Arts Prizes Should Be Privately Funded

What involvement should governments have in funding arts prizes?

Very little, according to the new government of Queensland. Writers have of course complained bitterly. There have been critical responses, many such as this example from Kate Middleton (I believe a different one from our possible future queen), a melange of self interest and non sequiturs.

The argument by analogy with tourism funding is particularly absurd:

“Given the millions spent on boosting tourism, surely some money can be laid aside for the arts.”

So, because tourism receives money from the government, the arts should also get a slice of the pie? The argument epitomises the leftists’ handout mentality: money is being collected and distributed, so why can’t we / they have some?

How about collecting and distributing less of it in the first place?

Firstly, funding tourism is an investment. The intention is that the funding will be repaid many times over in job creation and tax revenue. It is sound economic practice for governments to perform a venture capital role. Tourism is one of the best export industries because its earnings come from the provision of services and the enhancement of the environment, as opposed to mining which degrades it. In fact, valuable environments such as the Great Barrier Reef and Kakadu must be preserved in order to facilitate tourism.

One could suggest that funding of writers via prizes is an investment, since some will later become successful and provide the community with tax revenue. However, Kate Middleton's article argues against this claim by admitting that this is often not the case. Conversely, most financially successful writers have never received a government grant or prize.

Secondly, governments do fund the arts to a significant degree. All large Australian universities have English, Music and Fine Arts departments. Opera and theatre companies are subsidized. Film finance corporations offer incentives and investment. Rebates are available through the tax system. NIDA is part of the University of New South Wales. There are also annual arts festivals, although these are partly aimed at stimulating tourism.

“Arts cuts will reward only the unthinking”, says Kate Middleton. How? Is the government diverting the prize funding to support rugby league? In fact, the cuts will reduce the public debt, which rewards everyone.

Kate Middleton is a previous winner of the West Australian Premier's Award For Poetry and the Bruce Dawe National Poetry Prize. The latter is funded by an endowment from the poet Bruce Dawe. Her poem Rainbow's End won it in 2006. It can be found in her book Fire Season.

It’s a good enough piece of work. I like the way the complexity of the themes marries with the cadence. Sure, give it a prize. But why should taxpayers fund it per se?

If Kate Middleton was on a university English faculty, she could get paid to write stuff like this all the time, as long as she contributed some wider literary criticism and taught it as well. Not an unreasonable trade off for a professional poet.

In fact, no-one is being rewarded by arts cuts. Taxpayers’ money is being saved, because this government believes it is preferable not to take money from citizens in the form of taxes and redistribute it to a select handful of writers and poets. Their rationale is that the funding of arts prizes is a matter for the private sphere.

Lefties would say governments at all levels should fund prizes in art, literature and music. The federal government should fund a few major, annual prizes in several categories, state governments should fund prizes for younger or lesser known artists and even local councils should offer arts prizes to schoolchildren. That’s the way lefties think: “What can government do?” As soon as they gain any control over public office or funds, they immediately set about exploring this question, assuming without doubt a moral imperative.

True libertarians don’t want any funding for arts prizes by governments or large corporations. It is more than a philosophical belief that this is not a legitimate role of government; funding from such sources is dangerous because it has the potential to compromise artistic integrity.

The compromise from funding by large corporate entities is pretty clear and certainly the left would agree. However, the assumption that governments would not also be likely to seek to influence awards by threatening to withhold future funding and / or stacking the prize committees is naïve.

Often, a less actively conspiratorial mechanism delivers similar results. When arts prizes are instituted by governments, the types of people who seek membership of the awards committees, or whose membership is sought, tend to be left of centre politically. Not all them, but the overall balance tends to tilt to the left.

Eventually, they just can’t help themselves and award a prize to an overtly (left) political work, whose didacticism greatly exceeds its artistic quality. This sets a precedent and more such awards follow. If there is not currently a conservative government in power, there eventually will be. Their reaction is to reconstitute the board of trustees of the prize or even to shut the prize down. Left wingers then evoke Nazis and their attempts to control culture. I have read one citing the Germanic Art versus Degenerate Art exhibitions, conveniently overlooking the fact that socialist realism was virtually mandatory in the Soviet Union. Apparently, conservative governments should just fund the arts and not criticise what is produced. It’s perfectly acceptable for left leaning governments to involve themselves in arts debates, of course.

You can’t keep politics out of art, or art prizes. Political fighting ruins it for everyone. That’s why democratic governments should not be involved. Arts prizes should be privately funded. The biggest ones are.

The Archibald Prize came about as a result of a bequest in J.F.Archibald’s will. The Archibald, Sulman and Wynne Prizes are all funded by a combination of donations and entry fees to the exhibitions of the finalists. They are administered by the NSW Art Gallery via a board of trustees.

Prizes for literature and music are logistically more complicated to administer because there is nothing equivalent to a national or state art gallery, in that theatres are too small and diverse and libraries do not charge entry fees. It does not follow however that prizes in these fields cannot be privately funded and administered.

It requires some effort to raise funds, however given that many of these prizes are in the range $5,000 - 20,000 p.a., it shouldn’t be that difficult. Making the effort to get off the public teat will very quickly pay large dividends in terms of independence.

There are many Australian actors and writers who have done very well for themselves. I’m sure they could fund a few literature prizes. This would be vastly preferable to government involvement.

Aboriginal prizes are the ones with most to gain from independence from government. The David Unaipon Award could easily be funded by any Aboriginal land council (or group of them) which receives mining royalties. Why doesn’t a group of prominent Aboriginals propose to take over the trusteeship of the prize? There are certainly people competent to run it: Noel Pearson, Ken Wyatt, Warren Mundine. Approach some successful Aboriginal sportsmen for a funding contribution: Adam Goodes, Anthony Mundine. I’m sure they would be good for a few grand a year each. In the end, the Australian taxpayer will be funding 46.5% of the prize anyway.