NYTimes.com: In Italy, the world-famous opera house La Scala faces a $9 million shortfall because of reductions in subsidies. In the Netherlands, government financing for arts programs has been cut by 25 percent. Portugal has abolished its Ministry of Culture.
Thursday, March 29, 2012
The Euro Crisis Is Hurting Cultural Groups
NYTimes.com: In Italy, the world-famous opera house La Scala faces a $9 million shortfall because of reductions in subsidies. In the Netherlands, government financing for arts programs has been cut by 25 percent. Portugal has abolished its Ministry of Culture.
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3 comments:
There's an interesting paradox of ideals beneath all of this.
Arts funding is being cut in Europe because the governments are slimming certain items, like arts & culture, their national budgets. They need tighten down on spending because of the Eurocrisis, the financial difficulties being faced by countries in the European Union because of other member countries misrepresenting their debt and weatlh. Essentially, what one country does can affect others, worst case scenario being a domino effect of bankruptcy and default. To avoid this, the dominoes next in line need to tighten down their spending.
European countries' art doesn't depend on entrepreneurs and donors like in the states, the government helps then out. But the European Union, has a lot of legislation in place to avoid economic disaster. Because of this the Arts are suffering.
Now let's look at America. We all know about the financial importance that private donors and business contributions have to the Arts (as well as sports, entertainment, and politics.) This is so because the government does not contribute significantly to the Arts. America has avoided - or perhaps still is - in a similiar economic crisis in Europe due to debt and default. But the big difference is the role of the government in business legislation and practices. In America the debt crisis was likely a result of Reaganomics losening the government's regulation on the economy.
So we have Europe, where government is big but the Arts are suffering. On the other hand, there's America where government is small yet the Arts are still suffering. What's better? Both clearly yielded their fair amount of trouble and both don't support the arts. Though, the arts suck all over the place, if the European Union works and the Eurocrisis is averted, one would be expect Arts budgets to be fatter. Maybe it's better to suffer through bad times with a promise of knowing how it can work and the hopes of it returning than suffering through the bad times knowing the way it always worked sucked.
It is really upsetting to see European arts organizations starting to lose support the way they are in the US. As the article states, the arts in Europe are seen as an integral part of culture, which is not necessarily the case here in the US. Here, arts programs can often be the first things on the chopping block when money gets tight, which means that future generations of Americans lose out on all that culture, much of which reaches us from Europe to start with. Art in the EU is much more government-sponsored, which is great because it shows that the entire country is behind the existence of a rich cultural community. Here most art is funded by private organizations and donors, and we have no "National" arts organizations (meaning no national theatres/concert halls/etc as opposed to the NEA, which is a grant-giving organization). Most European countries also have the advantage of being smaller in size, so it makes sense that there is a National Theatre in London or Paris, which the US is simply too vast to declare something like Lincoln Center or the Kennedy Center our "National" theatre. The point is, that hopefully the EU will be able to see that their arts structure works, and is worth fighting for, because of its worldwide importance.
I was going to start a discussion on the topic of government and the arts but Matt has already beaten me to it. I go back and forth on this issue. Many of my colleagues are more versed in this topic and will articulate themselves better. As a conservative I would say I’m against government funding of the arts but when I look at some of the greatest artistic output of Europe in the past 500 years, so much of that was government funded and driven. I’m not real clear on which side of this I fall. I would like to address the Italian protestors and say it is a travesty that some of these established companies are losing their funding. But in the words of me to my daughter “We cannot go to Copelia, two ballets this year is plenty” (Interpretation, “ Who is going to pay for this?”
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