The uncertainty of the events sector and cultural institutions, after 17 months of lockdowns and one-half-meter openings, is not only disastrous for the mood of executives, artists and spectators. According to the Creative Sector Taskforce, much more is being lost. In fact, a 'Marshall Plan' is needed to help the cultural and creative sector get back on its feet, irrespective of whether the world can ever open again completely without restrictions. Main reason: there are fewer and fewer people able - and willing - to work in the cultural sector.
Now I was briefly triggered by the word 'Marshall Plan'. That's a rather big word. It was the plan of the US winners of World War II, to use a huge aid package to prevent the losers, Japan, Germany and Italy, from falling into crisis again due to reparations and general devastation, and thus becoming a breeding ground for fascism and war again. If such a word is now used for the cultural sector, it must be very bad. So just made the call.
Drama
'Yes, the comparison is on the dramatic side. But we want to emphasise the urgency and seriousness,' says Jeroen Bartelse, director of Utrecht's TivoliVredenburg from his holiday address. He, as one of the top figures of the Cultural and Creative Sector Taskforce, is the author of July's alarming message. 'The Marshall Plan, by the way, was more than what you describe. It was a comprehensive aid package aimed at economic recovery of all European countries. The cultural sector needs something like that too. The damage is great, the prospects of recovery murky. We do not yet know if we are rid of the corona pandemic, probably we have to reckon with an impact that will last for a long time.'
'The cabinet's decision this week to ban unplaced events, concerts or performances at indoor venues until 1 September illustrates this. It is a real tragedy for artists and workers in the cultural sector that they cannot practise their profession and are given so little perspective and guidance on when they can do so again.'
Permanent contracts
'We nevertheless launched a big campaign at TivoliVredenburg last month to recruit new staff again. If we are allowed to reopen fully after the summer -and I still hope for that- we want to be ready. One of the things we are focusing on now is hiring more people, including for positions we hired freelancers for before corona.'
Because with those self-employed people, things went badly wrong, by corona. Many institutions were saved, but the 'flexible shell' was left without work and income. However much the minister insisted that the generous support funds would also flow to the self-employed who found themselves without assignments, in practice little has come of it. Recent research showed that a number of cultural institutions even emerged from the initial lockdown with a big plus in the bank.
Bartelse feels that this trickle-down has not worked well: 'For many cultural companies, it proved impossible to keep giving assignments to freelancers, because there was little left to do due to the lockdown. As a result, sometimes financial assets grew, while freelancers were left without work and income. That has to change and if it is up to me, that support will still reach them proportionally. We have asked Platform ACCT to investigate how those emergency funds do trickle down properly to affected artists and workers. Because if it goes on like this, the sector will lose talent in essential places'.
Students
These are not only catering staff, but also technicians, producers, designers: skilled workers and creative people who naturally do not sit at home for two years. They have taken their talent elsewhere, or retrained. Bartelse insists that these people must remain in the sector: 'We must get rid of the poor ratio of self-employed to employed people. You want to bind people to the sector, not only with nice work but also with good working conditions.'
There is more to it, he says: 'Think about the students of art colleges. A second batch has already graduated when there was almost no work for them. What are they going to do? A huge amount of talent is in danger of being lost this way.'
Three focal points
As Bartelse sees it, three types of measures are needed to prevent us from having no significant cultural sector left at all in a while, and what the Taskforce refers to as the Marshall Plan for the cultural and creative sector: 'First of all, we have to fix what is broken. So repair damage. And that includes relaxing subsidy and performance requirements, including by adding an extra year to this policy period. Second, leverage the insights from this crisis so that we stay afloat when the pandemic strikes again. So invest further in the professionalisation of digital presentations and performances, go full steam ahead with the development of new revenue models, ensure good ventilation in all cultural buildings, encourage cooperation and solidarity in this usually so fragmented sector - to name just a few of these lessons.'
'The last group of measures is about structural transformation. Now is the time to get on with labour market reform, to really give cultural education a place in education, to improve the maker climate. If we don't, we will lose the talent with which we can fill our halls, museums and galleries again.'
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