All about politics, policy, society and how those things relate to culture and art.
82% cut in Overijssel's culture budget No, the VVD did not become the largest party in Overijssel in the last provincial elections, the PvdA attracted 1.6% more voters, but if there is a province where Halbe Zijlstra's nationally initiated policy had an effect, it was that province. Residents soon noticed this, but research by consultancy firm
The latest edition of the Movies that Matter festival kicks off in The Hague on Friday 20 March 2015. A fitting location for a festival that occupies a unique position with its focus on human rights and cinema. On Culture Press for a preview of the programme. Movies that Matter, like previous years, offers an interesting mix of documentaries and fiction films that will give you a...
You haven't seen this before: stop-motion animation with figures made of Chinese porcelain. In the short film Mr Sea Chinese artist Xue Geng has depicted an ancient legend about an explorer, a prostitute and a snake
"Of course I don't have to get rich from it..." It's pretty much the most frequently heard comment when you hang out with artists and creatives a lot. "Why not actually?" I then ask. Startled, they look at me. Appalled that you dare to question this universally held truth. In reply, something extraordinarily vague like "Well, just.... money isn't the most important thing, is it?" comes in.
We took another close look at the news surrounding the near bankruptcy of Groningen's illustrious Grand Theatre. Yesterday, it became clear that that theatre is in serious financial trouble. Problems that the municipality does not want to solve simply by an extra injection of thousands of euros. And they are right. After all, the Grand's coffers are as leaky as a...
In early March, The Great War Machine, the new play by director Joachim Robbrecht, premiered at Theater Frascati. A week earlier, at the Rotterdam Schouwburg Swamp Club to be seen, by French director Philippe Quesne. Both performances address the current political climate. Whereas Swamp Club is explicitly silent about the world it calls into question, The Great War Machine is instead a rhetorical spectacle, constructed from quotes from TEDtalks. Both performances make mechanisms felt, rather than pointing out culprits. Voluntarily withdrawing or being shut out, the neoliberal order does not seem to allow much more choice. There is no question of resistance.
The crisis is over. Especially if you are in the fine art business. In 2014, the global art market grew by 7% from the peak year of 2013. In total, the art trade turned over a value of 51 billion euros last year, making that market almost as big as the economy of Uzbekistan. The internationally authoritative website artnet reported that today
The Grand Theatre in Groningen is dying. Yesterday, the city council of the northern university city decided that no more money should be poured into the theatre, which is in acute cash trouble. Bills from suppliers and independent artists have not been paid for several months, and financial reserves are more than depleted. We have received reports from artists...
Will Ivo and Jan join this impressive list? Laurence Olivier, Ralph Richardson, Joan Littlewood, John Gielgud, Alec Guinness, Peggy Ashcroft, Harold Pinter, Peter Hall, Judi Dench, Alan Bennett, Andrew Lloyd Webber, Alan Ayckbourn, Maggie Smith, Gillian Lynne and Michael Frayn. All big names of British theatre. International celebrities, all of whom have been awarded an Olivier, say the British...
Tree monuments make visible the unexpected and violent strike of death. Usually along public roads but sometimes in more remote places. Amersfoort-based photographer Jeroen Hansen photographed hundreds of them in recent years, resulting in the recently published photo book Signs of Life. A bunch of flowers tied to a dented crash barrier. Candles, photos or a teddy bear at a sharp...
Classical music is elitist, most conductors and orchestra members don't have a clue what they are doing and audiences have absolutely no clue. Subsidised art should be both accessible to a large audience and socially engaged. I also believe that The Joshua Tree is perhaps the best album ever. Signed, Hero Brinkman...
Minister Jet Bussemaker fully embraces the report released by the WRR on Thursday 5 March. In that report, entitled 'Revaluing Culture', the Scientific Council for Government Policy makes an appeal to see culture simply as culture again. "In doing so, the WRR distances itself, and I support it, from the instrumental approach to culture. As if culture only has something to mean...
