Cultural Intermediation Project Overview

Phil Jones

Overall aim

To identify means of enhancing the effectiveness of cultural intermediation as a mechanism for connecting different communities into the broader creative economy

Year 1 Year 2 Year 3 Year 4

WP0 Scoping & Theory Building

WP2 Historic

WP3 Governance

WP1 Valuation & Mapping

WP4 Communities WP5 Interventions

Year 1 Year 2 Year 3 Year 4

WP0 Scoping & Theory Building

WP2 Historic

WP3 Governance

WP1 Valuation & Mapping

WP4 Communities

WP5 Interventions

‘Communities’ into ‘Intervention’Balsall Heath Ordsall or Hulme

~30 Community expert witnesses

10 Community Evaluators

6 members of commissioning

panel

~30 Community expert witnesses

10 Community Evaluators

6 members of commissioning

panel

Working with Karen/Saskia to unveil

manifestations of creative economy

within case study site

Training with Dave / Victoria to evaluate

projects

Commissioning new projects

Key outputs

• Working paper on location quotients for cultural intermediaries by Lisa (submitted for peer review)

• Paper by Karen & session by Saskia at RGS-IBG on governance issues– Two planned journal articles– Book proposal being prepared for Ashgate

• Paper presented by Ian & Natasha on community photography (submitted for peer review)

Creative Cultural EconomyInternational Case Studies

Phil Jones

Cultural Intermediation Project Continuity Day, 27 September 2013

Scoping papers by

• Delhi: Yudhishthir Raj Isar & Navina Jafa• Guangzhou: Yuanping Fang, Sisi Wang &

Xuewei Liu• Medellín: Theresa Bean• Budapest: Emilia Barna• Chicago: Whitney Johnson

Budapest

• 1.7m population• Capital of Hungary• Largest city in

Eastern Europe• C19 legacy of being

capital of a very large empire

Chicago

• 2.7m population• 3rd largest US city• Largest city in Midwest• Legacy of civil rights

era migration• Suffering from a failed

attempt to rebrand as a global financial hub

Delhi

• Population 22m• Capital city• Surprisingly small

creative sector by scale compared to Mumbai/Bangalore

• 14.7% considered to be below the local poverty line

Guangzhou

• 12.7m population• Part of 40m Pearl

River delta region• Proximity to Hong

Kong / Macau• Distance from

Beijing gives more governance flexibility

Medellín

• 2.7m population• Second largest city• Around 2700 creative

enterprises in the city– Assets totalling

~£346m• Significant problems

relating to drug cartels

• Birmingham Population 1.07m– Greater W Mids region 5.6m

• Manchester 503k, Salford 234k– Greater Manchester 2.6m

• Both regions below average representation of core creative activities

Policy and strategy

Medellín

• Plan Columbia, $7.5bn US strategy– Strengthening state institutions, reducing power

of cartels/paramilitaries• Social Laboratories for Cultural Entrepreneurs

(LASO) funded by Columbian Ministry of Culture in 2009

• Columbian Coalition for the Creative Industries (CCICC), with Ministry of Culture as a partner

Medellín

• 2004 Mayor Fajardo introduces Integrated Urban Project, tackling social, economic, physical issues in tandem– Botanic gardens, Science & Technology Park,

Moravia cultural centre– Emphasis on safety e.g. cable cars crossing

contested zones of the city

Medellín

• Participatory budgeting – since 2004 5% of city budget allocated to projects produced/voted for by local communities– E.g. 2010 Communa 11 gets resource for cultural

events aimed at community integration– But very technical and difficult for local

communities / groups to draw down the resource

Guangzhou

• Recommendations on the Tenth Five Year Plan of national economic and social development 2000– First official mention of ‘cultural industries’ as one of the

modern service industries driving new economic growth in China

• National 11th Five Year Planning Outline of Cultural Development, 2006– Importance of ‘chuang yi chan ye’ (~ ‘creative industries’) noted

• The Plan of China’s Cultural Industries Promotion, 2009– Cultural industries thus ranked as one of ten key industries

nationally

Budapest

• State funding still key to culture (private capital just 4-5% in 2003)– Soros withdraw after EU accession

• Music recognised as a key driver in earlier plans– Bartok heritage– But not included in the New Szechenyi Plan 2011

• Podmaniczky Programme (medium term development programme in Budapest, 2005-13) major aim to decentralise and democratise Budapest cultural life– But still highly centralised

Chicago

• 1986 Cultural Plan under Mayor Harold Washington

• 2012 Chicago Cultural Plan under Mayor Rahm Emmanuel– Major series of public consultation events– Lays out a series of projects with different timescales

and budgets– 34% initiatives under $50k, 17% over $1m– Leveraging existing city resources (e.g. Parks

buildings)

Delhi

• Much less attention paid to creative sector in formal policy– Focus on ICT and traditional industry

• Some exceptions e.g. National Design Policy 2007– India Design Council established 2009

• Issues around taxation (e.g. in craft production), hindering development

Flagship projects

Delhi

• National Museum in Delhi, 1949 is largest museum in the city yet reports just 300 footfalls per day in winter – problematic management and audiencing

• Delhi ‘formal’ arts scene for theatre/performance characterised by non-paying audience (although in Mumbai people will pay)– 30 auditoriums, 10 amphitheatres, 7 stadia– dance, theatre, music, fashion events– Plus neighbourhood level community halls (50

controlled by Municipal Corporation)

