appear as rather handicapped when compared for example to a medical or an environmental engineering project. But let us look at more abstract fields of science. In 1995, David Munford, then president of the International Mathematical Union, talked in an interview about the tasks of Mathematics Research in the 21st century. He said:  "I personally feel that a very important issue is to restore the free interchange of ideas between pure mathematicians and applied mathematicians. During the 19th century, you see that most mathematicians were both. Fourier series, for instance, were inspired by applications. But there has been a divergence, especially in the US, although I think to some extent in other countries too. I hope that the present emphasis on the usefulness of science in general (if the public is going to put money into scientific research, then it will be useful), will not lead simply to pushing applied subjects at the expense of work on pure subjects, but rather to a sense of common purpose where pure researchers can find inspiration in applications and use their theoretical ideas to grapple more effectively with applied problems. I think there has always been an interchange, but that will really be a major challenge. " (http://wmy2000.math.jussieu.fr/3_mumfo.html). However difficult it may seem to argue at that level, it seems to me that it is a "major challenge" which we cannot afford to permanently avoid. Rather, it is one to be taken head on, though it may require some fundamental thinking to tackle. An additional problem that faces the Arts is that, in addition to being more or less abstract, detached or "fantastic" (fanciful) in their scope, they are far less prone to formalism and precise formulation than Mathematics. Thus, in another quasi inevitable section of proposals: "Problems Addressed by the Project", one can hardly be as precise and concise as for example the list of current mathematics problems collected by the American Institute of Mathematics (see for example: http://aimpl.org/hilbertschemes/1/, or an even more details-rich list of problems: http://aimpl.org/tateconjecture/1/). The question that arises therefore is: What is (are) the mode(s) of discourse in the Arts, or what is a mode of discourse for the Arts, that might serve as ground for supporting funding claims and evaluation of projects? In other words, the present discussion at empyre is by necessity a prototypical meta-discourse on the Arts. By analogy, just as Mathematics has its own constellation of strategic alliances with applied fields, so do the Arts. Thus, to propose one at least more concrete step of enquiry in the issue, one might build a map of strategic alliances and try to describe the dependencies and dynamics between the Arts and allied fields. 

I hope that the above very general and theoretical remarks may be useful as part of a framework for discussing Art Funding. 

Iannis Zannos 

Associate Professor 
Department of Audiovisual Arts
Ionian University
Corfu, Greece

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