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Thursday 17 April '08 (from Grizedale Arts Blog)
The Great Table of Cumbria
Oh boy, what a table, the conference table at the Malcolm Wilson Rally Headquarters in Cumbria. I was at a meeting there, something called Culture Cumbria - I know a contradiction in terms, but.
The venue was supposed to illustrate the great things of Cumbria, this mighty table must be one of them. The whole place was a kind of heart of Darkness experience, plastic trophies everywhere and a racing driver wife sensibility throughout married to this manly beast of design excellence. Looks like the kind of thing that a man that does all his Christmas shopping in Halfords would come up with, 'what's wrong with a steering wheel cover, an ideal ladies gift'.
The meeting did its usual Cumbria centric fanfare of self importance we were told that the Kendal Mountain Film Festival was the most diverse film festival in Europe, thats a film festival centred around one screen over a weekend, blows Edinburgh and London outta the water, The clue to the falseness of this statement is in the title of the festival - Mountain Films, not really leading in terms of diversity being mostly about mountains. Other great things we have include the largest outdoor art festival in Europe, all run on a budget of 30k - Munster shmunster. I could go on, but it really is too embarrassing.
Topics: 'Malcolm Wilson Rally' 'Culture Cumbria' 'furniture' 'film festivals' 'self-importance'
Topics:
- add things[1]
- amphibians[1]
- architecture[2]
- being different[1]
- building[1]
- building site[1]
- celebrity[1]
- censorship[1]
- China[2]
- construction[1]
- Culture Cumbria[1]
- drystone walling[1]
- Egremont[1]
- farmer[1]
- film festivals[1]
- fungi[1]
- furniture[1]
- golf[1]
- ground source heat pump[1]
- Guest Room[1]
- handling[1]
- Lawson Park Collection[1]
- Liverpool[1]
- London[1]
- Malcolm Wilson Rally[1]
- money[1]
- Mycology[1]
- name[1]
- Narnia[1]
- outside broadcast[1]
- overkill[1]
- proposal[6]
- public works[1]
- residencies[1]
- rural girl[1]
- Ruskin[1]
- self-importance[1]
- soil[1]
- something[1]
- soul music[1]
- SXSW Film Festival[1]
- Texas[1]
- toads[1]
- two guys[1]
- USA[1]
- village shop[8]
- weather[1]
Months:
Our blogs:Grizedale Arts Blog, Farmyard Radio, myvillages.org
3 Comments
Embarrassing? This certainly is. Aren't you on the Board of CC? I suggest you remove yourself. Or are you simply arrogant and hypocritical? Oh, but you're in China. Right on!
Brenda, April 25, 2008 20:35
Brenda, while the tone of voice is wrong the message is right. If Adam hopes to bring some sanity through cynicism to yet another backslapping culture initiative who only know how to waste money and not value it then good luck to him.
James, May 2, 2008 09:22
I am on the board of CC and principally because any organisation wishing to access the very large sums of public money distributed by this quango were informed that could not even apply unless they were members of this constructed group. I am cynical because it is too painful to be straight about these things. I try to be honest about what I do, the openness of the blog entries are meant to express that. I would like the arts to have some integrity - it seems that most arts activity in Cumbria is knowingly dishonest - this misinformation causes all sorts of problems not least with credibility but more importantly with how Cumbria sees itself. The starting point for change and improvement has to be an honest appraisal of where we currently are. Within the meetings of CC I am articulate and critical in a serious way, however I am not sure if the content of these meetings is exactly readable blog material - although saying that the new Cumbria Tourism study is a hilarious read. If you are interested in more detailed analysis I would be happy to forward documents.
Re China I find it a bit rich that the west seems so comfortable in its criticism. Per person Chinese people contribute minimally to carbon production having in the main none of the luxuries of the west. Politically it is hard for the west to point fingers, we live under a system that promotes inequality and goes to war with 'other' ideologies and religions. We live in a system that controls it's people very effectively. And by the way people are people, if you have a look at the blog from China I think that is evident. The work we are doing there is in a small eco village and a highly idealistic company that is trying to forge a 'new way'. I hope that we can bring some of that idealism and ambition back to Cumbria. And yes I am arrogant and hypocritical, but then we all have faults don't we.
Adam Sutherland, May 9, 2008 09:41