Bringing good ideas to life

Good ideas of young artists are the cherries on her pie. Belinda Hak (business coordinator of Witte de With Center for Contemporary Art) witnessed a multitude of initiatives get stranded for all sorts of unnecessary reasons and couldn’t stand it any longer: she set up a council company and started a weekly blog on (creative) businesses.

You started out at Witte de With as an educational curator. What does that mean?

It’s a concept that’s foreign to Dutch museums. It means: that the job has an artistic side as well as a practical one. It focuses on the transfer of knowledge and involvement of the audience and young artists with our institution. We actually wanted to get rid of the word education, but we couldn’t quite figure out how. ‘Nobody wants to be educated’ is the favourite saying of our director, Nicholas Schafhausen.

You’re currently business coordinator. What’s the difference between this title and educational curator?

I don’t practice art education anymore. On the one hand that’s a shame, because I love working with young people, on the other hand, I was ready for a new challenge and I am very glad that I could make this step within the institution. The main difference is that I no longer focus on projects, but that I am involved in long-term vision plans and policy. For example, I work with the director and vice-director on year plans, I’m setting up a human resource policy and I’m actively engaged in fundraising. I love my new position, also because I became more involved with the work my colleagues.

How do artists approach the field of business?

Ten years ago, the Dutch Assistant Secretary of State, Rik van der Ploeg, introduced cultural entrepeneurship as a political term. It got a lot of negative response back then, but it has gained more positive feedback since. At the moment it is inextricably connected with being an artist. Nowadays, artists have to consider how they will sell their work or market themselves as an artist. Especially now funding is under pressure and the right winged idea that art is a ‘luxurious hobby’, is gaining popularity.

How do you help artists with their entrepreneurship?

At Witte de With I’m involved with a lot of young artist and I’ve decided to council them on own initiative. It’s fine when an artist combines his artistic practice with earning an income by a paid job, but at some point three part-time jobs will drive him crazy and he will feel the urge to deepen his knowledge and develop his artistic potential. That takes time and money. Selling your work is a good aim, but it shouldn’t become the main goal. Doing research and extending your expertise is still very important.
I cadvise artists who want to focus more on their artistic work and who need helpt with project conceptualization, funding applications and budgeting. A satisfying job.

A lot of young artists don’t know where to take their ideas. Another recurring obstacle: they often think too small. For example, an artist wants to set up a magazine to go along with his exphibition and has no money. Most artists would ask the help for such a thing exclusively from their own network. There’s nothing wrong with that, but you can also think of a way to bring your idea to another level by making a solid plan and involve other professionals. You can do your ‘thing’ autonomously for the rest of your life within the limitations of your own network, but perhaps, with a little more management and entrepreneurship, you can make a living out of your work and make it more professional.
Whether you like it or not, management is a part of an artist’s life nowadays. You’re self-employed!
With knowledge about the art world and entrepreneurship, you enable yourself to make the right choices for your business.
A tip for young artists: gain the knowledge about that art world and decide then which path feels good for you to take. Realise that every choice has a consequence for your practice and income.

Because of my new position at Witte de With, I’ve had less time in setting up my business than I would’ve liked, so it’s currently on hold, but as soon as there’s a little time left, It’s the first thing that’s up.
Besides my daily job, I advise young artists as charity. I do limit myself to artists I’m already acquinted with and who ask me for help directly. Hopefully it will grow into something more, then I can put more hours in it and make some real money with it.

In what way is your blog Bootstrapper’s Lab a part of your business?

I started that blog to gather and keep the information I found on starting a small business in the cultural sector. Along the way, fundraising and management became a part of it too. It’s subjective and not by far complete yet, and I’m not sure if a visitor will find something helpful –although I do get very positive feedback. It’s public, because I like sharing the knowledge I gain. There is not a whole lot of information on entrepreneurship, management and leadership in the art sector to be found, or at least, not in one place. There is a lot of knowledge however, but it often sits indoors and sometimes it’ll get published. But just try to find a book about human resource management in the arts. I’ll bet you come back empty handed. I’ve learned a lot from my study art and cultural management at the Erasmus University. I use that knowledge daily, but I love the lifelong learning principle and I see the blog as a part of that. It exists next to the books and researches I read –and it has just as much value to me as the people I meet on Twitter and IRL.

Above reposted from bootstrapper's Lab, originally by Keri Smith

What have been your findings so far as an entrepreneur yourself?

That it’s hard making money in the arts (hahaha). And it takes time. I tend to get impatient sometimes. Keep going, having fun, meeting people, stay moving, growing your network...Maybe I’ve already said all this before...

Which artist/institution do you think is on the right track, entrepreneurship wise?

For artists that gain fame, it’s easier to think big. They are less likely to make concessions to their concept, like Joep van Lieshout. For a young artist it’s very important to find out where his/her passion in the arts lies. Then you have to learn how to work from this passion. That takes time. As an artist you can work in different sorts of media and some are closer to a business than others. I’ve graduated in fine arts with the focus on text and internet and that’s a hard thing to sell. In the current system of funding I miss the possibility to ask for small contributions to realise plans. Big work grants scare young artists and they’re often helped with 1000 or 2000 euros. With such a relatively small contribution, they are capable of realising projects and increasing their skills.
I think that the project The Exciting Museum that I initiated at the Witte de With is a good example of giving a platform to young talent. A group of seven young people and work together very intensively on making a conceptual coherent project. The group works behind the scenes of an art institution and learns how it functions. They have to initiate and organize everything themselves. Incidentally they learn skills and widen their network.

Brainstorming the day away at the Exciting Museum project.

Do you reckon the social development of artist to entrepreneur will ever be reversed or do you expect the business side will only grow more dominant in the lives of artists?

Who knows what the future will bring. It’s probably better if I don’t predict the future. But turning this development back seems unlikely. As an artist you have a responsibility towards society and people will always demand that. Of course, it is to often about economic responsibility. From my experience I find that young artists want to take control of their own lives. They’re creative and very competent. It seems unlikely to me that they would wait around for someone else to come around and give them something. They have to earn a position, claim it, become indispensable and make sure they’re taken seriously.
Entrepreneurship, or at least the attitude, can help with that. It’s unsure how society will appreciate art in the future, which space art will be given and what kind of investments people are willing to make. Of course, I’m optimistic, it’s like Joseph Beuys once said: ‘Art alone makes life possible.’

Belindas blog on cultural entrepeneurship can be found on:

http://bootstrapperslab.blogspot.com/

A video on what motivates us, reposted from Bootstrapper's Lab. A speech by Dan Pink at RSA.

Witte de With museum is an institution that sees it as its task to present the latest developments in contemporary art, without making concessions concerning their content, yet simultaneously seeking to reach as broad a public as possible. Their website supports these efforts by providing news, an archive, background materials, and the opportunity for the public to react and interact.

They currently have an ongoing, year-long discussion about morality on show. It incorporates a changing constellation of five exhibitions, a discursive web platform, film program, performance cycle, symposium and book. Morality is one of those inflammatory topics, often evoked as being in crisis, about which everybody and every society has an opinion. From the playground to the battlefield, it shapes both thinking and behaviour. This project looks at morality as a total concept through the filter of different art forms. It does not seek to label art or individual artists as being “moral” (or indeed “immoral”). Nevertheless, some of the works presented at Witte de With tackle moral issues head-on. Others provide a more oblique commentary on morally-charged situations. And others present an amoral subjectivity.

More on this:

http://www.wdw-morality.nl/

  Portrait photograph by Geertje van Achterberg.