European Conference
Access to Art and Culture throughout Childhood and Youth
19. april 2012
The Black Diamond, Copenhagen
Beth Juncker
A cultural policy in its own right!
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Most of us gathered in this concert hall today live in countries
who have signed UN’s Convention on Children’s Rights. Article 31
focuses on children and young people’s right to access to art and
culture.
Slide 1
“Article 31
1. States Parties recognize the right of the child to rest and
leisure, to engage in play and recreational activities appropriate
to the age of the child and to participate freely in cultural life and
the arts.
2. States Parties shall respect and promote the right of the child
to participate fully in cultural and artistic life and shall encourage
the provision of appropriate and equal opportunities for cultural,
artistic, recreational and leisure activity.”
The keywords of article 31 are leisure, play, recreation, fully
participation, culture and art – and the keywords are linked
together telling us, that cultural life is an independent dimension
of our lives. Cultural life is leisure life, time to open and to
conquer all the possibilities for aesthetic experiences and
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aesthetic activities offered by the cultural sector. Time to meet
these special productions of knowledge, which give access to all
our values and all our feelings.
Implementing article 31 we are compelled not to confuse social
policy or educational policy with cultural policy. As a
consequence we have to develop a cultural policy in its own right.
A cultural policy opening access to art and culture as a
continuous part of and inspiration to children and young people’s
cultural lives. Today’s conference calls it: the red thread!
Developing a cultural policy in its own right and ensuring the red
thread is the main challenge we are facing just now. We are – at
least in Denmark – standing at the end of a shift of cultural
paradigm. Since the late 1980’ties we have been on a move from
an educational cultural paradigm founded in theories of
developmental psychology to an aesthetic cultural paradigm
founded in theories of play and the meaning of aesthetics in
everyday life.
In relation to children and young people we developed
throughout the 20th century an educational cultural
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communication tradition built on the notion of the child as a
becoming and the notions of art and culture as instruments
serving the aims of the social and the educational system.
This tradition was based on a thinking founded in oppositions,
contrasts – between cultural communication linked to cultural
institutions and the market, between fine arts and popular
culture, between literacy and entertainment. Market,
entertainment and popular culture were regarded as the bad
guys. Cultural institutions, cultural communication and fine arts
were seen as the good guys. Keywords connected to the qualities
of this tradition focused on the educational qualities of the
aesthetic products, on children and young people’s
comprehension and on their literacy.
During the last decades of the 20th century this educational
tradition, the monopoly of the cultural institutions
communicating it and the very thinking in opposites between fine
and popular, good and bad have been challenged. The radical
changes of the society due to new media, new technology,
changes in the structure of childhood, the development of a
cultural liberation transforming children and young people’s
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private rooms into the greatest cultural institution of the country
play a main role. As cultural human beings Children and young
people are no longer just receivers, silent audiences - readers,
listeners, spectators – they are at the same time creators,
evaluators and communicators. Researchers have started talking
about the Gutenberg parenthesis and about social conditions
opening possibilities for new kinds of participatory cultures.
So metaphorical spoken these challenges are leading us from
Apollo to Dionysus. From an attendant culture with a silent
audience to a participatory culture with an audience keen to take
part in development, evaluation and discussion of the aesthetic
experiences offered by the cultural policy.
The key words accompanying this development have been
interactivity, creativity, dialogue, process, participation. We are
facing new kind of cultural users, new kind of audiences forcing
us to rethink, re-democratize, re-vitalize cultural policy: we call
them the omnivorous! They don’t respect the old oppositions,
they find qualities across fine and popular art and culture.
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The American researchers, Henry Jenkins and Vanezza Bertozzi,
give us in an article on how and why young people create (
Engaging Art 2008) a description of theses tendencies calling for a
new kind of cultural policies and new forms of recognition. They
notice that the culture in the United States is moving away from a
world where a few gifted artists produced works that would be
consumed and admired by many to a world where many are
producing works that can be circulated among smaller niche
publics.
