CC(3) AC 52

Communities and Culture Committee

Inquiry into the Accessibility of Arts and Cultural Activities in Wales

Response from Jon Gower

Dear Committee,

Thank you for turning your attention to the provision for the arts in Welsh communities, especially at a time when chill economic winds blow. I should like to start my personal contribution by reproducing an account of the arts commissioned from me by Wales Arts International. It was penned to give artists overseas a sense of the range and embeddedness of the arts in our country. I hope it‟s useful to the committee, if only as a quick audit of the artistic wealth we currently possess. It is certainly a treasure worth more than money.

The arts in Wales are vibrant, vital and varied, with practitioners who both respect the continuities of tradition and sharpen the cutting edge. The country is well provisioned with arts centres, galleries and theatre spaces and there‟s a real sense of stuff going on, of this being a country where people want to make things, from house music to conceptual art, from high octane dance to serene verse.

The historian Dai Smith recently suggested that Wales is an old country becoming young and in many senses he‟s right. The existence of the Welsh Assembly Government, the National Assembly for Wales and new civic institutions have generated energy, deepened self awareness and touchstoned new ambition. These have led to ideas such as the Library of Wales, which reprints books, a sort of Welsh canon if you like, by such writers as Gwyn

Thomas and Margiad Evans, making their work available in all of the country‟s schools and funded by the Welsh Assembly Government.

Bands such as Super Furry Animals, Stereophonics and Manic Street Preachers have long served to put the country on the musical map, and sell millions of albums to boot. Now talented newcomers such as Duffy are forging a trail for emerging artists such as Marina and the Diamonds and Ellie Goulding. They all join a musical roster which includes the ever energetic Tom Jones and other great singers such as Bryn Terfel and Shirley Bassey, in opera and showbusiness respectively.

Folk or traditional music is energized by bands such as 9 Bach ( Little

Grandmother) whose singer Lisa Jen Brown delights in arranging old tunes in sparkling new arrangements and delivering them with a voice that rings clearly true. The spirited melodies of the five piece band Calan and individual artists such as the extraordinary harpist Llio Rhydderch, refashion often ancient tunes and mold them into modern cuts. While individual musicians can make arresting music put over fifty together, as happens with Y Glerorfa, a sort of folk orchestra, and old melodies are given both depth and punch.

The harp, of course, is a symbol often associated with Wales. It‟s believed that the country has more harpists per head of population than any other: little wonder that the town of Caernarfon hosts an International Harp Festival, with lectures, concerts and competitions.

In classical music, too, composers such as Guto Pryderi Puw and John Metcalfe build on a vibrant tradition established by the likes of Grace Williams, Alun

Hoddinott and William Mathias. The Vale of Glamorgan Festival is an annual celebration of contemporary music which first started in 1969 and has attracted composers of the calibre of Aarvo Part. Welsh National Opera, based in the golden armadillo shaped Wales Millennium Centre in Cardiff Bay is simply world class. It tours regularly around Wales and beyond and its community projects such as Opera Max are rightly lauded. The WMC, designed by architect Jonathan

Adams is itself well worth a visit, staging anything from large scale musicals in the 2000 seater Donald Gordon theatre, to stand up comedy and experimental theatre in the smaller Weston studio. The centre regularly features free concerts and performances in one of its main public spaces while the building is home to a range of artistic companies including the Dance Company Wales, which thrives under the artistic guidance of Ann Sholem and attracts enthusiastic audiences wherever they go, be it Brecon‟s Theatr Brycheiniog or a recent Swiss sojourn which drew much critical acclaim. Matching energy with intelligence this is a national treasure of a company and a celebration of the human body and all its aspirations and expressions.

Indeed Wales encourages dance in all its manifestations. Swansea‟s Dynion is an all male company which recently celebrated its twentieth anniversary. Dynion started life in the city‟s economically disadvantaged areas such as Townhill but has recently led to the formation of Dynion Pro, a professional company.

Newport is the base for Independent Ballet Wales which, under the aegis of artistic director Darius James stages pared down but popular versions of established classics such as Giselle as well as new works, such as Under Milk

Wood and The Lady of the Lake, inspired by Welsh texts or myths.

