Introduction
Cultural Art involves the process of creating and arranging items of aesthetic value to in a manner that attracts an individual either emotionally, intellectually or just physically. Cultural industries combine creativity, production and commercialization of pieces of art capable of stimulating one’s mind and thought drawing them to such items. It is a combination of human activities such as generating movies, writing books or journals, architectural designs, journalism and advertising activities etc. Some technological advancements also represent culture, Everitt& Mills (2009, P 749-768). There is therefore no doubt that art is valuable, both economically and culturally, to the contemporary society. This essay will discuss the economic and cultural importance of culture brought about by creativity as well as how to measure and assess the various economic impacts of cultural art.
Culture and Economy
Culture has been for a long time the backbone of the economy for communities all over the world and thus should be looked at as a precious object, which the international community should behold. However both culture and economy are interdependent; culture brings about a sustainable development to a country on one hand and on the other hand “for a culture to thrive, it needs a supportive distributive system and investment infrastructure, as well as stimulating environment for its creators and artists,” (Fisher 2002, P.14). Culture contributes to both the intellectual capacity and cultural life of a country. Arts make up a substantial amount of a country’s economy thus “culture and development can no longer be viewed as independent of each other,” (Fisher 2002, P. 17). It does not only provide revenue through taxes and exports but it is also channel for creation of employment opportunities for a large number of people in any given economy. In Australia, “over 250,000 Australians are employed in the cultural sector, which represents 3.3 per cent of the total Australian workforce” (Fisher 2002, P 17). The cultural profession is no doubt of paramount importance if we are to continue enjoying these benefits and we need to recognize the efforts of those individuals who dedicate their lives in this industry. These individuals are referred to as cultural professionals.
A Culture Professional
A professional artist includes “any arts practitioner working in the arts (…architecture, dance, film, video and animation, literature, music and opera, visual arts and new media)…” (Madden 2002, P.3). Cultural professionals are important for the overall development of the society. There is need for creativity and innovation so as to handle new challenges that so often emerge and “without the creative process we languish,” (Mike, 2011). Creativity has enabled to fight diseases through new cure methods, overcome natural calamities by using items that can forecast the future happenings and so many other things. So what is creativity?
Creativity
In the contemporary global society, the world is always in need of new developments and enhanced commodities. This makes creativity an integral part of our everyday life to create new and appealing objects of admiration as a pathway to commercial success. No wonder every other book writer nowadays is obsessed with the word ‘creativity’ as their title and the current anthropologist is always looking for a way to explain the term. Liep too was not left behind and defines creativity as the “production of novelty,” (Liep, 2001). Others define creativity as the exploration of new possibilities within a given framework of rules, which Liep dismisses with the argument that is only but invention. Nonetheless, people of all the generations respond to thecontingencies of life by coining and improvising new types ofculture because there is no conceivable system of rules or norms thatcan be so adequately structured to cover all the possible future happenings. Creativity is therefore a representation of the human imagination in the form of intelligent building designs, thrilling books, exhilarating movie theatres and so much more (Nielson, 2000).
Conflicts Between the creative artist and Their Producers
Conflict between the artist and the producer or the managers is not an alien thing to us. Both parties are determined to improve the creative world but for diverse reasons. “The biggest difference between the creative artist and the manager is that most of the time the manager will be profit-oriented while the artist will be motivated by something beyond money,” (Nielsen, P. 54). It is based on something inside that demands to be satisfied by attaining self-actualization; he/she wants to be perfect in what they do, to reach the peak of creativity and innovation which is their idea of success and the world will only recognize and reward them for this. He/she engages in creativity for what it is rather than what it can bring in. People out there expect the creative artist to use their expertise of innovation and convert those ideas into complete admirable objects of art. On the other hand, the manager is only expected to develop strategy and utilize organization resources optimally to generate revenue. In this way, the manager is, arguably, only concerned with how he can allocate the available resources for maximum returns on investment.
