Placing Culture at the Heart of the Games Key Achievements And
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Placing Culture at the Heart of the Games Key achievements and challenges within the London 2012 Cultural Olympiad Dr Beatriz Garcia Head of Research Institute of Cultural Capital Senior Research Fellow in Sociology University of Liverpool PLEASE NOTE: This document provides an advance on key findings published as part of the broader London 2012 Cultural Olympiad Evaluation Find the full London 2012 Cultural Olympiad Evaluation at: http://www.beatrizgarcia.net/?portfolio=london-2012-cultural-olympiad-2 http://www.artscouncil.org.uk/what-we-do/our-priorities-2011-15/london-2012/ Full Report available at: www.beatrizgarcia.net Abstract Putting ‘culture at the heart of the Games’ was a feature of the London 2012 Cultural Olympiad’s strategy since the bid stage and was widely considered to have been a distinct dimension of London’s 2012 unique offer. When the Cultural Olympiad launched in 2008 and, again, within its culmination as a 12-week London 2012 Festival in 2012, the centrality of culture to the Games was consistently emphasised. While many other host cities have aspired to achieve synergy between culture, sport and education, success in this area has eluded most previous Games. Ongoing challenges with branding and marketing regulations, budget commitments, and the publicity priorities of core Games stakeholders, all frustrate achievement in this aspect of the hosting process, making culture one of the most difficult things to get right within an Olympic and Paralympic programme. This paper articulates the support for London’s claim to have fulfilled this vision, while also indicating the challenges the host city’s stakeholders faced in putting culture at the heart of the Games. It addresses three main questions: 1) How was the aspiration to place culture at the heart of the games delivered and did it succeed? The evidence shows that this aspiration was successfully met mainly thanks to the consistent adherence to a series of core values which translated into actual artistic programming decisions; the exploration of innovative branding approaches; the involvement of partners with a vested interest in the Games at large, and investment into nationwide infrastructures to make the Cultural Olympiad an effective platform for people to feel part of the Games experience, beyond London and ticketed sporting arenas. 2) Did the public acknowledge the achievements of the Games cultural programme? The scale of public awareness about the Cultural Olympiad was remarkable, peaking at 29% of the UK population and 40% of Londoners in 2012. People tended to agree that the Cultural Olympiad was a relevant dimension of the Games and over 70% of attendees to activities indicated that their experience positively influenced their overall Games experience. 3) Did the UK cultural sector value the existence of a Games cultural programme? The majority of programme delivery partners and contributing artists considered the Games connection relevant and saw added value in being part of the Cultural Olympiad. Key additional benefits of such association are described as feeling part of a bigger national celebration, attracting different participants or audiences and gaining greater national profile. Key words: Cultural Olympiad, London 2012 Festival, London 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games, cultural values, branding, partnership, public awareness, stakeholder engagement Acknowledgements Thank you to the International Olympic Committee for granting access to the Olympic Transfer of Knowledge extranet and allowing reference to selected documentation about the London 2012 cultural programme. The research informing this paper has been developed with support from Tamsin Cox, DHA Head of Policy, who led the ICC/DHA Projects Survey, and Kate Rodenhurst, who led the Case Studies Research. Prof Andy Miah, from the University of the West of Scotland, has provided invaluable support towards copy-editing earlier versions of this paper. Garcia, B. Placing Culture at the Heart of the London 2012 Games (April 2013) 2 Full Report available at: www.beatrizgarcia.net 1. Introduction The findings presented in this paper are informed by the two-year Cultural Olympiad Evaluation commissioned by the London Organising Committee for the Olympic and Paralympic Games (LOCOG) and Cultural Olympiad stakeholders.1 Findings derive from the analysis of official documentation produced by the London 2012 Culture Team, which communicate the development of the programme’s vision and supporting strategic decisions over the years. They also also draw from final summaries and recommendations presented by LOCOG as part of the Olympic Transfer of Knowledge programme and the London 2012 de-brief to the International Olympic Committee and future Games hosts. Furthermore, evidence support is found in the analysis of interviews with key stakeholders; analysis of public and audience surveys produced for LOCOG, and analysis of a survey of all Cultural Olympiad projects conducted by the Institute of Cultural Capital. 