WE know that Covid-19 has had a dramatically unequal impact on society. In the arts as a whole this impact has been felt by artists, freelancers and frontline workers.
Most freelancers are either marginalised, new or emerging artists, those who are already socially economically deprived or just out of art school, and some have no outside support.
Due to Covid-19, art organisations have been cancelling collaborative projects, at times regardless of a contract being in place. On top of that, most often there is no cancellation fee.
This has a knock-on effect. For existing artists, it means a lack of income, but for many marginalised and emerging artists, especially those in rented accommodation, this becomes a matter of sheer survival and a closer step to falling into destitution.
How does someone pay rent with no income?
For these artists, it becomes a dire choice between paying their rent to keep a roof over their heads, paying bills to keep the heating on, purchasing food and travel, or choosing to purchase materials to create new art in the hope of generating income.
This has a further consequence for grassroots arts venues across Scotland. The rent charged by these venues allows them to run exhibitions and pay staff. This income is now especially needed as they cannot have their bars open or hold any events.
Some of the current Covid funding, such as the Culture Organisations and Venues Recovery Fund, is directed at struggling businesses, mostly the larger scale ones within the sector.
Overall, funding seems to be targeted at those businesses that are deemed to have staff who might be losing a living, which is, of course, vitally important.
However, in this rush to support, we should not and cannot forget the smaller, community-based venues which have supported artists, particularly those early in their careers.
Artists themselves also need direct support. Yet the majority, those who have some form of part-time work – or did prior to Covid-19 – or have just left art school, do not qualify for the Hardship Fund for Creative Freelancers which opened in late October 2020 and promptly closed a few hours later with no warning, while many were still in the midst of completing the application. It did re-open last month.
It’s critically important right now to continue working on making the arts inclusive and appealing (by helping people access it) regardless of the shameful reality that the UK Government seems intent to devalue it and turn people away from it, even though the arts bring in £10.6 billion annually.
There seems to be no funding specifically directed towards marginalised artists as well as no funding towards new or emerging artists who have just completed art school. This is especially disappointing considering we have acknowledged a racial impact of Covid-19 and that only 2% of artists across the sector are BAME. Yet, the funding does not seem to be targeted to assist in developing new work, or in setting up space within your home to develop new work even though this is what masters art students had to do during summer 2020 in order to create work needed to graduate.
At the moment, these new and emerging artists are often not making a living from art, but they are suffering the consequences of not being able to access the materials and places that would aid in creating new artworks and give them the chance to grow and succeed as artists.
The funding decisions simply do not consider marginalised, new or emerging artists or practitioners. As usual, the little people are being ignored and are falling through the cracks in the system.
There must be a way for artists and community-based venues to be fully valued and funded.
Not only can funding assist with subsidising artists in studios who can’t afford rent for a few months, but grassroots organisations can pay their staff and continue to be there to offer support for new artists, musician, dancers and other emerging talent when we emerge from the current crisis.
The arts are critical to our economy, our wellbeing and our recovery.
This column is the first in a series from the Pass The Mic project, a directory of women of colour experts who aim to diversify voices and expertise in the media
Cat Dunn is a social art producer
Why are you making commenting on The National only available to subscribers?
We know there are thousands of National readers who want to debate, argue and go back and forth in the comments section of our stories. We’ve got the most informed readers in Scotland, asking each other the big questions about the future of our country.
Unfortunately, though, these important debates are being spoiled by a vocal minority of trolls who aren’t really interested in the issues, try to derail the conversations, register under fake names, and post vile abuse.
So that’s why we’ve decided to make the ability to comment only available to our paying subscribers. That way, all the trolls who post abuse on our website will have to pay if they want to join the debate – and risk a permanent ban from the account that they subscribe with.
The conversation will go back to what it should be about – people who care passionately about the issues, but disagree constructively on what we should do about them. Let’s get that debate started!
Callum Baird, Editor of The National
Comments: Our rules
We want our comments to be a lively and valuable part of our community - a place where readers can debate and engage with the most important local issues. The ability to comment on our stories is a privilege, not a right, however, and that privilege may be withdrawn if it is abused or misused.
Please report any comments that break our rules.
Read the rules here