When both parties set to accomplish their own goals and objectives, conflicts will certainly occur especially because concentrating on art for what it is rather than for commercial benefits may not necessarily yield financial gain. Thus, the managers on the other hand will suffer because they will not be realizing their goals by following the creative artist’s dreams. The managers will therefore tend to align the artists dream to match with his own, namely wealth maximization. This leads to commercializing the whole aspect of art and creativity.
Though of course the cultural industry is expected to sustain itself, focusing on the commercial aspect of art over the original goal of increased innovation, our effort will only lead to a fatal end to creativity. We need to balance our commercial objectives with the bigger picture of promoting and developing creativity.
Measuring and Assessing the Economic and Cultural Value of art
It is not easy to quantify the value of any piece of art since art has so many elements to it that are hard, not to mention impossible to measure. Besides there is no clear strategy of valuating culture and there are no value systems in place to determine what the specific results indicate. However, there have been methodologies devised by researchers to attempt to assess the intrinsic impact of cultural art (Brown & Novak 2007, P.6).
However, economic valuation of art will most often focus upon the various outputs relating to such pieces of art. Such outcomes may include employment opportunities created by such cultural items as workers in the various cultural industries and the salaries they earn from such employment. The other element may be the profits generated by such an innovation. This refers to the amount of money that the writer was able to bring in through the sale of such art. It also includes taxable income raised through the sale of the book or movie or the consumer spending of people in the particular economy, and from their spending habits, we can tell the amount money circulating in the economy and therefore the economic value of such items of art on the economy as a whole.
On the other hand, there may not be clear criteria to follow in assessing the cultural value of art. Cultural value can is a combination of “instrumental value, institutional value and intrinsic value,” (Holden, 2006). Instrumental value is the use of culture to formulate social and economic policies and rules. Institutional value is the fame and prestige that an organization acquires from the cultural art. But the most important one is the intrinsic value which is unique to the cultural art and is the most difficult to quantify.
Nevertheless, cultural value may be assessed through cost-benefits analyses. The economic benefit is compared with the social benefits derived. Here, money is the instrument used as “a standard by which many different values can be compared and contrasted,” (O’Brien, 2010). The social benefits include such things as how much culture shapes the moral behavior of individuals for example when they listen or watch music or movies. This can be assessed through events impacts instruments established to assess what effects events and performances have on participants. Assessment may also be done through research e.g. by interviewing various individuals about how they perceive a particular piece of art.
Analyses of Cultural and Economic value using two case studies
The first case study is by Michelle Tager in his work The Black and the Beautiful Perceptions of (a) Generation(s), where research was conducted to determine how the soap opera, Generations, impacted on people’s everyday life and made them change their way of thinking and adopt a whole different attitude towards life facilitated by the setting of the Soap opera. The soap opera was geared to overcoming the effects of apartheid in South Africa by portraying a situation whereby the black people, and other races conceptualized by the apartheid system as inferior races were equal to the whites, who were then viewed as superior and untouchable and they both could attain the same socio-economic goals if they worked hard.
The research was conducted through ethnography by way of careful observation of interviewing the various participants. This was aimed at exploring normal life experiences of individual participants and find out how their feelings and attitudes were towards the soap opera. During the study, the researchers were able to find out how the various individuals view the things they are involved in, “to uncover an idiographic knowledge of the world,” (Tager 1992, P107).
From the information obtained from the students involved in the research process, it was shown that “multiracialism in soap operas on the SABC [had] been deployed as a means of redress the damage and injustices inflicted by apartheid and its legacies,” (Tager 1992, P108). Most of the respondents agreed with this conclusion and confessed that it was exactly how they interpreted the soap opera. Thus, this was the value of the soap opera to the whole country; it created a whole new dimension on how people thought about them in relation to their social groupings.
Research has shown that in soap operas, the “lifestyle patterns discourse and commodities associated…result in the breakdown of local cultural practices and diverse traditions,” (Tager 1992 p109).
