The State as arbiter of taste

You may have heard on the news about Creative New Zealand’s recently commissioned report on its support for the ‘et al’ installation as its entry in the Venice Biennale 2005. Creative NZ is the government’s main arts funding body, and this was its 3rd entry to the Biennale. The Venice Biennale is easily the world’s most significant international art exhibition. Et al is an anonymous artist (though it’s now well known who she is) and her installation caused a great deal of controversy. Why should the government have spent $500,000 on this? And is it the best use of scarce arts funding? The report mentioned above generally endorses the involvement of Creative NZ, and the presence of an NZ pavilion, at the Biennale. It does, however, recommend that more be done to proactively manage media and political reaction to the choice of artist. The negative publicity was not helped by ‘et al’ choosing to remain anonymous and hence refusing to talk to the media. Having attended the Biennale 2005 myself and seen the et al installation, I’d have to say that I did not particularly like it, nor did I find it intellectually challenging – though I don’t mind if Creative NZ takes a risk or two. Nonetheless, the whole issue highlights some interesting public policy questions. How do we ‘value’ the arts and their role in social and economic life? How does an agency of the state decide, on behalf of the taxpayer, who is to be shown at an event like the Biennale? Is the state effectively acting as an arbiter of taste on behalf of the rest of us? I am reminded of Pierre Bourdieu’s famous dictum: ‘Taste classifies, and it classifies the classifier’. Perhaps I’ll explain that another time, though.