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November 20th, 2008

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Funding cuts threaten theaters

A frustrated arts community starts petition, plans protest

By Kimberly Hiss
Staff Writer, The Prague Post
April 9th, 2008 issue

ČTK

Arts community leaders, including critic Vladimír Just, Yvona Kreuzmannová, Ondřej Hrab and Ondřej Černý, led an April 1 press conference. enlarge

Archa Theater has had to cut nearly all international dance programs. enlarge

The relationship between Prague’s nonprofit arts organizations and City Hall has long been strained by a series of culture policy changes and grant delays. But the latest funding flare-up brought the situation to a fever pitch, and this week arts groups started a petition calling for policy revisions and the resignation of involved city officials.

On March 27, City Hall approved the first grant allocations to be produced by a new arts funding system established last November. After months of anxious waiting for the grants to be announced, nonprofit arts organizations were devastated to learn that they were receiving less money than the previous year, and some were getting no money at all. Frustrated artists responded by organizing an April 1 press conference at Archa Theater, which was itself affected by funding cuts. Moderated by National Theater Director Ondřej Černý, the discussion among some 250 artists aimed to identify methods of recourse.

“We need to seriously address how the funds are divided if Prague’s rich cultural scene is to survive,” said Steve Gove, founder and director of the Fringe Festival Praha, who attended the conference. “Prague is on the world map for festivals and events. It would be a pity to have this die off because of bad decisions made by a handful of people.”

City Hall, which has long awarded grants in artistic fields, approved a pair of new culture and grant policies in 2006. The reforms, however, drew complaints from commercial theater owners, who felt the new funding system broke the rules of fair competition. Such concerns came to a head in August 2007, when a co-owner of the commercial theater Divadlo Ta Fantastika sued City Hall in the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg for disruption of economic competition.

City Hall, with Milan Richter now installed as the city councilor responsible for culture, responded by suspending the allocation of all grants until the matter could be resolved. The shutdown sent nonprofit theaters into a panic over whether they could finance their rapidly approaching 2008 season.

In November, City Hall announced a revised funding system, officially reopening the grant process. While some reforms were welcomed, such as the formation of a grants approval committee comprising arts experts, many nonprofits worried that the new policy had not been based on sufficient analysis.

The greatest such concern was the structure of the funding system, which split grants into four groups. The first category was based on ticket sales, and drew criticism from nonprofits as it benefited commercial theaters. The other three categories were for “artistic activities,” young artists and long-term grants.

In December, with a budget of approximately 200 million Kč ($12.5 million), the grants committee, chaired by Ondřej Pecha, began reviewing around 700 applications. But the committee found itself struggling with insufficient funds, especially for the long-term grants category, which had a deficit of 8 million Kč from the previous year. In January, the committee asked City Hall for more money for this category, but was given limited options to redistribute funds, putting committee members in a frustrating position.

“Somebody did not count before they split the whole amount of money,” committee member Yvona Kreuzmannová, founder and former director of Tanec Praha and now an independent expert and adviser to the culture minister told The Prague Post Jan. 16.

Meanwhile, the clock was ticking loudly as the late formation of the committee made it impossible to allocate the funds by January. For the first months of 2008, many theaters worked without a financial safety net, seeking private loans and hoping the upcoming grants decisions would be fair.

Pay day

On March 27, City Hall announced the approved grant decisions, and many arts groups were stunned by the funding cuts.

“It felt like a slap in the face,” said Ondřej Hrab, director of Archa Theater, whose funding went from 20 million Kč in 2007 to just over 13 million Kč. “We were actually the pioneers of international work in Prague, bringing world artists here and gaining international respect. Now City Hall is saying it doesn’t care.”

As for festivals, which are paid out of a separate partnership fund, the Fringe, for example, was initially awarded no money at all.

“It was a shock,” Gove said. “It seemed so out of the blue to be told ‘no’ and for no reason — especially so early in the life of this fast-growing event before we could stand on our own feet.”

In terms of smaller theaters, the funding for Alfred ve dvoře went from 5 million Kč in 2007 to 4 million Kč. “Everybody is hurting from this,” said the theater’s artistic director, Šárka Havlíčková, who also serves on the board of the Initiative for Culture.

The view from where Richter sits, however, is quite different.

“I think the new grant allocation system has proved competent,” he said, adding that due to “new, fairer conditions,” hundreds of new groups had entered the grant allocation system this year, resulting in significantly more money being awarded to more artists. He was also quick to point out who was responsible for the funding distribution.

“The amount of money given to a particular theater or project depends on the expert decision of the grant committee,” he said. “I am not able to influence the amount.”

But directors recognize the committee’s difficult position of having to work with limited funds.

“We should not blame the committee,” Hrab said. “They are hostages just as we are hostages of the system.”

As discussed at the April 1 press conference, nonprofits are also concerned by a sense of preferential treatment being shown to the city’s commercial theaters, which benefited from the grant category based on ticket sales (50 million Kč of the overall 200 million Kč grant budget was allotted to this group) and are largely patronized by tourists. Havlíčková feels that aid for commercial theaters, which “go for the sure, immediate, mainstream product,” contradicts the 2006 culture policy’s goal to “support long-term innovation and help culture and arts in Prague.”

Such arguments get little sympathy from City Hall.

“It is clear that part of the artist lobby is opposed to the redistribution of the funds and are doing everything to stop it, sometimes even using false arguments,” Richter said. “They don’t care about culture, but about money.” He added, “Prague contributes some 500 million Kč to its theaters, which is a fantastic amount for the Czech Republic. … If somebody has problems surviving in this generous environment, then that is something to think about. But I am not sure City Hall has to think about it.”

In the absence of a sympathetic ear, the arts community is looking to a higher power.

“We all feel we have to wake the mayor up,” Havlíčková said. “There are a lot of voices crying out right now, and he remains silent.”

The office of the mayor did not respond to a request for comment by press time.

The fight ahead

On April 9, arts community leaders started a petition calling for a series of changes, including the creation of separate funding systems for profit and nonprofit groups. According to Havlíčková, the petition also calls for the resignation of Richter and grant committee chairman Pecha. It furthermore urges Bém to establish a new cultural advisory board. The petition will be presented to City Hall during a demonstration on the morning of its April 24 assembly meeting.

Meanwhile, on the individual level, a few battles have already been won by groups such as the Fringe, which secured funding by soliciting letters of support from the embassies of countries participating in the festival and delivering them to the mayor’s office.

But organizations such as Archa continue to struggle.

“We are only paying basic costs to run the theater,” said Hrab, pointing out that, even though the grants had been announced, he does not know when funds will be dispersed. “We were destroyed by the floods in 2002, so we are used to catastrophes. But at this moment this is very, very frustrating.”

Archa, which had to cut almost all international programs in theater and dance, is this week beginning rehearsals for the premiere of former President Václav Havel’s newest play, Leaving, a production, Hrab points out, that is happening without city funding.

“This situation will lead to difficulties that might end in catastrophe,” Hrab said. “If we don’t get support, it might lead to an end of the organization.”

— Hela Balínová contributed to this report.

Kimberly Hiss can be reached at news@praguepost.com

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