In a foreword that was added to his published diaries in 1999, Sir Peter Hall says:
“The eternal question returns like a nightmare: why should we pay for the arts?”
He answers thus:
“Because art can keep our society healthy…”
HOW?
“… what is a minority today becomes the majority position of tomorrow.”HUH?
“In the seventies… Art was as important as education.”WHY?
“People without children paid taxes to provide money to educate other people’s children.”GOOD POINT, BUT NOT AN ANSWER.
“If we don’t subsidise the arts, we shall not have them.”WE ALL WORK FOR NOTHING, PETER.
“And we shall lack the questioning which nurtures and cherishes the very soul of our country. This is the function of art.”
QUESTIONING?
“A mature democracy should have the courage to pay its artists to criticise it.”
POLITICAL PURPOSE?
I’m not denying that art has that important function – but is it an ability rather than a function?
I’m sure a grassroots movement would rise up in support of such protest if we were in that kind of era, or we thought the freedom to criticise government through art might be being stifled. But that’s about freedom, not about art.
It feels wrong for the ‘now’. We don’t protest through artists now. We rise up and do it ourselves.
And we can all be artists these days. That’s the internet for you.
So I say that art and our connection to it has become more personal. We have the ability, and therefore feel we have the right, to more access.
We can take part.
We can make art.
So we look for – freedom.
Not guidance from artists criticizing government. Freedom to criticise government all by ourselves, using art or not, as we please.
Peter says:
“The market cannot take risks on innovative art. Yet art is not fulfilling its social function unless it is innovative.”
SO WHAT IS THE FUNCTION, PETER?
“Mozart and Van Gogh had limited success in their lifetime. If they had been subsidised, they would perhaps have lived longer, and left more art to guide us.”
TO GUIDE US
ART GUIDES US
ART GUIDES US
(Must read more of The Uses of Enchantment)
Peter says:
“…bland art neither stimulates, nor entertains, nor does it help us understand how to live.”
HELP US UNDERSTAND HOW TO LIVE...
This leads on to the new post about Confession, Connection, Catharsis, which is a sort of conclusion, and a sort of answer to the search for a language to describe the social value of the arts.
There are other sections prompted by the intro to Peter Hall's Diaries:
- a section about ‘high-brow’ and ‘low-brow’.
- a section about the appeal of the ‘old’ arts to the young.
- a section about freedom.
- a section that links into teaching the craft.