2. Narrative: ‘Culture at the heart of the Games’ A sustained focus on key values Opinions vary over which is the most effective approach to placing culture at the heart of the Games. From community empowerment to focusing on excellence and iconic cultural references, there is no single model through which to deliver culture within the Olympic and Paralympic programme. The London 2012 Cultural Olympiad committed to exploring as many angles as possible by developing a four-year lead-up programme using an open source approach to programming which involved many grassroots organisations beyond the arts world, and culminating the Olympiad with a twelve-week London 2012 Festival focused on artistic excellence and world-class acts. Thus, empowering communities broadened the opportunities for direct involvement and a sense of shared ownership over the programme, while promoting excellence created distinct messages, attractive to national and international media and appealing to audiences beyond immediate communities of interest. To achieve the transition from a broad Cultural Olympiad involving multiple-ownership of programming, into a single-curated London 2012 Festival, it was important that the LOCOG Culture team remained committed to a series of core narrative angles or values. These evolved from the London 2012 Candidature File culture chapter (2005), into the original Cultural Olympiad vision (2007-8) and the final main objectives of the London 2012 Festival (2012). These narrative angles emphasised: • Engaging young people, as artists, producers and audiences; • Raising the profile of Deaf and disabled artists and providing more opportunities to showcase their work; • Inspiring and involving the widest and most inclusive range of UK communities, reaching every region in the UK; • Showcasing the UK as world leading hub of creativity and the creative industries, helping to develop cultural tourism; • Celebrating London and the whole of the UK welcoming the world – its unique internationalism, cultural diversity, sharing and understanding • Creating opportunities for large scale and active participation. 1 The London 2012 Cultural Olympiad Evaluation has been directed by Dr Beatriz Garcia at the Institute of Cultural Capital and will be published by Arts Council England and LOCOG in May 2013. The full report will also be available at: www.iccliverpool.ac.uk Garcia, B. Placing Culture at the Heart of the London 2012 Games (April 2013) 3 Full Report available at: www.beatrizgarcia.net These angles are reflected in programming decisions across the Cultural Olympiad. Furthermore, their emphasis on inclusion and diversity can be seen as a pivotal to making them, not just valuable cultural objectives, but also key assets for the London 2012 broader communication strategy, a dual role (as both cultural and communication assets) that has been rare in previous Games editions. Analysis of the London 2012 website structure over time, final debrief documentation and interviews with LOCOG’s Communication and Engagement team, support the view that the Cultural Olympiad was used in support of two of London 2012 main communication priorities, thus showing its centrality to the Games at large: • Engage audiences – for instance, by making the Cultural Olympiad a key asset within the ‘Join in’ programme, which had a clearly defined profile within the London 2012 website and resulted in the establishment of a dedicated mobile devices ‘app’, claimed to be “the biggest event database in the world”(stakeholder interview). In this app, which secured 20 million downloads2, London 2012 cultural activities were fully integrated with information about all sport activity throughout the Games period • Create atmosphere – mainly by linking some dimensions of the Cultural Olympiad to the ‘Spectator experience’ programme and integrating its visual identity within the wider ‘Look of the Games’ programme (see section 3, Positioning) As noted by LOCOG’s Director of Brand, Marketing and Culture, the Cultural Olympiad is easier to explain once it has happened and everyone knows “how things end”. He argued that the Cultural Olympiad was very hard to explain in the early stages, particularly as there are no clear referents from previous Games and no high expectations from the general population or the media. In this sense, the creation of a “grand finale” in the form of the London 2012 Festival was critical in helping to tell the story and “get buy-in from a wider range of Games champions, as well as journalists, including