CULTUREVALUATION – FOR WHAT IT IS WORTH?

On 12 -13 of June uqbar in co-operation with NGBK - New Society for Visual Arts hosted a workshop for international participants focusing on 'Evaluation’ - the magic word in the cultural policy and practice field. Leonie Baumann’ (NGBK) analysed the difference between assessing creativity and success in cultural projects. Artistic activities that build up cultural assets have a delayed effect on audience’ attitudes, interest and skills.

Methods to measuring this long-term impact exist both for the artists and for the funding institution. The formula is based on clear intentions for their short-term goals and long-term ambition that frame project objectives. Dorothea Kolland (Kulturamt Neukoelln) set apart a project in public space and a project engaging the public. She drew attention to the fact that the pleasure in the process is a criterion of cultural value. Audience development is a special task for the cultural entrepreneurs. A challenge for public projects is the communication with their intended users and target audiences that rarely gets acknowledged as a financial need in the project plan.

Irina Cios (CIAC/ICCA Bucharest) analysed the success and challenge of the Rahova-Uranus Community Centre cultural project. As the urban regeneration plan turned into success, it caused the initiative to reconsider its indicators of achievement. Artistic regeneration in this project had led to an upgrading in the economic value of property that may jeopardize the upgrade in the social context. Was this an intended result and was it the inevitable output of cultural production? Petya Koleva (Intercultura Consult, Sofia) furthered the discussion with a presentation of selected charts from the ‘Culture Projects: a guide to European Cooperation’.

She analysed with feedback from the partners the use of the quality and quantitative tools to monitor a project’s development. Some artistic as well as some culture funding priorities can be traced if they are clearly analysed with proper tools. Sustainability for instance is embedded in the methods structuring the project committee and stakeholders involvement. A participatory method could be used to share monitoring and foresee some risks at the inception of project. Self-evaluations and study-circle methods are appropriate to the development of projects that foresee sustainable results and co-operation. The ‘community’ concept was centre-stage in the presentation of ICC expert, Dr. Ruth Cherrington. She outlined contexts of ‘Implicit Cultural Policy’ in the organisational structure, the informal learning and volunteer-based methods of operation of Working Men’s Clubs in the UK reflected on www.clubhistorians.co.uk .

A broader inter-cultural analysis presented parallels with the ‘chitalishte’ network in Bulgaria and ‘casas de la cultura’ in Latin America. It proved that the social space rising out of a civil initiative can institute an organisation actively shaping local cultural policy today, a point that captured the attention of arts and culture managers. This was not incidental – in the autumn of 2010, Catherine Schoss will develop for a ‘club’ for NGBK association. The Ludwig museum’s new project space in Budapest has also been experimenting with a ‘club’ model by promoting inclusive policies via free internet and yoga courses on its location. Both of these examples form part of an implicit strategy to include the residents or accidental, ‘organic’ public in the exchange of an arts space. The workshop continued with an Exchange and Review exercise and a visit to the new location of ‘New Bethanien’ arts residence space that is now a public-private partnership. The outcome of the workshop shaped the prototype of a resource tool that will contribute to the analysis of CultureValuation and volunteer, community activities, clubs and hubs.

The outcome of the workshop shaped the prototype of a resource tool that will contribute to the analysis of CultureValuation and volunteer, community activities, clubs and hubs.