A lost speech

Yesterday I arrived home too late to pay attention to the news. Just another day. As I opened my news-bookmarks this morning, I noticed an entry of a speech of the Slovak President in parliament. Oh yes, I vaguely remembered it was mentioned on the news. Just taking a glance, and just before clicking away, suddenly my eye fell on the sentence with the word "culture"! I began reading and fortunately there was a link to the integral text of his speech. Especially this section caught my attention:

"Our culture is the fundamental character of our Slovak identity. Its uniqueness is being strengthened, even through its openess, its moving towards and exchange of other cultural values. Our culture is our principal message to Europe and to the world. Today it lacks a bigger courage in its view on us and the surrounding world. We need timeless visions, refusal of trash and quick commercial fame. This is especially the case in creative arts, which has started to copy cheap foreign successes. Bussiness is nowadays cruelly trampling on the qualities of culture. We need to change this and support every attempt into this direction. ... "

One could not agree more. While the message of this excerpt is touching, and true, the context of the President's speech including the reactions of various parliament members gives it a grim after-taste. Cultural life suffers quite much - not only to mention the sheer implementation of funding culture (and I am not talking of the effects of a financial crisis here) but also the visible abuse of some of those involved, where the artistic quality seems irrelevant but what counts is one's political allegiance. In the event, he would have really cared, he could have intervened. He has the tools to do so. He never did.

Knowing - although I greatly regret having to say this - that the speech will land on deaf ears, the short-lived excitement of having read such frank truth on culture from a politician's mouth has slowly faded already. For such issues one needs a true statesman. One still hopes though.

MS

source: SME Newspaper
translation by the author

Failing PR in the Opera

A few days ago, a news item appeared on the internet pages of the most prominent Slovak newspaper. Only on internet. It was an open letter from the previous General Manager of the Slovak National Opera Marián Chudovský, addressed to the present General Manager Ms Hroncová to step down for proven mismanagement, simultaneously appealing to the Minister of Culture to take adequate steps. The smashing facts - so obvious, that even a blind person could see them in the past few months - were fully justifiably summed up, and still in a courteous manner. The fierce discussion, which it unleashed afterwards - less courteous in some cases - revealed even further serious matters that lingered under the surface. It was a deed, which normally speaking demanded a reaction. Any rection would do.

I waited for a few days, till another article appeared... In my wildest dreams I couldn't have imagine this to be true. What was missing? Any official respons of any possible kind to the facts presented. Here we are slowly treading into a dramatically damaging situation. Ms Hroncová has managed the National Theatre (under which the National Opera falls) for 4 seasons. She holds an almost unique record of having used 5 managers in the Opera (which she appointed herself, then disposed off). What good does it serve? Especially the last 2 Opera Managers were the least successful - a conductor (Oliver Dohnányi) not paying any attention to his function of being a manager at all, then the renowned opera diva Ms Beňačková, who at the beginning perhaps did try to play the role of a manager, however, had no managerial skills at all and after only four months left, shrowded in deep mysterious silence. During her office, the Opera had the most performance-changes, replacements and/or cancellations in history (and not all because of indispositions of soloists...) The Guiness Book of Records can add another chapter.

Where people work, some disaccords or mistakes do take place. When we work with transparency, we have some extra credit to mend our wrong decisions. The Opera seems to live in a phantasy world, where management is convinced that deceit and lying will remain within its walls as long as you keep your mouth shut.

The discussion after the aforementioned article proved exactly how well informed people are, and thanks to internet, insiders have a way - even as anonymous discussion partners - to reveal inside information without limits. Ms Hroncová and the Ministry of Culture should be much at guard; exactly their silence, trying to ignore signals, will prove deadly. If Ms Hroncová - by way of her spokesperson - refuses to react because Mr Chudovský's accusations are "emotional", this exactly arouses the suspicion. Why is it so problematic to admit flaws and explain what your strategic planning is? One doesn't refute news or rumours by refusal to communicate. In short: Ms Hroncová is not able to prove Mr Chudovský's points being emotional (thus implying they are false) because they are correct and valid points.

