'Why I commemorate? Because I am so afraid of what might happen if we forget.' I said this to my iPhone a few weeks ago, relatively happily, on my easy chair in the sun in the backyard. I had a glass of white wine in reach and I was enjoying the suburban spring - a white, content...
Stage poetry is usually held in lower esteem than written poetry. While stage poets can touch so powerfully. Only during the Night of Poetry, every year in Utrecht, do we honour the performers among the poets. Then it's back to the 'jokers' who can rhyme, as was recently written about Ingmar Heytze in a podcast announcement. Spoken Word, the...
'There is no other sector in the Netherlands that is as controlled and regulated as the cultural sector.' D66 MP Salima Belhaj sighed this towards the end of the debate organised by the assembled cultural sector lobby clubs on Monday 8 February. 'It takes an incredible amount of work, time and especially money. And the basis is distrust.' The most culture-friendly party of...
What happens in 2022, when refunds are due or not, we will determine on 17 March. But we may just have to count on the Ministry of Education, Culture and Science changing its name already.
When it talks about 'some adjustments', of course, you have to be careful. They know that at the province, so they don't mention details. And those details include a cut of 1.3 million from previously promised amounts.
In recent days, tentative proposals for a new system to fund the arts in the Netherlands have appeared in various places. Tricky pieces, and so far not attesting to very much incisiveness. In Het Parool, a number of prominent figures, including Tinkebel and advertising man Kessels, think that we should think less in pigeonholes, and that, besides quality, we should also...
The theatre seats, which served as the tractors of the arts in North Brabant on Friday 15 May 2020, have had an effect. At least, so it seems. Indeed, the province's deputies have restored the word "culture" to the budget. However, it appears to be a Pyrrhus victory, because at the same time the province is also not going to follow the agreements with the State, and...
Naturally, I stand speechless along the sidelines watching Dutch art get hit by a 'perfect storm'. Two, maybe three deep depressions crossing each other at the worst possible moment, creating a surge that sinks even the strongest ships. In this case: an extremely weak minister, a cultural sector divided to the bone ...
(8 May: updated to clarify that the cut is probably 100%) The new provincial government of North Brabant is still going to help the heavily corona-affected cultural sector to overcome this year's blow. Immediately afterwards, however, it will be followed by a cut of at least 25 per cent in the total 'leisure' budget. According to the...
The cultural sector should listen more closely to the minister's mother. Who said: 'You can be sad for a long time about what you didn't get, also be happy about what you did get.' Minister Ingrid van Engelshoven cited her mother in the closing stages of the inserted budget consultation on the incidental aid to the sector, which was declared last week....
The culture sector will have to be patient for a while yet. Minister Ingrid van Engelshoven had no intention of changing any of her policies on Monday 18 November, during the discussion of the culture budget in the Standing Parliamentary Committee on Culture. Despite a fairly widely supported desire, especially from the opposition, to do something about the 8.6 million cut in the...
'Culture is about stimulating, fraternising, challenging. Then there is no difference between corso and ballet.' Says Thierry Aartsen on Friday 16 November in the Volkskrant. Thierry who? Thierry Aartsen, the one who will be speaking on culture at the VVD in the coming months. In the coming months? Yes, because VVD culture spokesmen are usually appointed for one or two debates, after which...
By now, we are a little surrounded by voting guides and electoral compasses. There is one for every area of policy. What to vote for if you have a beating heart for art? The Correspondent gave a nice little overview the other day. It showed that art is indeed a hobby of mainly left-wing parties, at least when it comes to subsidised art. Art...
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