Response to European Commission
The Crafts Council responded to the European Commission consultation – "Unlocking the potential of cultural and creative industries".
Response from the Crafts Council, July 2010
1. Background
The Crafts Council welcomes this consultation, and supports the European Commission’s aspiration to improve the environment for the creative and cultural industries in Europe.
The Crafts Council is England’s national development agency for contemporary craft. It aims to build a strong economy and infrastructure for contemporary craft, to increase and diversify the audience for contemporary craft and to champion high quality contemporary craft practice nationally and internationally.
The Crafts Council works to promote participation and learning, promoting opportunities for interaction and informal engagement with craft. It supports craft makers’ professional development and builds the market for contemporary craft by running fairs and promoting export. It holds a significant collection of contemporary craft, which it makes available through touring exhibitions and loans. It also works to raise the profile of contemporary craft through critical debate and by building an evidence base that demonstrates the nature and value of craft.
Nearly 35,000 people work as makers in the contemporary craft sector in the UK, and the whole craft sector contributes £3bn to the UK economy each year. The UK’s contemporary craft sector has a strong international reputation which attracts people from within Europe and from across the world to study and work in the UK.
The contemporary craft sector is part of a vibrant cultural and creative sector in the UK, which contributed 5.6% of the UK’s GVA in 2008 (source: DCMS). This is considerably higher than the EU average quoted in the Green Paper (2.6% of EU GDP), supporting the document’s position that there is untapped potential for the CCIs in Europe.
Indeed, the Crafts Council believes that, with appropriate support, the contemporary craft sector’s contribution, and that of the wider CCIS, to the UK and EU economy could be even more significant. We welcome much of the Green Paper’s analysis of the sector’s strengths and some of the challenges facing it. In particular, we welcome the fact that the consultation recognises the importance of micro-businesses to the cultural sector. This is especially true of contemporary craft, where 87% of all makers work as sole traders (source Crafts Council).
We would however strongly welcome more recognition at the EU level of craft as an independent sector. On the Commission’s list of art forms supported by the Culture Programme design and the applied arts are classified together. The craft sector has its own strengths and priorities independent from design and other applied art forms. In terms of scale it is a significant sector: in the UK, traditional and contemporary crafts together represent 13 % of all those employed in the cultural and creative industries. We feel that greater articulation of this distinction at the EU level is important in ensuring that craft is adequately represented in policy and funding decisions.
2. New spaces for experiment, innovation, etc
Question: – How to create more spaces and better support for experimentation, innovation and entrepreneurship in the CCIs? More particularly, how to increase access to ICT services in/for cultural and creative activities and improve the use of their cultural content? How could ICTs become a driver of new business models for some CCIs?
Comments: In terms of improving the environment for CCIs, the Crafts Council agrees that “clusters” of creative businesses are very helpful in promoting growth. In the craft sector, such clusters often also include Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) and we encourage the EU to include HEIs in their planning in this area.
ICT is a driver of business models for contemporary craft in surprising ways. Recently published research for the Crafts Council (Making Value 2010), gives examples of the ways that makers engage with ICT. For example, it describes a project in which an academic crafts specialist worked with a CGI company to improve the way that fabrics are represented in CGI and to capture the fabrics’ qualities more accurately. The report also cites the work of the Autonomatic Research Cluster, at University College Falmouth, where makers are researching ways of engaging with emerging models of customisable, digitised manufacturing processes and are exploring the use of digital manufacturing technologies in the creative process.
The Commission should continue to take a very broad view of the potential of ICT to the CCIs, which goes far beyond the early-stage use of ICT for online retailing.
3. Better matching the skills needs of CCIs?
Question: – How to foster art and design schools/business partnerships as a way to promote incubation, start-ups and entrepreneurship, as well as e-skills development? – How could peer-coaching in the CCIs be encouraged at the level of the European Union?
Comments: The Crafts Council agrees that these kinds of partnerships are important. The Crafts Council’s recent report, Making Value, gives many examples of the benefits that can result from this kind of collaborative working. In the UK, start-ups in the craft sector already commonly emerge from partnerships between universities and makers. These have been encouraged in the UK by Knowledge Transfer Partnerships, with government funding. Relatively small grants can give creative academics and business people the chance to spark each others’ innovation. The Crafts Council believes there is scope for further, EU-wide investment in such arrangements.
Developing networks and finding partners at the European level is one area in which the current emphasis in the Culture Programme on funding multilateral projects could be beneficial, although multilateral funding should not be the only provision for the sector – see our response to the next section.
We agree that peer-coaching is important, and is a theme in the Crafts Council’s own work. We suggest that the Commission could encourage this approach by building it into EU-funded projects. So, for example, recipients of European funding in universities could be encouraged or required to share some of their skills and knowledge through peer coaching.
4. Access to funding:
Questions – How to stimulate private investment and improve CCIs access to finance? Is there added value for financial instruments at the EU level to support and complement efforts made at national and regional levels? If yes, how?
- How to improve the investment readiness of CCI companies? Which specific measures could be taken and at which level (regional, national, European)?
