Charlotte Higgins rightly identifies how arts institutions have “learned helplessness” in responses to Arts Council England’s wholehearted endorsement of neoliberal policies (Britain’s art institutions face death by a thousand cuts. Why are they just putting up with it?, 22 March). The risk-averse charity governance model adopted by most arts bodies, combined with the ambitious (ie overoptimistic) income targets needed to finance the “right kind” of arts leaders and associated tiers of operations staff, are among the structural flaws laid bare by the pandemic that remain unresolved by policy implementation.
Less documented in the national press is the dire artistic and economic climate for visual artists, whom policy has made helpless. The poorly conceived eligibility criteria applied to government and ACE emergency funding to freelancers during Covid meant that the vast majority of artists simply fell through the cracks.