The visual arts sector has been particularly confident these past couple of decades, with Wales hosting the biannual Artes Mundi Prize, one of the largest arts prizes in the world as well as hosting an exhibition at the Venice Biennale, which has showcased a range of artists from Cerith Wyn Evans to musician John

Cale. A chain of art spaces links much of the country from the contemporary arts showcase at Llandudno‟s revamped Oriel Mostyn in north Wales to mid

Wales venues such as Oriel 31 while cities such as Swansea are home to galleries such as the Mission and Glynn Vivian galleries while Cardiff is well served by such spaces as Chapter Arts Centre, Ffotogallery in nearby Penarth and the small but exceedingly influential g39, which resides smack bang in the middle of the city‟s café quarter. Indeed artists seem to abound pretty much everywhere, not just because Wales is innately picturesque but also because its art education is premier league. A small commercial gallery sector is growing, too, to complement established art spaces. You might like to explore the weird worlds of Peter Finnemore, easily one of the most imaginative artists working in

Wales, or the consistently inventive output of Bedwyr Williams. Check out too Sue Williams‟ vibrant canvases or the psychologically nuanced paintings of Kevin

Sinnott or the landscape meditations of Brendan Stuart Burns, not to mention the conceptual avant garde actions of Andre Stitt, whose work investigates the act of painting as performance. Young artists such as Carwyn Evans, from agricultural west Wales have a lot to say about place and nationhood and say it arrestingly while Blaenau Ffestiniog based David Nash‟s work in wood, living and cut, is an ongoing essay about sense and dimension and is certainly worth seeking out.

In the applied arts the Gallery at Ruthin Craft centre has regularly showcased the work of the country‟s makers and has gained an international appreciation for their work by presenting work at the Smithsonian, at Collect, the global art fair and at The International Expositions of Sculptural Objects and Functional Art

(SOFA) in Chicago.

The delicate ceramics of Lowri Davies are born out of everyday objects that her parents and grandparents would have used, or at least handled but with spry wit

Davies gives drinking cups or Welsh dressers an elegantly contemporary feel.

Referencing Nantgarw and Swansea porcelain her bone china tableware is alive with native birds and animals and her Welsh heritage is proving to be a deep font of inspiration. Other artists such as weaver Cefyn Burgess draw on their own cultural backgrounds for inspiration, making quilts that may depict Welsh chapels or reflect the landscape and light of his childhood days in the slate quarrying village of Bethesda. In her Cardiff studio textile designer Laura

Thomas draws on both the dramatic landscapes of her native Pembrokeshire and the vitality of visual communications to marry the organic with the graphic to produce anything from commercial home furnishings to public art, while companies such as Melin Tregwynt make commercial products such as furniture, clothing and cushions using Welsh traditions with innovative and modern design. Their blankets, in particular, are simply beautiful in design but also magnificent for dealing with the chill of Welsh winters!

Politically a process of devolution has produced a National Assembly in the country but culturally, too, new energies are being released. Wales is a net exporter of artistic talent, which seems appropriate enough, for as Welsh heavy industry ran down this small country on the western rim of Europe become a manufactory of world class actors, from Richard Burton through Anthony

Hopkins and Jonathan Pryce to Michael Sheen, a production line which shows little sign of stopping. A national Welsh language company, Theatr

Genedlaethol, established in 2003, set the scene, as it were, for a new National

Theatre Wales working in English, which started producing new work in spring

2010. This new company has just embarked upon its ambitious first year, with site-specific productions mapping all parts of Wales, incuding a production of

Aeschylus‟ Persians on a military range, work staged on north Wales beaches and ending with a huge community venture in the steel town of Port Talbot under the direction of Michael Sheen. NTW‟s work will complement the output of established companies such as Clwyd Theatr Cymru and Milford Haven‟s

Torch Theatre, where the artistic guidance of Terry Hands and Peter Doran respectively has shaped fine and memorable productions year on year.

Performance art of all kinds has its place too and practitioners such as Marc

Rees, whose often intimate and autobiographical work investigates the homoerotic and Eddie Ladd‟s intensely realized works such as „Scarface‟ and

“The Bobby Sands Memorial Race‟ which couple sense of place with urgency of expression have helped them establish international reputations and a legion of creative connections. Movement artist Simon Whithead‟s output is often prompted by walks, be they along the length of the river Ystwyth or the streets of Barcelona. He has been a keen collaborator, not least with sound artist

Barnaby Oliver.

