Art's Cuts
As both an actor and a writer you would expect me to be jumping on the bandwagon in denouncing the Arts Cuts and despairing for society. I'm not. In fact I am looking on with confusion and wondering why I cannot find an unbiased view point on this. Arts cuts are heavily reported in Newspapers like the Guardian who have been doing a countdown blog to yesterday. The coverage of this strikes me as excessive considering I have no real idea of how other cuts are affecting different areas of society. I heard somewhere about a centre for homeless people to meet, chat and eat in comfort (not a soup kitchen more a recreation centre) was being closed as they had lost funding. This struck me as exceptionally heartless. How can you excuse removing any centre that allows homeless people a chance to socialise in warmth and eat? It shocked me even more because I realised that apart from the Arts cuts, this was the first I had heard of where else the knife is falling.
I'm not saying that cuts in Arts funding are not a worthy thing to shout about and that those whose lives are being affected do not have a right to express their frustration. But why is it all we are hearing about and why can I not find a single article written about it by anyone other than an actor, writer, musician, dancer, director etc. As an actor these cuts affect me and as an actor I have to believe that the work I do has a place and a role in society because if not then I am rendered worthless, which as human beings is something we cannot live with. But do I imagine that the cuts to my industry are more worthy of fighting against than any other? No. I think we should be fighting the government on whether cutting national debt is the right thing to do when National spending is at a low. If everyone stops spending what happens to the economy? But if we assume we all agree with decreasing National debt then why does the Arts garner more coverage than anything else? Because it controls the news? Where I am standing it all seems exceptionally self involved. In no article has a member of the ordinary working public expressed that the arts is "vital to the health of the public...without culture we are impoverished; it makes one despair." Quoted by the Composer Peter Maxwell Davies in the Guardian today. The only people arguing the cuts and the only people arguing for the importance of culture in our daily lives is people involved directly in the arts. Now you show me where this affects anyone else who doesn't work as an artist and I will listen to this plethora of desperate despair for the fact that a few companies have lost their funding or had their funding decreased. Others have gained funding and had it increased so we are hardly exterminating culture from the Nation like some kind of Nazi cleansing of all things fun. I understand when you've worked hard to build something and you rely on money to sustain that, it can be desperately tragic to see your work unravel in light of cuts like these. I do not take lightly that peoples livelihoods are being destroyed. I just ask for some perspective. I would like to read more about government cuts than just some self important artists telling me their work is vital for my survival.
This is a National problem affecting all sectors, except for the one that got us in this mess. That is where the outrage should lie and we should bind together in fighting the government against this unfair burden we are all being asked to carry. We should not use it as an excuse to become self important.
As someone who is relying on Sponsors to get through my training in Paris and has had help from many different people to get me through this course, I understand the importance of funding to support new artists. I couldn't be here without the generous support of others. I would be devastated if this support was removed tomorrow and forced me to end my training prematurely. I cannot express my gratitude for this support enough but if it was to be removed tomorrow I have no right to shout about how unfair my life is. Me not finishing my training will only affect me. I am the only person who loses out and I do not believe it is my right to have funding because I want to be an actor. I am grateful to have people in my life who wish to encourage me and see where that encouragement takes me. They will be on the journey for the rest of my career and I hope to repay them with work worthy of their support. I am not self important enough to believe that my small cause is more than a grain of sand in the grand scheme of our nations cultural activities and I am well aware that there are thousands of other actors struggling to get involved in this work. There are more of us than there is need. So my personal disappointment if my training was cut short is nothing in the scheme of our nations cultural health. I think as artists we would all do well to remember that.
The part of the Arts cuts that has really disturbed me is the closure of our libraries and the loss in rural areas of all funding to their cultural centres, these are services used by many and are a tragic loss to us all. It sends a message that culture is not for 'ordinary' people and that is shocking and disturbing to say the least. Art encourages us to think and to imagine different kinds of lives and possibilities. This is only to be encouraged and more so in areas where people have very little. This is where our voices should be thrown but listening to voice after voice moaning their cause without any real outside perspective diminishes the argument for anyone forced to read about this day in day out. If you cannot see that then you have lost all perspective.
I'm not saying that cuts in Arts funding are not a worthy thing to shout about and that those whose lives are being affected do not have a right to express their frustration. But why is it all we are hearing about and why can I not find a single article written about it by anyone other than an actor, writer, musician, dancer, director etc. As an actor these cuts affect me and as an actor I have to believe that the work I do has a place and a role in society because if not then I am rendered worthless, which as human beings is something we cannot live with. But do I imagine that the cuts to my industry are more worthy of fighting against than any other? No. I think we should be fighting the government on whether cutting national debt is the right thing to do when National spending is at a low. If everyone stops spending what happens to the economy? But if we assume we all agree with decreasing National debt then why does the Arts garner more coverage than anything else? Because it controls the news? Where I am standing it all seems exceptionally self involved. In no article has a member of the ordinary working public expressed that the arts is "vital to the health of the public...without culture we are impoverished; it makes one despair." Quoted by the Composer Peter Maxwell Davies in the Guardian today. The only people arguing the cuts and the only people arguing for the importance of culture in our daily lives is people involved directly in the arts. Now you show me where this affects anyone else who doesn't work as an artist and I will listen to this plethora of desperate despair for the fact that a few companies have lost their funding or had their funding decreased. Others have gained funding and had it increased so we are hardly exterminating culture from the Nation like some kind of Nazi cleansing of all things fun. I understand when you've worked hard to build something and you rely on money to sustain that, it can be desperately tragic to see your work unravel in light of cuts like these. I do not take lightly that peoples livelihoods are being destroyed. I just ask for some perspective. I would like to read more about government cuts than just some self important artists telling me their work is vital for my survival.
This is a National problem affecting all sectors, except for the one that got us in this mess. That is where the outrage should lie and we should bind together in fighting the government against this unfair burden we are all being asked to carry. We should not use it as an excuse to become self important.
As someone who is relying on Sponsors to get through my training in Paris and has had help from many different people to get me through this course, I understand the importance of funding to support new artists. I couldn't be here without the generous support of others. I would be devastated if this support was removed tomorrow and forced me to end my training prematurely. I cannot express my gratitude for this support enough but if it was to be removed tomorrow I have no right to shout about how unfair my life is. Me not finishing my training will only affect me. I am the only person who loses out and I do not believe it is my right to have funding because I want to be an actor. I am grateful to have people in my life who wish to encourage me and see where that encouragement takes me. They will be on the journey for the rest of my career and I hope to repay them with work worthy of their support. I am not self important enough to believe that my small cause is more than a grain of sand in the grand scheme of our nations cultural activities and I am well aware that there are thousands of other actors struggling to get involved in this work. There are more of us than there is need. So my personal disappointment if my training was cut short is nothing in the scheme of our nations cultural health. I think as artists we would all do well to remember that.
The part of the Arts cuts that has really disturbed me is the closure of our libraries and the loss in rural areas of all funding to their cultural centres, these are services used by many and are a tragic loss to us all. It sends a message that culture is not for 'ordinary' people and that is shocking and disturbing to say the least. Art encourages us to think and to imagine different kinds of lives and possibilities. This is only to be encouraged and more so in areas where people have very little. This is where our voices should be thrown but listening to voice after voice moaning their cause without any real outside perspective diminishes the argument for anyone forced to read about this day in day out. If you cannot see that then you have lost all perspective.
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