Melle Daamen on @culturepress: 6 reasons why the arts debate in the Netherlands is so laborious.

I published two articles in NRC Handelsblad last year. The first (6 July 2013) was critical of government policy. There was little reaction to this. The second article (7 December 2013) was critical of the arts sector: it needs to make its own sharp choices. That did cause a stir, although I am convinced that many colleagues largely agree with the content.

That there would be negative reactions from some of my colleagues was foreseeable. But the vehemence, especially via Twitter and Facebook, I had not expected. Several colleagues, for instance, portrayed me as a sidekick to Halbe Zijlstra or even Geert Wilders. By also asking, as a thought experiment in the article, whether the Dutch National Ballet should maintain the precious classical ballet tradition at top level or whether it would be possible to anchor it elsewhere in Europe, I was proclaimed an 'enemy of dance' by dance colleagues. I had never had to deal with such 'framing' before.

A fresh and frank debate on arts policy is struggling to get off the ground. This was again evident when, before the summer, the Council for Culture presented its Cultural exploration called for a debate on arts and culture policy. There is every reason for such a debate. Digitisation, an ageing population, audience disengagement, urbanisation and globalisation are 'gamechangers' for standing cultural policy. Reactions to the Council's thought-provoking remarks were remarkably mild. Public debates on arts policy tend to be defined by idle chatter and sacred cows. In fact, the position of the art world has seemed isolated politically and socially for years, and it is hard to get out of it.

[Tweet "Public debates on arts policy are mostly defined by smooth talk and sacred cows"].

 

Why is that?

1 Calvinism

It starts with the Dutch identity of merchant and minister. The associated values (austerity, aversion to ostentation, pragmatism, uniformity and an attitude of 'just act normal, you'll be crazy enough') are by no means ideal starting points for a flourishing art life.

2 Political lee

The Dutch government was relatively late with arts policy. The moment the government started to actively involve itself in the arts only dates from after World War II and it was never a serious political item.

[Tweet "In the compartmentalised pacification democracy, minorities, artists and scientists found themselves in a political and administrative lull. "]

In the compartmentalised pacification democracy we knew for most of the last century, minorities, artists and scientists found themselves in a political and administrative lull. For that matter, the art world itself is also to blame; it liked being in the political lee after the war. By focusing more on the private domain than on the public domain, the Dutch arts sector itself did little to increase its support base. Consequently, the arts sector does not have a strong lobby, is weakly organised and fragmented, also because institutions compete with each other for scarce subsidy pots.

Curiously, she has also felt vindicated by the Thorbecke adage, 'that the government should not be a judge of art'. That statement by the 19th-century politician was commonplace in the second half of the last century. But that Thorbecke's ideas were held up as an ideal by the arts sector is naive, especially since his ideas towards the arts were nihilistic rather than committed. Thorbecke's main aim was to indicate that the government should not interfere in the arts at all.

From the end of the last century, the government increasingly turned cultural policy into a system, with arts plans, remote funds, regulation and, later, a basic infrastructure. Politics was increasingly distanced, and the social involvement (the 'ownership') of Dutch society in the arts was not promoted by it either. Current culture minister Bussemaker is quite clear how she stands on this: "The art world has been introspective for too long. Thorbecke's adage that art is not government policy has thus led to a certain non-committal and indifferent attitude. I want to break with that situation."

3 The elite do not stir

[Tweet "The elite don't stir"]

Usually the elite in higher developed countries form the basis for legitimising the arts and art policy. The Netherlands did not have a bourgeoisie ('bourgeoisie') such as exist in Belgium, France, the UK and Germany. We never had a court culture and, in fact, no real bourgeois elite here. And, to the extent that there was, that elite became disenchanted and lost its way after the de-pillarisation and innovations of the 1960s and 1970s.

If there is a weak elite, the arts have no support from it. The arts sector was therefore totally caught off guard by the rapid shift in political thinking when Rutte I took office and the cuts to arts and culture. Support from the elite remained largely absent; indeed, our 'friends' mostly went along with making derogatory comments about art and subsidies. Yet it is actually little wonder that if politicians and elites have little attachment to the arts, they can also easily pull their hands off it, if it suits.

4 Difficult relationship

There is a difficult and curious relationship between art and art policy. Artists are still artists, with their highly individual emotions and expressions, averse to public policy. While a government sees art as part of public policy, as a means or instrument of public affairs. See there, in a few words, the great dilemma of cultural policy: how to formulate government policy for a group of professionals (i.e. art-makers) that pre-eminently does not lend itself or allow itself to be used for any policy whatsoever.

