[spectre] New Media Art Organisations in Netherlands lose funding

Heiko Recktenwald heikorecktenwald at googlemail.com
Wed Jun 15 11:53:26 CEST 2011 

NOPE!

When the day is over you want to keep a present and why should new media 
institution have any better case than
theaters, museums, universities, orchestras and the like?


Get real,


H.


Am 15.06.2011 11:38, schrieb Alessandro Ludovico:
> And then what about joining forces with the UK affected institutions, 
> trying to make a shared court challenge, or two simultaneously?
>
> I'm not an expert too, but it seems more and more urgent to plan 
> relevant actions.
>
> a.
>
>> this may sound somewhat naive, but given that the organisations 
>> involved are not exactly 'fly-by-night' speculative or frivolous 
>> instances, but are historically significant parts of the Dutch, 
>> European and broader and international cultural, political, 
>> educational, academic and scientific landscapes, i.e. institutions of 
>> major significant cultural and national heritage, that perhaps this 
>> is an issue that needs to be taken up by a court challenge at the 
>> European level, either at the European Court of Human Rights or the 
>> European Court of Justice. It's not necessarily so that national 
>> governments have either the right, the mandate or the power to 
>> disproportionately or unreasonably erase such significant portions of 
>> their own cultural identity.
>>
>> any legal experts with relevant experience/insight among the ranks of 
>> the spectrites?
>>
>> greetings,
>>
>> Stephen
>>
>> On 14.06.2011, at 20:15, Andreas Broeckmann wrote:
>>
>>>  (fwd)
>>>
>>>  Last Friday the new policy plans of the new Minister were announced 
>>> and published and they are very dramatic in general for the whole 
>>> field of art and culture in The Netherlands. On the PNEK list it was 
>>> announced as:
>>>
>>>  New Media Art Organisations in Netherlands lose funding.
>>>
>>>  The Dutch New Media Art Organisations Steim, De Waag, Mediamatic, 
>>> V2 & NIMK are about to lose all their funding.
>>>  The Dutch secretary of state for Culture in the Netherlands, Halbe 
>>> Zijlstra, has published his policy plan for coming years. In 
>>> contrast to the official recommendations given to him by the Culture 
>>> Advisory Board, the cutbacks will not be spread out over a number of 
>>> years, but will take immediate effect in 2013. The budget for visual 
>>> art will shrink from 53,3 to 31 million.
>>>  Among the more damaging and destructive decisions is the complete 
>>> cutting of funding for the six leading New Media Art Organsiations 
>>> that produce, distribute and facilitate New Media Art;
>>>  -STEIM: Independent Live electronic music centre that is 
>>> exclusively dedicated to the performing arts.
>>>  -De WAAG: Organisation & Worklab for old and new media, developers 
>>> of open source tools, research & technology for the creative 
>>> independant industry & intermediate between art, science and media.
>>>  -Worm: Rotterdam based laboratory, venue and studios for film, 
>>> music and internet featuring concerts, new media events, screenings, 
>>> production of film, music and software art.
>>>  -Mediamatic: software art projects, lectures, workshops & 
>>> screenings aiming on the young generation of artists, designers & 
>>> tinkerers.
>>>  -V2: interdisciplinary centre for art and media technology in 
>>> Rotterdam, activities include organizing presentations, exhibitions 
>>> and workshops, research and development of artworks operating in an 
>>> international network
>>>  -NIMK: The Netherlands Media Art Institute (NIMk) promotes the wide 
>>> and unrestrained development, application and distribution of, and 
>>> reflection on, new technologies within the visual arts. Since the 
>>> Netherlands Media Art Institute came into being in 1978 an extensive 
>>> collection of video and media art has been assembled, to which new 
>>> works are constantly being added.
>>>
>>>  These institutes together form the foundation for New Media Arts in 
>>> the Netherlands and forfil an important role in the International 
>>> Network that shares knowledge, exchanges, produces, distributes and 
>>> promotes various forms of New Media Art.
>>>  For most of these organisations the budget cuts will mean their 
>>> disappearance.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>  (fwd)
>>>
>>>  BUT of course there is more to it. In the document one can read 
>>> that Architecture, Design and eCulture are fusing together in a new 
>>> fund called Creative Industry (something non of these sectors 
>>> wants). ALL organization in the 3 domains won't receive any 
>>> structural funding anymore in this plan BUT the new Fund, that is 
>>> now being structured, will likely offer the change to organizations 
>>> to get structural funding (2 to 4 years). But since this fund is not 
>>> there yet and since they are having strong debates about the role 
>>> and function, and program of this fund nothing is indicated about 
>>> this fund in the published document. So when reading the document 
>>> you get a different picture of what is being debated right now 
>>> insight the Ministry and with the 3 sectors.
>> > The thing that should be in place for this fund are
>>>  1. structural funding to some of the important plpl.ayers in the 3 
>>> sectors; and
>>>  2. creating space for basic research in the 3 sectors.
>>>  When we get this done we are still facing a hardcore economic 
>>> agenda (the Minister is a hardcore liberal) but that we can shape 
>>> and address 'creatively' since we can't and don't want to fullfill 
>>> this agenda ourselves. Dealing with the goals of the new Fund will 
>>> be a major challenge since NO ONE wants this Fund and it has NO 
>>> bearing grounds.
>>>  Still, if you read the whole document you can see that probably 
>>> eCulture, design and architecture are coming out best if you compare 
>>> what is happening in other sectors like theatre, performing arts, 
>>> post academic education, visual arts a.s. For example all production 
>>> houses for theatre won't be funded anymore; all post-academic 
>>> organization like the Rijksacademie, Jan van Eyck and Berlage 
>>> Institute won't receive any funding anymore after 2012. This are 
>>> just some of the cuts that have been done.
>>>
>>>  NIMk nevertheless, since they are not part of eCulture but the 
>>> visual arts, are serious trouble up from 2013. The Minister 
>>> indicated that he has NO responsiblity for an archive that is not 
>>> set up by the Ministry but by a foundation itself, so it's NIMk's 
>>> responsibility to deal with their archive he thinks. The same for 
>>> the Theater Instituut Nederland that won't get any funding and who 
>>> also have a large archive on theatre on theatre covering decades of 
>>> history. but it's also an archive setup and organised by the 
>>> institute itself so also here the Minister sees no responsibilities 
>>> for him.
>>>
>>>  So you can imagine that I have been lobbying, having meetings last 
>>> months since we saw all of this coming, even though the result is 
>>> very unexpected in its format (bringing architecture, design and 
>>> eCulture in one new sector called Creative Industry - that nobody 
>>> wants to be related to).
>>>
>>>  I keep you updated since the coming month will be essential for the 
>>> future of eCulture in the Netherlands since the new fund is now 
>>> being discussed and shaped and should be announced end of July. And 
>>> of course we think and push that this new fund will supoort some 
>>> organisations structuraly since the budget is there (eCulture is far 
>>> less cut down then any other sector, only about 15% while other 
>>> sectors face cut downs to 25 till 50%).
>>>
>>>  ______________________________________________
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>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> Initiator / Director
>> McLuhan in Europe 2011 Network
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