Literature is one of the most respected art forms in the land, and the Welsh language has generated a remarkable body of work, not least poetry written in cynghanedd, a form of strict metre verse which has been described by the

Princeton Encyclopaedia of Poetry as „the most sophisticated system of poetic sound-patterning practised in any poetry in the world‟. Magazines such as the quarterly New Welsh Review and Planet present the work of many Welsh writers, established and emerging, and Welsh language publications such as Barn do the same in Wales‟ senior tongue.

Wales is home to the Hay Festival, arguably of the UK‟s most successful literary events. Bill Clinton dubbed it the “Woodstock of the mind” and as a festival it has now branched out, not only to cover other cultural forms but also to become a cultural brand in its own right, having spawned highly successful sister festivals in such places as Nairobi, Cartagena, Grenada, Zapateca and

Beirut. The latest addition to the literary calendar, the Laugharne Festival, uses the picture-book setting of a town set on the edge of an estuary, filled with connections with Dylan Thomas, arguably Wales‟ most famous literary son, to create an intimate and joyous celebration of words and music. If you‟re interested in great Welsh writing check out the novels of Niall Griffiths, the travel writing of Jan Morris, anything by Jim Perrin, the sublime essays of Robert

Minhinnick, Nia Wyn‟s emotionally devastating memoir Blue Sky July or the poetry of Damien Walford Davies, Dannie Abse, Gwyneth Lewis or Gillian Clarke.

Wales‟ biggest festival deserves it own paragraph. The National Eisteddfod is a unique establishment, rightfully described as the largest travelling cultural event in Europe. It‟s a sort of artistic circus, with a tented pavilion instead of a big top, and each year it pitches up in a different part of Wales in the first full week of August. From druidic ceremonies to late night rap concerts, it‟s a remarkable event, which has the side benefit of recharging interest in the Welsh language wherever it goes.

The existence of such bodies as S4C, the Welsh language television channel and the Film Agency for Wales have been propitious for film making. Recent successes include Hattie Dalton‟s „Third Star‟ and the prize garnering „White

African‟ by Welsh producer Elizabeth Morgan Hemlock. Directors such as Marc

Evans have created engaging and illuminating bodies of work ranging from the

Valleys dystopia „House of America,‟ through the tenderly moving „Snowflake‟ to the terribly scary „My Little Eye‟. Cardiff based director Justin Kerrigan‟s followed his commercially successful coming of age movie „Human Traffic‟ with the recently released „I Know You Know‟ and one of the most lauded films to Welsh country life, the post-modern pastoral „Sleep Furiously‟ by Gideon Koppel won the Guardian First Film Award or its depiction of life in a close-knit sheep farming community.

Even a rapid fire survey artistic landscape in Wales reveals a country full of vibrancy and colour, populated by a passionate people who cherish creativity and encourage it. Collectively the arts allow us to say here we are, here are our marks and signs, our songs and stories. Listen to them awhile, look at what we have fashioned and composed, share with us, if you please our sense of things, our wonder at it all.

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The committee has invited comments about the accessibility of high quality arts experiences for all. In my experience as an arts‟ journalist over the past two decades or so Wales has improved access to the arts immeasurably and in recent years (concurrent and in tandem with the evolution of both the Assembly and the Government) the focus on accessibility, and the role of the arts in both community development and expression has been both successful and active.

“Community” changed from being a buzzword to a watchword for arts bodies and the focus on community arts even had repercussions for academia, with the establishment of a Chair in Community Arts at the University of Glamorgan.

Nowhere is the changed nature of the relationship between people and culture than in the museums, which are now properly “owned” by the people, and free admission has normalized museum going and broken so many barriers at a stroke.

In terms of physical build the chain of art venues and theatre venues, such as

Blackwood Miners‟ Institute, Galeri in Caernarfon and Theatr Mwldan in

Ceredigion, the Riverfront in Newport, the new look Mostyn in Llandudno, the splendid arts centre in Aberstwyth and the Torch Theatre in Milford Haven, the list goes on, have acted as local and regional hubs.

