Culture - a good thing in yoghourt

[shewhomust]

For the record:

Local councillor Nigel Martin passes on, without comment, this invitation to support the City of Culture bid.

I called in at the Empty Shop this morning:

and spoke to the lady there. She was very pleasant, and as helpful as she could be when she really had very little hard information to offer. She did demonstrate very clearly that this is not actually about Durham City, we are just the (World Heritage Site) face of the campaign: a couple carrying a big camera and tripod were in the shop when I arrived, asking where they should go to take photographs of the Cathedral; she didn't know, she was from Barnard Castle.

There's a web site coming in September, it seems. (There's a holding page already, in fact). It always winds me up that the web, which is such an instant medium of communication, always trails behind the other publicity: if you can get posters and T-shirts printed, surely you can get some information onto the web? But of course that's assuming that the site is about information (I'm looking for who is involved, where the budget is coming from, what sort of activities are proposed and where they might take place, the sort of information you woldn't want to print until it's complete, but which you could post incrementally on a web site) whereas in fact, of course, it's advertising.

Anyway, here's the comment I left on Nigel Martin's post (Currently held for moderation):

Thanks for this pointer. I went down to the Empty Shop in the hope of getting answers to some of my questions about this project, but came away with as few facts, and as many apprehensions, as I had when I arrived.

From the presentation at the AAP, and from talking to the very pleasant staff at the Empty Shop, it seems clear that the bid brings together the Tourism department (whose priority is visitors rather than residents) and the County Council (who are committed to action county-wide, not just in the City). Moreover, it defines 'culture' very broadly, covering the whole spectrum of sports and leisure activities.

There is nothing wrong with any of this in itself, but I would be sorry to see funding diverted from actual cultural activities in Durham City into this much larger pot.

I see from the Gala Theatre's new programme that they are backing the bid; have any other arts organisations (DCA? the Local Strategic Partnership?) or practitioners been involved?

If I had a budget to do one thing to improve Durham's cultural standing, I'd put it into a What's On service, a listings magazine for the City and a calendar web site listing what's on today.

Comments

[durham-rambler.livejournal.com]

The listings service for the City was something identified as a top priority by the Culture Group of the Local Strategic Partnership, of which I was a member, but was never implemented before the City Council was subsumed into the County, and the LSP was dissolved.

I also posted a comment, also awaiting moderation (aside: if a LibDem Councillor cannot come up with moderation, who can?) and this is what I said:

I’d be a lot more confident about the success of this bid if there were more sign of it engaging with the existing cultural community in Durham. As it stands, it reads [1.8MB PDF] as a bid to gain economic benefits, with the culture coming as a spin-off. I’d be a lot happier if the culture were at the heart of the bid, with the economic benefits being the spin-off.

As an example, the Sage Gateshead had the Northern Symphonia and Folkworks on board at an early stage. There was a real buzz in the cultural communities of Tyneside supporting the bid for European City of Culture, and a real disappointment when it failed. To make this work there has to be that sort of engagement or this will be seen as a transparent and cynical attempt to attract funding: Art for art’s sake, money for God’s sake as 10cc sang in 1975.

[shewhomust.livejournal.com]

Has the LSP now ended, then?

That's a really interesting PDF, and it does actually answer some of the questions I was asking (eg, who is funding the bid: "County Durham Partnership Board ... will oversee the project as a formal 'sponsor', whilst providing an initial investment from the Performance Reward Grant (2010-2012) to assist with costs linked to the bid." I may be none the wiser, but I'm much better informed). Why was this not available at the point where the bid was engaging with the public? (It's much too flashy a production for an internal document, surely?)