[Tweet "Artists don't want to be fitted into 'multiculti', social or welfare policies"]

The government wants to be targeted with subsidies, needs to be able to legitimise spending, pursues policy, looks for interfaces with other policy areas, etc. Artists do not want to fit in with 'multiculti', social or welfare policies, artists do not think first and foremost about their 'usefulness' for the public good, and I do not know of any artist whose objective is to improve the business climate or tourism in a city. To illustrate, a heartfelt cry from art critic Anna Tilroe: "Politicians always set out to make art instrumental. That is, to use art for political purposes. Please stop doing that! Your purposes are far too opportunistic for art. Look how fast your weather vane is spinning these days! Let art explore aspects of reality in its own way, independently, freely, even if it is subsidised."

For its part, the government finds this ungrateful vanity and, over the past ten years, has devised a planning system with a fixed basic infrastructure (the BIS), 'result agreements' and 'formats' in order to get the sector into line with the current art policy. And I foresee the government, in the absence of choices and substantive input from the sector itself, continuing to technocratise cultural policy.

The arts sector reluctantly, but with fervour, participates in this technocratisation and responds with increasingly meaningless policy plans, now called business plans, drawn up by art managers, now called cultural entrepreneurs. This does not lead to a dynamic arts policy, because artists and the arts cannot be planned or regulated in a structure.

5 Psyche of the sector

While artists are open, curious, smart, driven, on the other hand they are also individually oriented, vulnerable, socially shy. People are quick to feel attacked, misunderstood and undervalued. Director Johan Simons even called artists "an endangered species". People react strongly emotionally, and with arguments that are socially unconvincing. There is a boundless progressive thinking and optimism, which undoubtedly also has to do with the nature of the arts and artists. Art looks forward, is progressive and not conservative. Art seeks audiences; that combination is ultimately art's raison d'etre.

[Tweet "there would be no overproduction but underconsumption or underconsumption."]

It is therefore in our sector not done to come up with negative news about overproduction or declining interest. This thwarts the dream. Negative developments are ignored and the head would rather disappear in the sand. When I spoke of overproduction in my controversial article, several reactions immediately denied and reversed this: there would be no overproduction but rather downturn or underconsumption. And usually someone else gets the blame for it, in this case 'the cuts'. While the declining interest in parts of the subsidised arts is really earlier than the Rutte I cuts.

6 The arts debate commandments

Debating art and policy seems to be allowed in the Netherlands only according to certain and commandments and conventions. Woe betide those, like me, who do not adhere to them.

[Tweet "First the creed, then the critical note: this is how it should be"]

The first commandment is to start every discussion on art policy by first declaring your love for art. So I would have done better to start my controversial passage on the international position of classical ballet by saying that I have been visiting the Dutch National Ballet since I was nine years old, that I once attended the premiere of Swan Lake with my parents and that ballet has never let me go. First the creed, then the critical note: this is how it should be.

The second commandment is that you can feel free to criticise the government and art policy, but not art and artists. That explains why the reactions to my second piece were so much more vehement than to my first.

A third commandment is that you are supposed to assume progress and innovation of art. However, I spoke of "a fixation on the new and innovative" and argued for delay.

Related to it is the fourth commandment that reporting on 'bad news' is not done is. In my article, I spoke of an impending marginalisation of the subsidised arts, drop-outs of audiences and too many institutions. Spot on spot, so to speak.

Finally, the fifth commandment is not to criticise each other, at least not publicly. In my article, I mentioned some institutions by name.

[Tweet "Daamen: "Finally, the fifth commandment is not to criticise each other, at least not publicly."]

Despite the criticism that was my part after breaking these commandments, I am not pessimistic (let alone frustrated) about how the arts sector is now picking up the conversation. There were several meetings in recent months where things were named for the first time. Even in the world of classical music, people seem to realise that things are serious and the museum sector picked up the ball earlier. Viviënne Ypma, director of Amsterdam's Kleine Komedie, for instance, said of arts policy: "Cultural institutions need to look each other in the eye honestly. We may well ask ourselves what facilities are needed. Actually, these choices should have been made much earlier. Choices have been made too cautiously. The thinking was: if only as many as possible continue to exist. That way, we are all hungry."

New perspectives given in NRC included Walter Ligthart (The National Theatre) and Stan Paardekooper, director of the Radio Philharmonic Orchestra. He relativised: "We cannot choose for ourselves. The sector should and can participate in debate at the height of its intellectual ability, but cannot ultimately advocate suicide or fratricide of a colleague. The government and its advisory body (the Culture Council) are mandated by the people to make good choices, please do so."

The Council has answered its call with its recently published Culture Outlook 2014, but at this stage it does not go beyond pointing out trends. We need to talk about answers to those trends, about future arts and culture policy. Because there is a lot going on and there is cause for concern. I will be happy to go into that next time.

Previously published in NRC