By IRNA
London : Some 100 leading representatives in design and architecture fields Saturday joined the arts world in expressing at plans by the British Council to disband art-form departments.
“We are specifically concerned about the British Council’s apparent wholesale replacement of art with the language and aspirations of the ‘creative industries’,” the representatives said.
“We are not convinced that the way in which to achieve positive cultural relations and economic prosperity is through the proposed emphasis on ‘market intelligence, knowledge transfer and progressive facilitation’,” they said in a letter to the Guardian newspaper.
“Innovation is not achieved through these means, but through sustained and informed support of artists and creative practitioners,” their letter warned.
Signatories included professors from the Royal College of Arts and many other leading representatives from design and architecture institutes.
Their dismay comes after more than 120 leading artists and galleries last week denounced the British Council for being “intent on abandoning the best proven means of conducting cultural relations through the arts.”
The British Council, which acts as the cultural arm of the Foreign Office, has yet to reveal plans to change the way it delivers arts abroad.
The latest letter in protest warned that the design and architecture department of the British Council has over the past 10 years developed a world-leading programme of creative, innovative and socially responsive design and architecture projects.
These interventions, including two of the first international exhibitions of contemporary design to tour India and China, have “not only resulted in an increase in critical debate around the role of architecture and design in shaping our lives,” it said.
“But have immeasurably contributed to the success of British designers and architects internationally. Critical to the success of these initiatives has been the specialist perception and knowledge within the design and architecture department,” the letter said.
The architects and leading design representatives said they were urging the British Council “to engage in a serious debate about how to retain the knowledge and expertise built up within their specialist teams prior to any structural changes.”