MEASURING THE EXPERIENCE #31
In looking at the practices and intentions of artist-led organisations, this study has highlighted the notion of a ‘life-style’ approach and of a visual arts practice which may have different aspirations and operate over different time-frame than other kinds of visual arts practice. Clearly therefore, the evaluation methods used to measure of the impact of the work need to be appropriate to this context. Thus, consideration needs to be given to the work’s value within the artists’ own personal and artistic development, the quality of its relationship or engagement with other people, the impact the work may have on social and environmental well-being and regional or local identity, and the time-scale required to create that impact. In considering the benefits to an audience, evaluation would need to take into account not only the numbers of people who saw an event, became collectors of art and craft work, who worked to make a community mural, etc – but also to consider the notions of change in perceptions and empowerment of people, as these have been described as the “more subtle, creative and sensitive benchmarks by which we can measure our progress as a society”.[1]
The Integrated Advisory System has been referred to earlier as a means by which artist-led organisations might gain practical support from arts funding bodies. This system also offers a mechanism by which the work of artist-led organisations could be more firmly located within the arts infrastructure. A closer relationship would enable the vitality and originality which artist-led organisations have to feed more directly into the activities which take place across the rest of the arts infrastructure. As artists are listed amongst those who can be called on to be advisers, it is suggested that some of those artists be chosen because of their involvement with artist-led organisations. By contributing to policy discussions, assessment of visual arts work and through interaction with other advisers and officers, this area of practice would be then be more likely to be acknowledged as an integral and valuable aspect of the arts infrastructure, rather than as a relatively minor aspect in terms of the resources allocated to it. These artist-advisers would also be in a position to contribute to reviews and development of the evaluation mechanisms which are employed by the funding system and by doing so, help to ensure they are in tune with artist-led practice.
As the case studies show, devising and implementing evaluation is familiar territory for artists, for whom it is an automatic and integral part of artistic practice. Artists have to review and assess the quality and resonance of an artwork or project and the working methods used to achieve it before moving on to other work. Evaluation is a continuous process which, over a period of time not only provides artists with assessment of the quality of their work, but also determines why and how their practice will develop within their overall artistic vision and within the framework of their particular situation and life-style. This self-critical approach also runs through the work of artist-led organisations, with the case studies demonstrating their commitment to evaluating for themselves the outcome of their projects, both artistically and organisationally, in order to improve what they do in the future.
It is significant that many contributors to case studies commented that artist-led organisations are well-placed to “take greater risks”. It follows, therefore, that there needs to be an acknowledgement within the funding system that artists have the right to fail, however unpopular this may be with those with interests in the outcomes of a venture. Case studies reveal a certain uneasiness with artistic failure, particularly when public funds (and thus public accountability) are at stake, and especially where an organisation’s activities don’t take place very often (meaning a ‘failure’ may not be replaced with a ‘success’ for a good while). Artists sitting on this knife-edge are in an unenviable position in that they “Seem to be constantly sitting exams. They make work, they are tested on it and if they fail to meet the mark, it’s not just the work but their whole creative personality which is judged to have screwed up”.[2]
[1]Defining Values: Evaluating arts programmes, Francois Matarasso, Comedia Working Paper 1, The Social Impact of the Arts, 1996
[2] From a text by David Butler in Taming Goliath, a publication arising from a research project dealing with artists’ public interventions in Aberdeen in August 1996.
