Art for All? Their Policies and Our CultureEds: Mark Wallinger and Mary Warnock (PEER, 2000, ISBN 0-9539 7720-X £18.00 [£23.85 inc p&p*]) A core cultural policy text doubling as coffee table arts book…Arts for All invites and holds attention in its intriguing mix of images, jokes, polemics, arguments, documents and anecdotes. Through the imaginative selection of a range of voices "speaking" in a range of forms, the key issues of accessibility, accountability and instrumentality are examined and challenged in this informed debate on the principles of state support for the arts. I found myself not merely "dipping in", but reading for a purpose — following the warp and weft of contrary opinion and policy creating a flexible weave in which tension is prized. Memorable strands? The 50 line long Proposed Sculpture by David Bartholomew, which should be pinned on the noticeboard of anyone involved in public art; Jes Fernie’s Swiftian response to access: feed artists to the masses; Roland Miller’s dilemma of creativity: "the artists dance - to entertain - pulling flowers and stones from their heads; they offer both to the people watching; what the people do next is their choice"; and the importance of Helen Gould’s assertion that developmental community based work demands specialist expertise. An historical perspective comes from the selected texts 1945-1997. The path runs from Lord Keynes to Chris Smith via Jennie Lee, the Arts Council of Great Britain’s Report of the Community Arts Working Party, the Glory of the Garden and the National Arts and Media Strategy (remember?). Try applying the social inclusion indicator "distance travelled" to assess this cultural policy journey - and enjoy contemporary artists’ views.
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