A provocation around the role and value of and expectations for artists within cultural and social change. Rather than expecting others to articulate artists’ value on their behalf, I am proposing that artists take responsibility themselves for this and for advocating for and translating their value to others.
Ever since the early days of New Labour in 1997, it’s been government and arts policy to integrate and progress development of the visual arts through the creative industry umbrella and to embrace its economic imperatives. As this situation is likely to continue for the foreseeable future, through my new research I’m addressing some key questions. Do these industries provide a conducive environment in which visual artists can make a living and develop their careers? Are the conditions and employment practices more favourable to ways of working by some artists while others lose out?
Drawing on past UK evidence , this essay provides analysis how the landscape and drivers for artists’ residencies have changed and insight to inform more productive residency practices within future arts policies.
Introduction to fees to artists for exhibiting in public with examples indicating that sustaining such schemes is dependent on widespread and continued acceptance of the principle and rigorous self-regulation within the sector, and on gaining suitable levels of public subsidy to the visual arts. Three financing options are considered in support of equanimity. An afterword considers whether in a political climate of reduced subsidy to the public sector, some new strategies are needed to finance the arts and artists’ contributions.
Being asked a while back to provide some advice to artists on pay and pricing matters for a new website was the generator of this short text. It begins with summarising some of the issues and ends with a few suggestions for what artists might do to improve their chances of making a living while steadily moving their art practice forward.
This resource that includes commentary, evidence and advice is intended for individual artists, arts organisers, commissioners, trainers and policymakers intended to achieve equitable and inclusive conditions in which individuals can flourish. It’s a basis for exploring frictions and misassumptions about artists and pay and understanding why individual negotiation is a vital to ensuring productive exchanges and collaborations.
Cover: Working artists aspect of arts and labour
This essay for the 2014 Seoul Art Space, Seoul Foundation for Arts and Culture International Symposium briefly covers UK arts policies for support to artists’ development, comments on their impact on artists’ social and economic status and suggests a rethinking of the artists’ intrinsic role in society as a vital part of securing and sustaining contemporary visual arts in the future.
This paper combines arguments first presented by Susan Jones at an engage annual conference in which she questioned the efficacy of our institutionally-driven visual arts ecology with new research and enquiry into future cultural, digital and social environments for the arts. It calls for adoption of a more open, imaginative, lateral, collaborative and responsive approaches to creating cultural value, premised on building relationships and rapport with the different kinds and bandwidths of audiences and with the enablers and the makers of art. Links updated 17/05/2018
This provocation commissioned by Stoke Airspace for an Artists’ Soup Kitchen addresses and confirms the importance of the role and value of artists within cultural and social change. The four sections are designed to open up a discussion on ‘what now?’ and – more importantly – ‘what next?’ for Airspace and artists and future artists located in Stoke.
In reaction to government arts funding cuts, Leeds Metropolitan University in partnership with Culture Vulture and the Audience Agency, initiated a public debate at which a panel of industry experts debated what arts funding is for and who is most deserving of it. A short provocation by Susan Jones argued for more recognition and resources for artists and individuals to counteract the slow, ponderousness of institutions whether for the arts or otherwise. View the whole event including the audience ‘question time’ at the end using the link provided.