First – I too would have been very annoyed at the tenor of the comments you quoted. (BTW your link for the politician is ‘dead’). It did seem rather generic and sterotyped to me.

Second – the Arts Council has been criticised for its last round of grant-giving and there has been an investigation and a report into the chaos which ensued. The report was published at the end of July.

As somebody who, a very long time ago, used to sit on the other side of grant giving machinery (some of which involved the arts) I can tell you that if there wasn’t a fee to pay to process the grant, there would be a whole load more applications from people without serious intent. The net effect of that would be that they would still need to be processed and that would mean money intended for arts would need to be diverted into administration. Administrators, if faced with this sort of situation, then end up devising ways of quickly scuttling applications to whittle them down to a serious few.

Fees are a crude way of diverting those who aren’t serious – but they generally work.

The forms might also be complex – but similarly they tend to test out whether people have really thought through their idea – or whether they just have a good idea which they really need to go away and work on some more.

You’d be really surprised how many people want to be given money without putting any sort of real effort into making a good case. Seriously.

Finally, I don’t know any business which doesn’t incur marketing costs to get business and generate income. I’ve always seen time spent on grant applications and fees as exactly that – part of the normal cost of doing business. I don’t know why artists should expect to be let off ‘normal costs’ just because they’re artists.

So – bottom line. I agree with you – lots of artists exercise a whole load of skills other than their talent to try and make art work for them. On the other hand, any artist or organisation which factors in the costs of being business-like into the total equation is far more likely to succeed.

First – I too would have been very annoyed at the tenor of the comments you quoted. (BTW your link for the politician is ‘dead’). It did seem rather generic and sterotyped to me.

Second – the Arts Council has been criticised for its last round of grant-giving and there has been an investigation and a report into the chaos which ensued. The report was published at the end of July.

As somebody who, a very long time ago, used to sit on the other side of grant giving machinery (some of which involved the arts) I can tell you that if there wasn’t a fee to pay to process the grant, there would be a whole load more applications from people without serious intent. The net effect of that would be that they would still need to be processed and that would mean money intended for arts would need to be diverted into administration. Administrators, if faced with this sort of situation, then end up devising ways of quickly scuttling applications to whittle them down to a serious few.

Fees are a crude way of diverting those who aren’t serious – but they generally work.

The forms might also be complex – but similarly they tend to test out whether people have really thought through their idea – or whether they just have a good idea which they really need to go away and work on some more.

You’d be really surprised how many people want to be given money without putting any sort of real effort into making a good case. Seriously.

Finally, I don’t know any business which doesn’t incur marketing costs to get business and generate income. I’ve always seen time spent on grant applications and fees as exactly that – part of the normal cost of doing business. I don’t know why artists should expect to be let off ‘normal costs’ just because they’re artists.

So – bottom line. I agree with you – lots of artists exercise a whole load of skills other than their talent to try and make art work for them. On the other hand, any artist or organisation which factors in the costs of being business-like into the total equation is far more likely to succeed.