| |
|
The State Secretary for All Things Cultural has resolved after due deliberation that certain orchestras and theatre companies, literary journals and a host of other specific cultural efforts should be curtailed. Of course he wouldn't dare put it in so many words, but because it's a generally accepted given that cultural activities should be pinned down to government funding (did you know that they are to a very limited extent only? There is an extensive circuit of amateur activities whose participants far and away outnumber those who are involved in the officially chronicled activities - but I'll pretend just for now to be blissfully unaware of this) and that those involved thus relinquish their independence beforehand, he is most certainly achieving his target by scrapping a nought here and a nought there. The reason why those who are being curtailed relish having to negotiate a situation which renders them dependent on the State Secretary's lackeys has something to do, among other things, with the fact that it is deemed (in the world of the visual arts as least) to be culturally incorrect to do something, anything, which is appreciated by the general public ... but that's another subject entirely. If I were State Secretary for All Things Cultural (perish the thought!) I'd find it very difficult to accept that existing situations must never be changed. Of course it's true that if a listed building were to start listing rather badly, one would prop it up until the problem had been solved - to universal acclaim, most likely. And yet (I'm still deputising for the State Secretary) I cannot of course be held responsible for my successor's actions, who might well be convinced that nothing must be changed or renewed, which would confer greater raison d'être upon my decision, especially if I were to ask myself whether it would at all be possible to have any existential form go on forever, independent of whether it would be a good idea that it should. Although at the same time the sobering thought forces itself upon me that everything will change in the end even if change is not a deliberate pursuit. So where does that leave us? Time for swift intervention in my capacity as a private citizen. You see, I'm convinced that it's all to do with money. Apart from the capacity to shape commitment (which is a talent in its own right) I cannot but conclude that although every single decision lacks true justification, it is nevertheless a good thing to insist on a mechanism being available to keep things moving along (surely this qualifies as a generally experienced wish, or am I wrong?), and that the operation of the said mechanism costs a lot of money which is used among other things to reimburse those who, voluntarily or otherwise, sacrifice themselves for the sake of the prescribed dynamics, or rather, on a more positive note, to reward them for their contribution to all of this. After all there's nothing to renew as long as there's nothing old to be ditched. That's all very well provided it's what everybody wants, but not without rewarding the fellow man who makes it all possible. And so I would suggest to the State Secretary that although I'm not in favour of government grant schemes, the social market value of a comprehensive selection of traditional forms of cultural entertainment should undeniably be acknowledged, and cherished as the one and only true motivation for wanting to make changes. |