In a policy document published late in 2006, the Arts Council presented the findings of a comprehensive survey that recorded the attitudes of a varied demographic to "the role of the arts in society".
The survey recorded "the obstacles people have in interacting with the arts", as well as the particularities of people's attendance, participation and consumption of arts events and arts-related items. According to the survey, four-fifths of those questioned believe that the arts have become more accessible in the past 10 years; four-fifths consider arts education as important as science in schools; and three-quarters believe that arts amenities are as important for communities as sports facilities. Of those surveyed, 86 per cent agreed that "the arts play an important and valuable role in a modern society such as Ireland" and 75 per cent said they have a personal interest in the arts.
Significantly, The Public and the Artsincorporated elements of popular culture into the fabric of its findings, allowing an inclusive definition of the arts - one that incorporates mainstream cinema, rock and pop music, and amateur participation into people's potential artistic experiences, allowing an 85 per cent participation/ consumption figure during the previous year.
Some cultural consumers might quibble with such loose demarcation of artistic territories, especially when figures for the "high arts" were depressingly low: theatre 30 per cent; opera 4 per cent; dance 3 per cent; with 36 per cent of those surveyed admitting that they had not read any type of literature for pleasure in the last 12 months. The survey's findings might be taken to suggest that if popular culture provides the majority engagement for the public, the social value of the "high arts" is negligible, undercutting the case for public funding.
However, for Martin Drury, who oversaw the report, the inclusiveness of the survey reflected the fact that "we live in an age where the definitions of art are very fluid. It doesn't necessarily lead to chaos or the devaluing of art, but to very interesting possibilities. By high arts, people often just mean the subsidised arts; the rest of the arts being 'popular' or 'commercial'. But if we put [ these definitions] into financial context, [ the difference] becomes clear: some art just wouldn't survive without subsidy. People often take that as a value judgement, but all it is really is a recognition that the marketplace behaves differently.
"It would be ridiculous for the Arts Council to start funding airport novels. That is not a comment on their value. It is just a recognition that that end of the market looks after itself. But there are certain things that wouldn't survive conventional marketplace forces - such as dance or opera or poetry - but they still deserve to be part and parcel of our social fabric."
For Drury, the relationship between the public and the arts is not merely one-way, not just one of passive consumption, and he sees the interaction between the artist outside the framework of established institutions, in the social sphere, as a key inspiration for the development of the individual artists: "It is an enormous enrichment: not just for the artist's social impulse, but for their art; it is another set of influences on them and on their work."
The Public and the Arts is available to download at www.artscouncil.ie/publications or from the Arts Council offices, 10 Merrion Square, Dublin 2