Andy Lown’s Post

Sobering reality of the landscape for Arts and Culture here- with an insightful report from University of Warwick - have a read- gives great insight and comparison to Europe.

Wow. This is, at the same time, a brilliant statement about an essential issue and totally depressing and boring that we are even still debating the matter. Art is vital. Our culture is what makes us human. The short-sightedness of cutting arts funding anywhere, but ESPECIALLY in education is mind-blowingly stupid. Want a happy population, constructive society and thriving economy? Throw money at culture. Want a sad, stale, stagnant situation? Cut arts education. Read my recent articles for Sceptical Scot (which cite the excellent work by Campaign for the Arts) for my proposed solution. Cutting arts funding is like a business facing financial difficulty cutting marketing spend, stupid. Local, national and federal governments take note: sort this out now or watch our future spiral down the drain.

My Tuesday...attend Australian Academy of Cinema and Television Arts (AACTA) Festival and Awards launch at Home of the Arts, pick up camera gear and jump on a video call with Federal Senior Advisors to the Minister for the Arts. How and Why you may ask? (I know you didn't but I'm going to tell you anyway because this perfectly summarises what I do). The launch - of the AACTA Festival included the Screen Careers Expo presented by Essential Screen Skills (my wonderful workplace!). This event provides a platform for all Creative Industries to showcase careers, pathways and employment in the Screen Industry. The AACTA Festival itself includes an incredible myriad of professional learning and sure opportunity to fangirl over Aussie legends too. The launch was also a great celebration and reflection of the economic impact, tourism opportunities and jobs created that the Screen Industry brings. The camera gear - this week we are collaborating with Asia Pacific Screen Awards to deliver the Reel Connections networking event and Youth Pitch Masterclass (we have 11 eager High School students keen to pitch their ideas to ASPA Mentor Producers). Our ESS Youth Ambassadors will also be flexing their social media content creation skills - snapping photos and highlights reels. Hence camera gear to capture the magic! The video call - here is where it comes full circle. As the representative and in my capacity as Co-Chair of Australian Teachers of Media I work with the incredible team at National Advocates for Arts Education. Currently, the Tertiary pathways to Creative Industries is in a crisis - there I said it. It's a crises and we are advocating at Federal, State and Institution levels to bring attention to bigger picture challenges that students and the industry will face. It's no secret that there is a shortage of skilled technicians in the Creative Industries. There is a survey running currently to capture what is happening across the country at a Tertiary level. Please share (the findings already are so disheartening). https://lnkd.in/g3Ng4etb

There is so much talk about #productivty and the Government keep cutting funds for the most productive UK sector. This always leaves me baffled. The Rev Peterson Feital I think you will be interested in this report

Daisy Fancourt is an award winning researcher who has been seeking to understand what role the arts play in society - are there real, measurable benefits, or do people engage in the arts purely for the arts sake? Her research demonstrates numerous robust cognitive, psychological and physiological benefits and is an important contribution to the larger research effort analyzing the role the arts play in our wellbeing. One of her longitudinal studies, looking at a cohort of over 6,000 participants over 14 years with an average age of 65, looked at mortality rates when adjusted for frequency in engagement with receptive arts. Receptive arts as opposed to active arts engagement, include attending theater performances, concerts, operas, museums, art galleries, and exhibitions. Infrequent receptive arts participants who engaged with the arts once or twice per year, had a 14% lower risk of dying compared to their counterparts who reported no receptive arts engagement. Participants who frequently engaged in receptive arts, every few months or more, had an astonishing 31% lower risk of dying. These results are after adjusting for demographic, socioeconomic, health related, behavioral, and social factors. The arts literally help you live longer. Click here to read the full study: https://lnkd.in/eDwUhjd

Just gonna keep on highlighting this issue… it’s not going away. The impact is now hitting education - FE particularly very hard indeed.Senior management play a numbers game and it’s all about money not success of our young creatives. Low numbers and they will and are closing courses. Once closed these provisions rarely start up again. The outcome? FE will become creative wastelands. The industry will not be able to recruit the new generation. Industry.. this is happening now. It’s time to wake up. Be woke. Protect our industry’s future.

Isn't this fantastic to learn? We mainly focus on activities to maintain physical health or activities that test and assist in acquiring knowledge but his often do we talk about the emotional and creative activities to lead to longevity? Personally, I saw the covid lockdown as a blessing as it allowed time to show a bit in a sense that people started looking at art again or they were brave enough to pick up a brush or pencil for the first time and put it to paper or canvas. It allowed for the topic of discussion of mental health and brought even more focus to a topic often pushed to the side. I have met and see many people who have used art as a form of therapy and that's fantastic because there a periods in history where genres of art acted as forms of therapy. Creating art allows us to give free reign to our subconscious and let whatever is on our minds out even if we aren't atune to what's there. Creating art is the first step to developing stronger communication skills because first we must identify the problem and art assists in doing so. To learn more keep following...

Unless the government choose to radically reform education's accountabililty system, the arts will continue to be squeezed out of schools regardless of funding. We treasure what we measure, and the Ebacc performance measure (Gove, 2010) prioritised core subjects, meaning schools focused on this at the expense of creative arts. Art GCSE entries have dropped by around 42% since then. Let's hope this current government curriculum and assessment review is a genuine attempt to make change #education #arts

Here is a wonderful example of inspiring leadership from the National Endowment for the Arts and many actors from the arts, academia, civil society, and government. This summit invites people to imagine what policy would look like “when one thinks of the arts as not being confined to a narrow sector, but woven and integrated into other things we care about” (María Rosario Jackson) There are too few spaces like this one, through which we can ask two fundamental questions: what are our moonshot goals as a society and how can the arts help us reaching them?

What importance do the fine arts have for traditionalism? Can the arts really save our infected modern society? Read the full article here: https://loom.ly/tgroclE -- Enjoying Intellectual Takeout? Consider supporting our mission: https://lnkd.in/gPChuR9Y