Calling All Developers
As more local authorities ask for developer contributions for public art, the
question inevitably arises as to how that money should be spent. Few local
authorities have public art strategies or even arts development officers.
Planning Committee councillors rarely challenge what 'contribution towards
art' actually means, and not all authorities monitor how and where the
monies are used.
Nevertheless, there is the temptation for developers simply to agree to
providing an art contribution as a condition of planning consent, without
appreciating the potential for strategic promotion of their own brand
identity.
So how much should developers contribute? Should the art be on site or
contributions put into a pot towards a major piece of art in a prominent
public space? What actually constitutes ‘art’? What control should the
developer exercise?
It is our view that these contributions should be an extension of a
developer’s marketing and PR strategies. £20,000 (and often a lot more) is
not an unusual amount to be requested, and if handled properly the return
can far outweigh the actual costs.
To maximise the benefits to their businesses and profile, companies should,
themselves, have a clear policy for supporting art – in all its forms. There
should be a reciprocal gain for these contributions.
Think for a moment how much it costs to advertise each of your developments
week in, week out, in the local press. A great deal more than £20,000 over
the lifetime of a single scheme!
However, if you link the art project to an effective media campaign, you can
easily double your money in terms of airtime, goodwill and column inches,
raising a company’s profile in the right context of community care over months
and years, locally and even nationally.
An art contribution could be phased over the duration of construction, through
sponsoring a local art project; it could be focused on, for example, helping
the respected charity, Sane, develop its annual arts awards at local levels.
Art is one of the great healers for people with mental health problems.
Alternatively, why not commission a local artist (or develop a schools/college
programme) to record the changing urban landscape as a regeneration project
takes shape? Having an artistic/photographic record of before, during and after
is a valuable contribution to local archives, and could form part of a permanent
exhibition within the scheme or be used to attract City investors by emphasising
a company’s wider social credentials.
Street theatre is art, sponsoring the local museum to create new exhibition space
so it can get its collections out of storage is art; try linking an arts project
to reducing anti-social behaviour (graffiti walls and special activities can be
very successful, reducing crime by as much as 36% in one town during the summer
holidays). Offering to restore a town monument, such as a War Memorial, is art.
Having a competition through the local media to create a piece of sculpture
linked to the history of an area would be welcomed as encouraging local talent,
individually made street furniture, lighting and delightfully crafted gates to a
pocket park (as with Barratts at their Foxhall Gardens development in Ipswich) are
all art. Even paving can be art.
Providing funding for an annual short story award is art. A mobile bandstand
(average cost £25,000), which can be moved from one public space to another for
community events, is art (and it can be heavily branded with the developer’s name).
There are occasions when a signature piece is integral to a specific high quality
scheme which both developer and local authority want to use as a benchmark for others
to follow. In such cases an open invitation to the country’s top art colleges to
submit ideas working from a detailed brief shows an understanding of how important it
is to encourage the next ‘Damien Hirst’. And it creates wide and prolonged publicity.
Local authorities never have enough money to deliver all they aspire to, so it is well
worth taking the time to understand their problems and create an arts policy built
around their ambitions. Such ideas have potential for permanent legacies, and should be
branded as such, with the company logo, but they also demonstrate social responsibility.
And at least you know that your money is doing what you want it to!
Similar principles apply to LAPS, LEAPS and NEAPS, but that’s for another day...
For further information, please contact: Chris March on 01702 236449
Email: chris.march@countrywidema.co.uk
Countrywide plc is the UK's largest property related professional services and estate
agency group, with over 1200 offices nationally.