Use arts funding for research&development, attracting venture capital and crowdfunding with public money. In this way, according to the Scientific Council for Government Policy (WRR), the same public money can yield more. In an 'exploration' presented to the government today, this advisory board breaks a lance for more daring and commitment from the government to strengthen the Dutch cultural sector: 'Increasingly,...
Of Dutch people, the province can cut back even more on Culture. This week, Ipsos Synnovate presented a survey to that effect, and it was another slap in the face for the sector. Apparently, the image of art as an expensive kind of leftist hobby has not yet been eradicated by three years of optimistic NLPing by culture minister Jet Bussemaker's PR machine....
Ron Jagers has been providing playful commentary on culture in Amersfoort and elsewhere for 45 years. His latest find is the 'Prince Bernhard Fanclub'. But the 63-year-old absurdist and multi-artist also made a gripping book about East Berlin before the fall of the wall. 'hop, two-three-four!' He walks along in the Silent Fanfare, an orchestra that marches forward with much fuss
In a chock-full DeLaMar theatre, deputy director Robert Guijt presented the 2014 Dance Audience Award and Dance Photo of the Year on 23 February 2015. This fitted well with the festive premiere of Crazy Blues by winner International Dance Theatre. Many acquaintances from the dance world performed at the DeLaMar. 'Hans van Manen is sitting beautifully on Princess Beatrix's chair,' joked Guijt. The same...
Clark Terry was a legend and is no more. The American jazz trumpeter died on Saturday at the age of 94. He began his musical career with jazz greats Count Basie and Duke Ellington, who soon recognised his extraordinary talent. He said of the two: "Count Basie was college, but Duke Ellington was graduate school." [Tweet ""Count Basie was college, but Duke Ellington was ...
Theatre De Nieuwe Doelen in Gorinchem will close its doors on 31 May, due to lack of support in local politics. The city council, which earlier also closed the music school, would like to continue using the building as a Village Hall for amateur artists. For professional theatre, a CDA party leader reported, those few enthusiasts can just go to Dordrecht. Theatre director Rob van Wijk...
The Netherlands is one of the few countries where Science Fiction plays no role in mainstream media, let alone in the arts. If we look upwards at all, it is through Govert Schilling's disarming Duplo bricks, or Vincent Icke's mildly ironic commentary in DWDD. Or turning 'Mission Earth', a failing soap opera with bickering comedians, into...
According to Rotterdam alderman Visser, the current subsidy system is unsustainable. The system, in which cultural institutions submit a plan every four years and thus have to look years ahead, no longer fits with the times. Nowadays, there is a need for flexibility and change, not rigidity and certainty. The alderman said this during the presentation of the sector analysis by the Rotterdam Council
No foreign performances at the sixth PopArts festival. Are the budget cuts making themselves felt? The festival programmes internationally every other year, and this year it is staying close to home. With Nicola Unger, there were the other Dutch 'usual suspects' like Duda Paiva and guest artists from the Ulrique Quade Company. But the De Krakeling and the Ostadetheater also featured young makers...
Like children, sometimes you have to educate your audience a little. If they do something you like, you reward them for it. Behaviour that you like less you want to discourage. Yet many theatres do exactly the opposite with their booking fees and last-minute promotions. It has been a trend for years. Visitors are deciding later and later that they want a...
The General Court of Auditors, a high college of state that independently audits government spending, is blowing the whistle on Culture Minister Bussemaker. Indeed, in an interim opinion, published on 12 February, the Court of Audit states that nothing at all is yet clear about the real consequences of the previous cabinet's cuts. That cabinet, with the widely beloved Halbe...
This Saturday, 14 February 2015, Reinbert de Leeuw will conduct the Radio Philharmonic Orchestra in Polish composer Henryk Górecki's (1933-2010) Fourth Symphony at the NTR Saturday matinee. Górecki established his name overnight in 1992, when the CD of his Third Symphony shot to the top of the classical charts like a flare. The recording of this Symphony...
In Amersfoort, one art hall is empty and one art hall is full. KAdE, only recently completed and already successful, was dismantled five years after opening and moved to another, even newer building, across the railway line. However, the city council does not appear to have been properly informed about the financial consequences of this move and is now stuck with and noose of at least 10...
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