Changing of the seasons: investigating the role of fashion weeks and film festivals in Amsterdam and Vancouver in fostering innovation ROSA KOETSENRUIJTER, UNIVERSITY OF AMSTERDAM ABSTRACT The role of temporal economic phenomena, such as film festivals and fashion weeks, in the field of cultural production is manifold. Drawing upon qualitative empirical research, this paper presents a view on festivals as protective institutional environments where creators can experiment materially and semantically without being pressured by isomorphic parameters and market forces. Through a comparative, small-N study of four festivals – two film festivals and two fashion weeks – in respectively Amsterdam and Vancouver, the innovative potential of temporal economic phenomena is studied. Via qualitative interviews this study has found that festivals appear to be a central node in the cultural field. Not only do they constitute spatially and temporarily bounded places where the latest/newest products and trends are showcased, as well they appear to bring together different, spatially dispersed key actors from within the field to contribute to the bridging, accumulation and conversion of social, economic and cultural capital. Furthermore, the festivals appear to be a laboratory where, to some extent, new and innovative ideas and creative experiments are presented to people within the field and to the general public. As such festivals play a part in supporting and fostering innovation within the industry. However, due to both internal pressures and external developments the role of festivals as bearers of innovation, protectors from isomorphic and market pressures and institutions for the development and internalization of Habitus is being challenged. KEY WORDS: innovation, cultural industries, film festivals, fashion weeks, field of cultural production, isomorphic pressures Changing of the seasons 2 INTRODUCTION “A pathbreaking gatekeeper can achieve an innovation by searching out a new class of artists or presenting them to a previously unserved audience.” (Caves, 2000: 202) In the week before the 90th annual Academy Awards ceremony I watched Get Out, a comedy horror film by Jordan Peele, where issues of modern day racism take centre stage. Its description indicates that this film does not pertain to the traditional parameters of a horror film. While Peele had successfully been addressing issues of banal racism within the comedy genre for quite some time, this horror film marked his cinematic debut as a director. By bridging humour and societal relevance the director attempted to cross the boundaries of the horror genre. The fact that Peele had for long been humorously criticizing certain societal norms and relations, perhaps granted him the trust from various agents to actually debut with this innovative film. While Get Out screened in mainstream theatres, won one Oscar (for Best Original Screenplay) and was nominated for three more, such films that challenge genres or the norm often tend to be confined to the safe bounds of film festivals. Providing a safe environment wherein creators can experiment, cross boundaries or challenge set parameters is one of the roles that festivals or so-called temporary economic phenomena aim to fulfill (Brandellero and Kloosterman, 2010). Power and Jansson (2008) and Maskell et al. (2006) deem these spatially concentrated and short-lived/temporal events with a specific sectoral specialization a locus where supply and demand are concentrated and where various agents come together to construct social relations of trust and cooperation, and to exchange products, services, information and knowledge. In the research conducted, the role of film festivals and fashion weeks as institutional environments in which creators and producers of cultural products are protected from isomorphic pressures and market forces and through which innovation can be fostered by experimentation (DiMaggio and Powell, 1983; Brandellero and Kloosterman, 2010; Alvarez et al., 2005) is central. Changing of the seasons 3 This research into processes of innovation within the cultural industries and the role of festivals therein, is framed within Bourdieu’s notion of the cultural field of production. Seeing that festivals can be considered as a temporal crystallization of the field where the latest/newest products and trends are presented and where the various actors from within the field are brought together in order to build social capital, transfer knowledge and connect economic and cultural capital, they appear to be central nodes in the cultural fields of film and fashion production. Furthermore, festivals can be seen as laboratories and filter mechanisms where new and innovative ideas and creative experiments are curated and then presented to people within the field and to the general public. As such, festivals contribute to supporting and fostering innovation within the industry. However, both fashion and film are confronted with contemporary challenges that put pressure on the functioning of their respective fields of production. At present, the negative impacts of fashion production on the environment and the livelihoods of garment producers are becoming ever more apparent, as several interviewees have described. In the film industry, aside from the wide-ranging implications of the #metoo debate, technological innovations and digitization processes are putting ever more pressure on the traditional format of showcasing films in theatres. The question then arises whether film festivals and fashion weeks are still to be considered central and relevant nodes in the highly dynamic and changing fields of cultural production. Can these institutions still fulfill their role as laboratories for experiment and as a filter mechanisms if their traditional format is challenged by ‘external’ developments? By use of four cases – two film festivals and two fashion weeks in respectively Amsterdam and Vancouver – the contemporary role of these institutions in processes of innovation is investigated additional to their position and role within the cultural field. Answering these questions also requires unraveling the meaning of innovation within the cultural industries. Innovation has come to be a rather nebulous term which currently seems to stand for anything slightly new. Yet, innovation within the cultural industries seems to be fairly different from innovation in let’s say the automotive industry given the highly symbolic and aesthetic values Changing of the seasons 4 and meanings imbued in cultural products and services. These characteristics make an in principle measurable concept hard to determine. While innovation in this field also seems to be associated with technological and material advances (e.g. new cameras, Virtual Reality (VR) and 3D printing) renewal in relation to content, symbolism, aesthetics and the way in which a message is conveyed are vastly relevant in industries that are marked by these characteristics. The following section will start by succinctly setting out Bourdieu’s theory of the field of cultural production. Additional attention will be paid the notion of innovation within the cultural industries. The section thereafter centres on the selection of the four empirical cases (the Amsterdam Fashion Week, the International Documentary Festival Amsterdam, the Vancouver International Film Festival and Vancouver Fashion Week) that inform this research. Then, the qualitative research methodology utilized in this research will be explicated. The fourth section will present the findings of this research on innovation in the cultural industries and the supportive role of festivals therein. I will conclude with a discussion on the relevance of festivals as bearers of innovation and their future position in the field of cultural production. BOURDIEU’S FIELD OF CULTURAL PRODUCTION In the field of cultural production, products and services are produced that are characterized by a high symbolic/aesthetic value and a significant input of high levels of intellect and empathy (Scott, 2006). These products and services are marked by a so-called ‘nobody knows property’, meaning that due to the volatility of consumer tastes, the demand for these kinds of goods and services is rather uncertain (Caves, 2000). According to Bourdieu’s action theory, such fields are organized and structured by both an external force (the market) and an internal force (the cultural or the creative sphere). Hence, for an actor to be ‘successful’ – given the high experiential and symbolic value of cultural products this is highly subjective – his or her work should thus be creative as well as marketable. In the production of these goods and services – by Bourdieu termed ‘social action’ – actors combine their variegated set of capitals (social, cultural and economic). This social action, in Changing of the seasons 5 its turn, is shaped by two forces: an internal one (Habitus) and an external one (the field of cultural production). As such, actors are constantly ‘moving’ between market and culture and are simultaneously combining internal and external forces to create the cultural goods and services (Bourdieu 1996, 1998; D’Ovidio, 2015; D’Ovidio and Haddock, 2010; Becker and Pessin, 2006). Individual actors such as film makers and fashion designers are not the only ‘players’ existing within the field. A cultural field is composed of various institutions (e.g. festivals, schools), organizations (brands, production studios), people (critics) and cultural production