Delhi

• Auditoriums were built by government, but the more successful ones are now sponsored by large businesses and cost 10-100k rupees to hire per evening, with some increase in ticketed events– Bribes of free tickets etc. to secure official permits for

events• Major public & public-private events– SAARC Band festival, International Sufi Music Festival,

All India Bridal Show, Surajkund Crafts Mela, International Arts Festival

Ram Lila

• Depicting scenes from life of Rama• Sometimes very large scale events, including

parades through the streets to the Ram Lila Grounds. Not reliant on Delhi based actors.– Smaller scale, 25 non-profit Ram Lila companies

active in Delhi– Increased use of digital tech for both staging and

live streaming

Animation sector

• ~30 year history in Guangzhou.– 600 animation and game industries by 2012– Worth 300bn RMB (£30bn), capturing 60% of domestic market

• Guangzhou City Council 2006 policies on software and animation• New emphasis on IP• From 2007 five years of city council support with annual budget of 150m

RMB to fund software and animation industries

• Movie version of Pleasant Goat and Big Grey Wolf (2009) by Creative Power Entertaining, costs 6m RMB, box office of 90m RMB

Top-down funding

• Budapest City Council culture budget 85% goes to large permanent theatres (€6m in 2002, with €1m allocated to smaller theatres and other cultural activity)– Operation of the National Theatre seen as somewhat

Stalinist in approach• Controversial plans (revised several times) to

emulate the Vienna MuseumsQuartier– Museum director resigned and not replaced– Huge potential infrastructure costs

Inclusive creative cultures?

Whose culture?

• Budapest – some money for promoting cultural identities, esp Jewish and Roma– E.g. Kesztyugar (glove factory) community centre in district 8,

associated with Roma population– 27% Hungarians identified as openly xenophobe in 2007

• Guangzhou – Redtory now threatened with demolition to make way for Guangzhou International Financial City

• Medellin – since early 1990s 40k+ 14-26 year olds murdered

• Delhi – street performers seen as beggars and subject to harassment

Ruin bars, Budapest

• Spontaneous/spontaneous-looking• 6/7th districts, mostly pre 1919 housing stock• Privatised post 1989, developers starting to demolish

and replace with more valuable buildings• Some attempts to give official protection which led to

owners abandoning ‘worthless’ buildings• Become major tourist attraction– Wombats Hostel, 400 beds– Influx of designer boutiques, building on edgy cachet and

vibrant nightlife– Complaints about noise in newly valuable district

Redtory Creative Arts District

• Opened 2009, covering ~12ha.• Artists took over an abandoned fish canning

factory• Creative possibilities of Soviet-era architecture• Machinery repainted and turned into street art• 50 galleries, design firms, creative retail,

restaurants etc.• Planned demolition to make way for Guangzhou

International Financial City

Resistance

• From late 1980s early 1990s, culture becomes a mode of resistance against violence in Medellin

• E.g. Nuestra Gente (our people) launched in 1987 to produce a creative space for community

• El Mocho, hip hop artist, started establishing schools in late 1980s to teach hip hop, creating an alternative to the gangs in the barrios– ~3000 young people currently in Medellin hip hop

schools

Hip hop intermediation

• Crossing invisible gang territories can be very dangerous

• But hip hop artists have a certain cultural capital that allows them to cross borders unharmed by the gangs– But those who use music to protest against the

gangs can be under threat

Bringing everyone into the conversation?

• 8 town hall meetings, 50 cultural ‘conversations’, 4700 ‘in person’ engagements, 1500 follows on social media, 16k downloads of the draft Chicago Cultural Plan– Social media posts were screened by DCASE and nothing critical appeared– ‘Community responses’ from meetings included in the blog were selected

by DCASE– Participants in meetings disproportionately from North Side (i.e. not poor

black south side, and Latina West side)– Journalists noted highly structured nature of participation events that

stymied more open/critical debate– Comments from Facebook wall were deleted and public no longer allowed

to post to it• Shortcircuiting intermediation process?

Some connections- Policy- Funding- Infrastructure

Policy intermediation

• Chicago a little nervous about unfettered conversation

• Medellin, state continues to invest in culture because of proven role in addressing chronic social problems – participatory budgeting though flawed can play an intermediation role here

• Birmingham’s trial of participatory budgeting

Funding structures

• China: strong emphasis on state/municipal strategic support, with centrally dictated targets

• Hungary: refocussing of state support, loss of expertise at the municipal level, more difficult for private sector to pick up the slack

• Birmingham/Manchester: withdrawal of state to a handful of key institutions. Attempts to build public/private initiatives elsewhere but limited state seedcorn funding

Local state cultural infrastructure

• Delhi use of PPP to leverage resource for public facilities (auditoria)

• Budapest– Keep the flagships going at expense of smaller grants– Manchester International Festival / Library of

Birmingham• Proposals for Curzon Square Museum Quarter

now gone a little quiet– Linked to HS2...

Today’s Schedule

10.45 Cultural Policy Management, Value & Modernity in the Creative Industries: lessons for the cultural intermediation project

Dave O’Brien, City University11.15 Project partners, practice and reflections

David Tittle, MADEChris Jam, performance poet

11.45 Governance project: progress and findingsBeth Perry & Karen Smith, University of Salford, Saskia Warren, University of Birmingham

12.15 Moving into the ‘Communities’ workpackagePaul Long, Birmingham City University

12.45 Lunch 14.00 Field visit to case study site

Friction Arts, Deritend15.30 Open discussion16.00 Close (& drop-off at New Street Station for those heading home by train)