There is no denying the fact that all sectors of the arts have recently had to contend with the traumatic repercussions of funding cutbacks, policy and structural change in the Arts Council and the first significant reforms of arts legislation in over three decades. The extent of the impact of real and perceived damage has been evident in the chorus of criticism and concern that has been echoing for some time from a broad range of voices and viewpoints throughout all sectors of the arts community.
There is now one vitally important decision - and a once-off opportunity - that could do much to allay these concerns and restore a more confident sense of the role of the arts and their future to those who hold such anxieties. This opportunity rests with the Minister, Mr O'Donoghue, in deciding the composition of the next Arts Council. Unfortunately, in all of the recent upheaval, little enough has been heard from the current board members on the various issues that have arisen. A greater contribution to the debate on funding, the enhanced role of the Minister under the terms of the Bill now before the Dáil, and the policy and administrative changes that will affect how the council will in future engage with the arts, might have been expected from those who after all were appointed as custodians of the arts and representatives of the wider arts community.
The reduction in the number of council members, from 17 to nine, has given rise to suggestions that the new council could be less representative of the needs of some individual art practices; the appointment of individuals with singular sectional interests to champion is neither ideal nor desirable. While the reduction in the number of apointees is to be welcomed as a move toward greater efficiency and clearer focus, it is essential that the make-up of the new, more streamlined council will be one that gives voice and advocacy to the arts across the whole spectrum.
What is of greatest importance, perhaps, is that the appointees should be chosen with the intention of forming a body that will not only represent the best interests of all the art forms but would also be sufficiently strong, independent and tough-minded in its composition to challenge, if such need arises, the decisions and directives emanating from the bureaucratic level - some of which have come in for much criticism of late. The council should not be merely an instrument for rubber-stamping the prescriptions and objectives of either the State agency or the minister whose role will be enhanced through the new Bill due to pass into legislation in the next few weeks.
A position on the Arts Council carries with it duties of guardianship; it is to be hoped that on this forthcoming changing of the guard, no criteria, other than the selection of people whose knowledge of and passion for the role of culture in our society will come into play. This is not an occasion to reward any kind of lobbying based on political allegiance or cronyism or regional partisanship.