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If times of austerity discourage risk-taking among artists, then today's announcement of Arts Council England's (ACE) decisions on its national portfolio organisations (NPOs) also reminds us that it discourages risk-taking among funders too. ACE failed to seriously rethink its NPO portfolio during the more generous funding years – and when it made an attempt to reimagine a broken portfolio in 2007, it bungled it so badly it lost the trust of artists, which it has only slowly regained.
So with ACE itself being pared to the bone, it was never likely that today's funding decisions were ever going to see a radical shake-up. And we haven't. The shift geographically is a mere 2%, and in fact of the 58 arts organisations that were unsuccessful in their applications, 43 of them are from outside London. The clout remains very much with London and while I appreciate ACE chief executive Alan Davey's statement that ACE wouldn't be doing its job if it made funding decisions based "on anything but art", I'm pretty sure that if London is, as ACE chair Peter Bazalgette claims, "the world's capital of culture", that may have an awful lot to do with the historical funding imbalances. By protecting London, you are simply perpetuating the inequalities not addressing them.
What the Arts Council spreadsheets do not, of course, tell us is how much some organisations applied for and how much they actually got. There were apparently £70m of extra asks, which does seem a wee bit optimistic in the current climate. But we will never know of the unfulfilled promise, the loss of potential and of the ambitions that will remain unrealised largely because of a timidity in the funding decisions. I can think of several organisations outside the capital where larger audiences and a greater number of artists may have been served better than by their London counterparts who get many times the amount of money that they do, and who can also more easily attract philanthropy. Sharing some of that money wouldn't have gone amiss.
We also know about those who have been welcomed back to the portfolio (Third Angel, hurrah!), those who are newcomers (a deserved welcome to the Bike Shed in Exeter), but what we do not know – with a few exceptions from those brave enough to have gone public with their disappointment, such as the brilliant 1927 and excellent Tangled Feet – is who applied and didn't get investment.
Of course the Arts Council's intentions are honourable: trying in difficult circumstances, and with the double whammy of reduced funding for the arts for both central government and hard-pressed local authorities, to protect the portfolio as best they can. But there is much to be said for the idea that it is in the most difficult times that really radical decisions need to be made. What's largely happened today, despite the cutting from the portfolio of Ridiculusmus, the Orange Tree (ironically under new artistic leadership as of today), Red Ladder, Whalley Range All Stars, Theatre Sans Frontieres, Propeller (Ed Hall says: "it calls into question the whole future of the company,") and others, is that the status quo has pretty much prevailed. It doesn't feel as if there has been any serious strategic thinking about where the money might be best spent, just an acceptance that most of those already funded will see a 4.7% reduction and carry on as before.
It's a pity because there are signs that dissent is once again growing among artists and theatre-makers in the face of geographical inequalities perpetuated by the funding system, the dominance of buildings and the lack of transparency over the way money is, in some instances, distributed. This piece, published in Arts Professional, pretty well sums up many of the private conversations I've had with theatre-makers over recent months.
Today's announcements effectively try to protect the status quo and that means that buildings – particularly London buildings – continue to be funded over small organisations and the grassroots who will just have to hope that some money will trickle down to them. But in tough times buildings – and their boards – will always protect themselves rather than look to the future. ACE's argument is that it is stuck with historical decisions that means that particular organisations and buildings are located in particular places. You can't just pick up a building and move it. No, you can't but that doesn't mean you have to keep on funding it forever. Unless there is a radical re-evaluation of how buildings are used (which should be all day, every day, and for the benefit of the wider community for whom they will become a cherished asset), they will continue to gobble up money.
Buildings also work slowly, whereas smaller organisations tend to be more nimble and spread the money they get around more quickly. Many today will be heaving a sigh of relief, and I can't blame them, but much of the money invested by the Arts Council over the next few years will only benefit those already well up the ladder. Emerging artists, young companies, new audiences and those working beyond London will have to make do with the crumbs. Again.