Likewise, when Ms Beňačková left, not even a press-release was issued, the spokesperson was too busy "because of a première". What foul business must be hidden behind doors of Ms Hroncová's office? As the State Opera (c.q. National Theatre) is a public entity, government (tax-payers' money) goes there. But neither the Ministry has an interest in clarifying the matter. But in a country, where the Ministry pays the Slovak Philharmonic a budget, plus stashes additional sums (quasi for extra projects) into the pockets of its Director, meanwhile refusing to support other ensembles, which have even more to offer, it obvious how the political maffia systematically misappropriates funds. In other EU countries this is a punishable offense. In plain language; it's criminal behaviour. In Slovakia it's a sad reality. If we imagine how public broadly reacted on Emile Zola's newspaper article J'accuse, Slovak leaders are marked by an all present stiffening authism when fishy business is being addressed.

My recommendation; why doesn't the Ministry and its comrades-in-arms apply to go on a course "Basics in PR within Public Administration" (If it's too much of a luxury; you could request even EU-Funding for it!). There is still much to learn. Good governance is a rare asset these days.

MS

A Message from Obama

Even though Slovakia's economy has still the highest growth (!) within the EU, the effects of the crisis are slowly being noticed around. Foreign and national investors are pulling out the plug - be it partially or completely, and some closing down of factories has been reported already. The negative effect on arts is therefore even harder felt. It is not so much that the audiences are no longer coming out of their houses to attend concerts or galleries. It's rather the attitude of the institution which is in charge of exactly these arts that is pulling out and many performances and exhibitions are simply smothered by the Ministry of Culture for not receiving any support any longer. One would perhaps argue that if there's no money, then the state can no longer finance. OK, point taken. But in this fact, the money is certainly there (meant for this purpose). The sad thing is, that the money goes into the wrong pot, while at the same time, it gives a wrong signal to the public too, causing even private sponsors to lose the little remaining interest, which was still left. And thus the downwards spiral is created.

Therefore, the election of Barack Obama seems to be a promising turning point. As the most powerful person on earth, who has all the media's close attention, he has not only openly and unequivocally criticised managements of the large corporations for their money-covetting behaviour. What is a most astonishing signal, is that Mr. Obama has openly demonstrated his concern about the state of the arts. Not just by mere mentioning in one of his speeches. He called in several managers of arts institutions to the state's capital (even before he was inaugurated) to discuss the problems.

As most US presidents have - perhaps to add a tiny extra boost to their image - invited various pop-stars, playing the saxophone with them, president Obama seems to have a different type of interest in arts. Not to mention, that during the inauguration we could witness even a few minutes of a classical genre music. Obama seems to see a clear link between the role of (quality) arts and the strengthening of social cohesion. A valuable lesson from FDR? The unifying bond of a society in times of crisis. Where, as I have repeatedly pointed this out, art i.e. culture is a public domain, which comes initially from the people itself. As we (i.e. the tax payers) finance our government offices, it is the responsibility of the government, to have a solid and an empirical understanding of the function and value of arts. If the government refuses to see these connections, it is slowly tending to a kind of misappropriating of funds (I repeat: for which we pay). When giving a positive signal on culture, it will influence the general attitude towards culture and the more funding from outside somehow will be a result. Culture as a prestige still works. And as we look with envy to culture hotspots like Paris, Rome, New York, Milan, we don't even consider the question; how these cities ever became such important centres. It is unfortunately that so few people realise that everything has a start somewhere. And not that "we are not, so we will never be!". Staying passive is never a good strategy to advance. It is especially in these times, that we need to be creative and try to make a difference.

Last weekend, there was an artist ball in Snina. Probably, you have never heard of this city. It's perhaps the most Eastern town in Slovakia (near the Ukrainian border) with a population of only about 40thousand. No highway going there. Yet many guests (included the undersigned) had travelled for many hundreds of miles to be there, while the capital of Bratislava was celebrating mostly commercial-tabloid-type balls. When chatting with various artists - from Slovakia, Ukraine, etc - you sense a positive energy and a certain optimism as well. Hopefully, the clear message of president Obama on the value of culture will reach other political leaders as well and we will realise that perhaps our materialistic days should be replaced by priorities with a more intrinsic value. It would enrich all of us.

MS