The crafts sector in the UK typically comprises small enterprises and individual makers. Many makers in the UK rely on multiple income streams, for example combining teaching, consultancy and making, in what we term ‘portfolio careers’. It is very challenging for makers, throughout their careers to ensure that their practice is financially viable – even through portfolio working. Makers benefit enormously from professional development support and the Crafts Council have a strong track record in this area. Our current professional development programme is called Crafts Council Collective and helps makers to develop their businesses and revenue.
European funding for culture, though the Culture Programme, is currently too focussed on multilateral cooperation (specifically Strand 1 – 1.1/1.2.1/1.3) to be relevant for this kind of support. Less focus on partnership working at the application and delivery stage would make European funds more accessible and relevant for the UK crafts sector, although we welcome opportunities to share professional development experiences with other European craft makers.
With the new government in the UK there is also new emphasis on philanthropic giving to supplement public funding for culture. Information about accessing philanthropy at the EU level and lessons from other countries about stimulating philanthropic giving would also be valuable.
5. Local/regional development
Questions: How to strengthen the integration of CCIs into strategic regional/local development?
Which tools and which partnerships are needed for an integrated approach?
Comments:
We agree that CCIs can have a significant impact on regional and local economic development. The Leitrim Design House in Ireland (supported by the DG REGIO Peace II Programme – Measure: 1.4 Promoting Entrepreneurship) provides an excellent example of how investment in craft, in this case by providing market development services such as a new gallery/showroom and full time craft officer, can stimulate the creation of businesses and growth of existing businesses in an underproductive rural area. We would strongly welcome more investment on the Leitrim model which is the only example to date, as far as we are aware, of a craft specific project supported by the Structural Funds.
We also welcome the Commission’s ongoing study The contribution of Culture to Local and Regional Economic Development, particularly if it leads to recommendations for stimulating further investment in craft in EU regions.
Representatives from the craft sector in the UK also report that regional and local networks provide a valuable means of stimulating partnership working which can lead to shared resources in areas such as advocacy and lobbying for the sector. Further EU support for multinational and regional networks would be valuable – particularly with the pending abolition of RDAs in the UK, which have been the mechanism through which EU regional funds are distributed. Support for intermediary craft specific organisations at the regional and national level is also essential in the UK as they provide routes to employment and the market for makers.
6. Mobility of cultural works and practitioners
Question: – What new instruments should be mobilised to promote cultural diversity through the mobility of cultural and creative works, artists and cultural practitioners within the European Union and beyond? To which extent could virtual mobility and online access contribute to these objectives?
Comments:
The European strategic objectives for culture, set out in the European Agenda for Culture, commonly focus on European priorities rather than the priorities of specific art forms. Although creative industries can make valuable contributions to European objectives including fostering cultural diversity and intercultural dialogue, these are not the primary objectives of the sector.
The Crafts Council welcomes the Commission’s publication in June of the report from the OMC working group on the Mobility of Artists and Cultural Professionals, but also recognises that the most valuable outcomes of increased mobility at the European level for UK craft makers would be access to new markets rather than contributions to intercultural dialogue and cultural diversity – although these outcomes are also desirable. We hope that the recommendations in the report translate into practical policy measures which open up new opportunities for makers to sell and generate revenue streams at the European level.
In terms of online mobility the Crafts Council has a well established directory of UK craft makers; it would be valuable if the Commission could provide information about similar resources relevant to the sector in other European countries.
7. Promoting export
Question: Which tools should be foreseen or reinforced at EU level to promote cooperation?
Exchanges and trade between the EU CCIs and third countries?
Comments: The Crafts Council agrees that SMEs need help if they are to realise their export potential. In the contemporary craft sector, most makers’ export potential is under-developed.
We welcome the inclusion of relations with third countries in the recommendations from the OMC working group on Mobility of Artists and Cultural Professionals, particularly around visa issues and the mobility of cultural goods, specifically if these recommendations facilitate greater access to markets for UK makers beyond the EU.
8. Spill-over from CCIs into other industries and sectors
Questions: – How to accelerate the spill-over effects of CCIs on other industries and society at large?
-How can effective mechanisms for such knowledge diffusion be developed and implemented?
- How can “creative partnerships” be promoted between CCIs and education institutions /businesses / administrations?
- How to support the better use of existing intermediaries and the development of a variety of intermediaries acting as an interface between artistic and creative communities and CCIs on the one hand, and education institutions / businesses and administrations, on the other hand?
Comments: The Crafts Council strongly agrees that the boundaries between CCIs and related sectors – in particular HEIs – are porous. Craft has an impact far beyond what might be seen as the boundaries of the sector. Making Value, the Crafts Council’s recent research report includes an example of a maker who acted as a colour consultant on a major new hospital build, for example. The Crafts Council welcomes the Commission’s emphasis on mainstreaming culture, and agrees with the findings of the study, Impact of Culture on Creativity. However, too many policy makers and opinion-formers still see culture and the creative industries as marginal and something of a luxury. It is vital that the Commission contributes through its work and policy to a more positive environment for the CCIs.
More practically, we suggest that the Commission has a role to play in matching up European partners including relevant businesses, education institutions and administrations.
