ArtScapeAt his Budget briefing, Minister for Arts Séamus Brennan said he would outline "my own arts plan for 2008" within about 10 days. He indicated part of this would involve support for individual artists. Decisions on Access III infrastructural investment are also expected soon, writes Deirdre Falvey
Meantime, Fine Gael arts spokeswoman Olivia Mitchell said she was astonished at "the deception being perpetrated on the Arts Council by the Government. It appears the council has fallen for the Minister's spin, which portrayed a cut in their budget as an increase. A supplementary budget passed on Tuesday reallocated €3 million of department savings to the Arts Council, bringing the annual 2007 budget [ from €80m] to €83 million. The Minister then added this €3 million for 2007 to the €82 million allocated for 2008 to make it appear they had received an increase of €5 million," she said. But the extra €3 million must be spent in the current year and is probably already committed, she said. "The Arts Council, when it realises how it has been conned, may feel like withdrawing its congratulations to the Minister. Certainly, the arts organisations it funds will feel the pinch and will wonder how the council was so easily deceived.
"When it finally dawns on the Arts Council that it has less money in 2008 than it had in 2007, it may not be as eager to fund a Dáil party for the current Minister similar to the one it held recently for the former minister for arts."
The council is apparently still in discussions with the department. Perhaps Arts Council chairwoman Olive Braiden's congratulation of the Minister is a function of how any Minister/Arts Council relationship works, a relationship spelt out at that party Mitchell referred to. Towards the end of his evocative speech this week, former minister John O'Donoghue offered some advice to the Arts Council: "Critically, the Arts Council operates as an arm's-length body, so that the State is placed in the position of doing what it has historically done well - funding - and not what it has historically done very badly - control of the arts. I have one message for the council: cherish your minister, he is your voice in the panelled walls where funding decisions are made, he is your lone advocate in the sometimes soulless fog of political debate. He is your champion. You live in each other's shadow. In Séamus Brennan, you have the most experienced Minister in Government and he delivers. In this game, people earn their longevity."
At the party for O'Donoghue, top arts people gathered in the Dáil to honour the former minister, now Ceann Comhairle. The group included a clutch of arts advisers - Fiach Mac Conghail, Tony Sheehan, Donal Sheils and, from another era, Tony Cronin - as well as Minister for Education Mary Hanafin, former minister for arts Michael D Higgins, assistant secretary general Niall Ó Donnchú, Colm Tóibín, Michael Colgan, Tom Sherlock, Garry Hynes, Theo Dorgan, Alan Stanford, Anne Haverty, Tony McMahon, and John Kelly. O'Donoghue got a warm reception and extended, genuine applause.
"I am very conscious of the major contribution all of you make to the arts in Ireland. And I am also very aware of what I have gained personally from my contact with the arts and with you the artists and writers and music-makers; you, our valued arts community, the creative thinkers and doers, and makers of things that endure."
He talked about how the arts are "central, an essential part of the narrative about the character of a new, different, changed Ireland. When I said this all those years back, I think there was a certain amount of scepticism. But looking back I believe that I can say that during the last five years we have seen a significant expansion of the arts in Ireland. A country like ours today survives and prospers by the talent and ability of its people. The gift of individual talent is key. The more it is developed, the better we become. Modern goods and services require high value-added input. Some of it comes from technology or financial capital - both instantly portable. But much of it comes from people - their ability to innovate, to think anew, to be creative."
Remembering his initial approach, he said: "When I came to this brief I resolved that I should draw on whatever command of language I have - and say nothing for a while. I came to learn and understand first. In the process, I found that my experience and my general take on life was enriched.
"I said many times during my ministry, if art is to nourish the roots of our culture, society must set the artist free to follow his vision wherever it takes him. We must never forget that art is not a form of propaganda, it is a form of truth. In free society, art is not a weapon and it does not belong to the spheres of polemic and ideology. Artists are not engineers of the soul. It may be different elsewhere. But a democratic society - in it, the highest duty of the writer, the composer, the artist, is to remain true to himself and to let the leaves fall where they may.
"The whole process of stimulation through plays, books, films, works of art; the delight in design, in architecture, in crafts - all of this enlarges a country's capacity to be reflective, engaging and bold. Dynamism in arts and culture creates dynamism in a nation - and in ministers with responsibility for the area. You, your ideals, your innate honesty and, above all, your welcome, opened for me a world into which I had hitherto merely dipped my mind from time to time.
"When more children get access to the joy of art, it is not the art alone they learn - it is the art of living, thinking and creating. They may never be, probably won't ever be, an artist or a dancer or a designer, but in whatever job, in whichever walk of life, they will carry an idea that is not just about the buying and selling, but about what makes the ordinary special."
He got a laugh when he said "Dublin is in something of a Medici period", but asked people to "imagine what the world would have been like if we had continued with the funding regime and the policies of the 1980s and early 1990s. Before arts arrived at the Cabinet table. Before Michael D Higgins. Before Síle de Valera. Many of the country's finest regional theatres would have closed or would exist as shadows of themselves, on a diet of magicians and bingo. Many musical groups would have gone to the wall. There would be no new programmes for touring. The Joyce and Beckett festivals would never have spoken volumes about our new pride in the achievement of Ireland's doyens of drama. Museums, far from being full, would have gradually diminished in importance as reduced the audience to the middle class. I'm not sure there would be an Irish film industry, or at least not one nearly so healthy, or the same about-turn in the fortunes of the National Theatre, more noted for offstage intrigue than onstage drama."
And O'Donoghue talked about one of his memories, of opening Paul Henry's exhibition in the National Gallery, "and as we all gazed on his Kerry landscape . . . I said that and I had something in common. He painted it and I canvassed it."
Last week was the beginning of the end of the Crossover Project, Upstate Theatre's season of performances devised by local adults in four Border towns. The project has been a cornerstone of Upstate's work since 2002, exploring "the potential of community drama as a means of creative cultural development, networking and dialogue among communities". Midland, by the Monaghan Crossover Group was in Castleblayney last week; the Dundalk Crossover Group presents Evergreen at Dundalk Institute of Technology (December 11th and 12th); the Belleek & Enniskillen Crossover Group present That Night at the Hotel Carlton in Belleek (December 12th and 13th), and Return to Drumhirk is at the Lennard Arms Hotel in Clones, Co Monaghan (December 17th to 19th).
One of the most distinctive voices in Irish poetry will be celebrated in a two-day symposium of talks, readings and discussion in Trinity College Dublin next Friday evening and Saturday. Poet, translator, broadcaster and journalist Pearse Hutchinson is the focus of the event, which marks his 80th birthday. A lecture on Friday evening by Prof Robert Welch of the University of Ulster is followed by a reading of Hutchinson's poetry by admirers including Michael Augustin, Sujata Bhatt, Eva Bourke, Melita Cataldi, Harry Clifton, Paul Durcan, Seán Hutton, Eiléan Ní Chuilleanáin, Michael O'Dea, Ciaran O'Driscoll, Alan Titley, Martín Veiga, Macdara Woods and Vincent Woods.
Saturday contributors include Philip Coleman, Eoin Bourke and Eiléan Ní Chuilleanáin. All events take place in Robert Emmet Theatre (2037), in the Trinity College arts building.