Many companies take their products on tour and WNO‟s Max project has successfully taken what is seen by some as a high art to such venues as leisure centres to great effect. Similarly National Theatre Wales (of which I am a board member) showed in its very first production „A Good Night Out in the Valleys‟ how there was a keen appetite for theatre. The run, visiting venues from

Bedwas to Pontardawe, sold out, playing to 2,690 people across 8 shows in 5 venues. Importantly 60% of the bookers at Blackwood hadn‟t previously been to the Blackwood Miners‟ Institute. Many factors might account for this success.

NTW hosted local bands in the show. It held workshops, and a free "Assembly" at Blaengarw workmens' hall but if there is one anecdote which sums up the success of this venture it was to be found in the young people who had their first taste of theatre at Blackwood and were a month later then to be found in the stalls of the New Theatre to watch a John Osborne play. It doesn‟t take much to kindle, or ignite an interest in the arts. But keeping the flame alive needs planning for the future, a sustainable plan for the arts.

Clwyd Theatr Cymru has had similar experiences to NTW‟s when the company visited the valleys and socially disadvantaged areas such as Pill in Newport with shows such as „Brassed Off‟, namely finding new audiences. Similarly bodies such as Academi have worked in new areas, physically, such as the Valleys and

Gwynedd, and in new locations such as work in mental health institutions and prisons.

Taken collectively such bodies, and galleries and arts centres (and this include a great many which are run by LAs) cover much of Wales, although there are still some obvious gaps in provision – Merthyr Tydfil is one such area. The last time an arts centre for the area was seriously mooted I went to the Gurnos estate to record vox pops for TV news. It may reveal a grave misconception on my part but I expected people in such a disenfranchised to be negative to the idea, perhaps suggest there were better things on which to spend money. To a man and woman the vox populi thought an arts centre for the area not just good but essential.

I broadly welcome the ACW Investment Review and can understand and appreciate the logic which underpins many of the decisions therein but I would like to highlight one problem area. Because they are so deeply enmeshed in their communities I find ACW‟s decision not to fund bodies such as Gwent

Theatre would leave a huge gap in arts provision in the south east just as Theatr

Powys would in mid Wales. There is much talk nowadays of arts ecology. These companies haven‟t just entertained generations of people with stories that are relevant to their communities, they have also nurtured writers, such as Charles

Way and scores of technicians.

Local authorities have a key part to play in arts provision with collective spending of the order of £ 36 million, but it‟s noteworthy that the picture of activity in Wales is incomplete, with some LAs failing to supply figures to the

Arts Council. In the Local Authorities Arts Expenditure Survey 2008-2009 only

17 out of 22 LAs responded, which means the picture of commitment and spend is incomplete. It is even more worrying that as I understand it one Welsh LA does not even have a strategy for the arts. It is impossible to take a pan Wales view of arts provision or plan for the future without such basic data. This sort of deficiency was highlighted by Ian Hargeaves in his exceptionally lucid report,

„The Heart of Digital Wales: a review of creative industries‟ when he showed that decisions were made about investing in this key strand of the economy without even base data being available. The committee might be encouraged to examine ways of getting at least one year‟s figures from all the LAs to allow a proper appraisal of their existing commitment, and future spend, at a time when it appears that they are collectively spending less year on year.

As to the Arts Council‟s Investment Review I hope that the rigour and openness of the process means that what its chairman describes as the post-review

“irreducible core” of its business is just that and that ACW doesn‟t suffer a double whammy of cuts over and above those it has already set in train.

I wish the committee well in its deliberations. No one is under any illusion about the chill factor of the economic winds that now blow. At such times a somewhat philistine argument is sometimes made about having to make a choice between hospitals and the arts. I am invincibly convinced that a mature, or maturing nation should have space for both. The arts aren‟t an add-on, a frippery for times of economic growth. They are part of us and in great part define us. They enrich our lives even as they challenge us. During the shaping of the Wales we now inhabit generations of people have proved their understanding of the nurturing and sustaining role of the arts, from the countless books read in the slate quarrymen‟s caban to the working class pennies of the south Wales valleys that paid for public art. It is perhaps moot that we should follow their example.

Best wishes to the committee and I look forward to your debate and deliberations.

Yr eiddoch yn gywir,

Jon Gower.

71, Romilly Rd.,

Canton,

Cardiff,

CF5 1FL