Tags: arts, Cork, funding, Ireland, John Buttimer, politics
John Buttimer
CITY councillor John Buttimer has called on the City Manager to conduct an audit of the arts infrastructure in Cork City and to identify strategies for the protection of the sector in Cork.
Cllr Buttimer who is chair of the Arts Committee tabled the motion as a consequence of the threatened closure of the Kino Cinema and the closure of a number of commercial art galleries in the city (The Shaw Gallery, The Fenton Gallery and the Vanguard Gallery) in the past six months.
“There is also some debate about the continued viability of UCC’s Glucksman Gallery and continued City Council grant funding for the public arts sector.
“I was motivated to table the motion because of the success of the Capital of Culture, the designation of the Lonely Planet Guide and the recent publication of the economic contribution of the arts sector to the local economy.
“My fear was that once the arts infrastructure was allowed to disappear it would be very difficult to replace it again. The economic report commissioned by Cork City Council found that the rate of return from grants and investment was tenfold and came in the millions of euro. It was also reported that over a thousand jobs were dependent on the sector”.
Arts from the city and county will march in the “March For The Arts” at 2pm on Saturday, November 14 beginning at Daunt Square.
If a convention on lap dancing were held in Cork, I am quite sure that it would attract as many visitors to Cork as the film festival and who is to say that lap dancing is not a valid art form – ? It hardly needs to be said that some of the popularity of art films in the past derived from the fact that nudity and the portrayal of sex tended to escape the censors attentions in ‘ art films’. So lets lighten up on pointing to the ‘ jobs’ potential of the arts – every sphere of human activity has the same or more potential for generating jobs.
There is of course a source of revenue available for saving the Kino apart from the very obivous one of having the people whoi are interested in the arts actually pay for it thenselves. Our Councillors could simply cancel thier monthly junkets and use the money saved for the arts. Of course we could never expect our dismal local politicians to do anything as radical as using the money devoted to junkets for good cause – greed is far too strong an emotion to allow them to do this.Mr Buttimer id wrong about the disappearing arts infrastructure not being replced, the mere sniff of grants or the availability of tax payers money will bring the Arts fraternity crawling from the woodwork.