The second case analyses of assessing economic and cultural impact of culture will be that of Harry Porter Book and movie as portrayed in various newspapers and journals including Journal of Marketing Management by Westburn Publishers, (Brown and Patterson 2009, P.522). In this case, value of culture is assessed by the number of sales that his book attracted. This has both economic as well as cultural value in it. Economically, the increased sales of the book provides a source of income to the publisher, the retailers, the booksellers and even the governments in terms of taxation costs charged from the sales. This earnings decreases as the book infiltrates the market and the demand for the book starts to go down (Brady 2007, Para, 2). Whether this amounts to diminished cultural value is subject to debate.
In the case of movies, the value is determined by how many tickets the movie theatres are able to sell for the performance of that particular movie every time it is showing on the screens. Also, the employment opportunities created by the movie theatres. As opposed to the book, the value received by the movie theatres does not reduce with time because the same amount will be charged to watch the movie regardless of its duration in the market. But the more the movie remains in the market the more people will prefer another one and therefore with time, it too will decrease in demand and thus decreased revenue.
Cultural value comes to the customers who buy the book, are the end carriers of the trophy for the real value of the culture contained in those books. They will continue to be enriched by the creativity and imagination engraved in the book day in day out. And so are the movie viewers who, from such movies will carry around with them the true beauty of genius imagination. Therefore, the books and movies will have both economic and cultural values to the community. These values will bring immeasurable benefits to the people of that country and the world at large.
The people of Australia for example, being the citizens of the country of where the art was produced, benefit from the money circulating in the economy. First of all, there is creation of employment opportunities whereby the publishers, the booksellers, the advertising agents, the theme park owners and the movie theatres all get money from the piece of cultural act. On top of that, the government gets a share of the total sales through tax. This money is used for the benefit of the Australian public through improved infrastructural developments and other public services such as health services or educational provisions by the government. But most importantly is the opportunity to experience new and original creativity from the reading of the books bought and the movies watched. This is the peak of the real value of the culture and art.
Conclusion
The growing interest in the creative industries signifies the recognition of their importance as a potential driver of a sustainable economy. Many countries have even come up with legal as well as infrastructural systems to protect their own culture and foster its development by uprooting any possible hindrances that may arise in the journey to the realization of a centre of innovation and creation. We all need to come up and help in the development of our culture. Not only for economic benefits but also to turn our country into a home of innovation and creativity.
References
Brady, D. (2007) The Twisted Economies of Harry Porter: The Wizard Brings Both Profit and Pain to his Business Partners. Business Week.
Brown, S. A & Novak, L. J. (2007) Assessing the Intrinsic Impacts of Live Performance. WolfBrown: Commissioned by 14 Major University Presenters.
Brown, S & Patterson, A. (2009) Harry Potter and the Service-Dominant Logic of Marketing: a cautionary Tale. Journal of Marketing Management, Vol. 25, No. 5-6, pp. 519-533, Westburn Publishers Ltd.
Everitt, D & Mills, S. (2009) Media, Culture and Society. (Los Angeles, London, New Delhi and Singapore) Vol. 31(5): 749-768 Sage Publications.
Fisher, S. (2002) Cultural Trade: Background Report. Australia Council: NSW Australia.
Holden, J. (2006) Cultural Value and the crisis of legitimacy London: Demos.
Liep, J. (2001) Locating Culture and Creativity: Anthropology: Culture and society. Pluto Press.
Madden, C. (2002) Defining Artists fir Tax and Benefit Purposes: International Federation of Arts Councils and Cultural Agencies (IFACCA).
Mike, A. (2011) 10 Hidden Benefits of creativity: This Old Brain, Life Mastery and Leadership for guys over 50. Now or Never Manifesto.
Nielson, T. (2000) The Learning Styles of Creative’s and Suits. DK: Frederiksberg.
Tager, M. (1992) The Black and the Beautiful: Perceptions of (a) New Generation(s). Critical Arts Projects & Unisa Press, pp. 99-127. ISBN 0258-0048.
O’Brien, D. (2010) Measuring the Value of Culture: A Report to the Department for Cultural Media and Sport, Department for culture. Media and sport.