Art, After Virus: Seven Questions for a Sector on the Edge

By David Maggs,

“Many of our cultural rituals were in decline before COVID-19. Now our cities are broke, our sponsors bled of cash, and older, art-consuming demographics are unlikely to take their seats anytime soon. If this tragedy needs comedy, consider that choral singing — surely the most wholesome activity in the Western world — is now dangerous? Granted, the arts feel doomed.

Which makes an obvious distinction painfully clear. Some folks want the world to change, others don’t. But is it not surprising to notice how much our cultural sector relies on stasis? On tastes, values, behaviours, and institutions remaining unchanged? Need this be so? Does a rich cultural sector imply a static one? Or have we backed ourselves into this corner unnecessarily?”

Source: The Philanthropist