“More young people are producing media than ever before, yet
policymakers complain about a lack of participation in the arts.
What is wrong with this picture? Historically, arts policymakers
and scholars have defined participation in terms of attending socalled high art concerts or museums. Currently, there is a growing
concern that members of the younger generation do not seem to
have much interest in these forms. This chapter argues
something different: youth are very interested in participating,
just not necessarily in the arts as they have been traditionally
defined. (…) These young people are passionate about emerging
forms of expression, which allow no fixed hierarchy, no
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standardized criteria for evaluation, and little inherited canon.
[…]
Their warning is: ”Arts institutions (and cultural policy) need to
keep up with these changes or they will be left behind. “
In Denmark both cultural policy and arts institutions have faced
these challenges. We don’t yet have all the answers, but we are
working on them – both in theory and in praxis.
Culture for all – it’s the title of the cultural policy in Denmark just
now. It addresses all of us – children, young people, adult. As
part of this policy the Network for Children and Culture has
developed a cultural policy especially addressing children and
young people. It is built on a vision, which is quoted in the
conference programme:
All Children and young people in Denmark must meet art and
culture
All cultural institutions in Denmark must contribute
All art forms must be included
The main word in this vision is ‘must’.
This little ‘must’ means, that Denmark as a state is obliged to
ensure an up to date, living and developing artistic production –
theatre, literature, visual art, music, dance, films, media
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addressing children and young people. Late modern arts
experiences, children and young people can meet.
The ‘must’ also means, that all public supported cultural
institutions in Denmark occupied with communicating culture
and cultural heritage – museums and libraries for instance – have
to address children and young people too – with exhibitions,
installations, arrangements, performances as part of their daily
work.
Why?
Because the heart of a cultural policy in its own right is the
constant war, the necessary conflict between cultural tradition
and artistic innovation. Without tradition no past no history,
without innovation no present no future. You might say that the
very meaning of cultural policy is to maintain this conflict, to
ensure our possibilities both to meet tradition and to be part of
innovation and thus making meetings and discussions with art
and culture an integral part of our lives from we are born.
The conference we are attending today can be seen as a small
demonstration of the kind of meetings with art and culture this
cultural policy offers children and young people. We are going to
meet some of them –in theory and in praxis.
The conference itself contributes as I mentioned in the beginning
to this vision with a red thread ensuring access to art and culture
for all ages, all over the country throughout childhood and youth.
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A great vision! But - looking back on the tradition we have to
rethink: also a dangerous vision!
Why?
Because the red thread in this conference is not a cultural red
thread. It is an institutional red thread, combining and composing
central social and educational arenas in children’s lives. So let me
end with a correction and a warning.
Children’s cultural life does not start in day care.
It starts at home, in the special wordless communications in
families - between babies, mothers, fathers, sisters, brothers,
grandparents. Winnicut calls it the potential space. That’s the
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correction – it is essential, if you want to understand the meaning
of aesthetics in children and young people’s everyday life.
The warning is just as essential. Using day care and schools as
arenas for a cultural policy in its own right are difficult. That’s
what we have done in the 20th century. Art and culture were
taken hostage – used as instruments for social and educational
policies. So - what’s new now?
Day Care and Schools during the 20th century have used art and
culture to their own purposes.
Today I ask:
How can day care institutions form arenas and contribute to
children and young people’s cultural life?
How can schools form arenas and contribute to children and
young people’s cultural life?
Why is it so difficult to make a genuine cultural policy in its own
right giving children and young people access to theatres, concert
halls, movies, scenes of dance, museums, exhibitions,
performances, artistic workshops ?
I ask. And I hope this day and this conference will bring new kind
of answers!
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The red thread is composed of and combined with different kind of arenas: social arenas, educational
arenas and cultural arenas.
Arena
I will end this key note with a small correction and a warning.
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