28 Jan 2015 | About Index, mobile, Press Releases
* Fear of prosecution over free speech can chill arts practitioners
* Issues triggered by Exhibit B shutdown and Muhammad images show need for guidance
A new project will offer artists, producers and curators help in negotiating controversial issues.
Experts, lawyers and arts practitioners will produce a series of information packs examining the impact of current UK laws on the arts sector’s practical freedom to present creative works. The packs will be published by new free expression advocacy organisation Vivarta, in collaboration with campaign organisation Index on Censorship and top law firms Bindmans LLP and Clifford Chance. The project is supported by Arts Council England. The new guides will be launched in May, with input from leading lights in the arts, civil liberties and legal spheres.
Covering legislation on public order, child protection, obscene publication, racial & religious hatred, and counter-terrorism, the packs will help informed decision making, contingency planning and risk assessment across the sector.
“Arts professionals rarely get any training in legal issues that impact on freedom of artistic expression,” said Julia Farrington of Vivarta. “These guides will give people across the arts more confidence in making decisions, with greater awareness of their legal rights and the role of the police.”
“The shutting down last year of performances like Exhibit B at The Barbican and Israeli hip hop opera The City in Edinburgh demonstrate that artists and venues continue to walk a delicate path when putting on challenging work,” said Index CEO Jodie Ginsberg. “Often fear of opposition or protest forces groups to self-censor. We hope clearer guidance on tackling these issues can help to reverse that trend.”
For more information contact: Julia Farrington – 07980 288 365; [email protected]
Notes for editors: Vivarta is a media production house and advocate for free expression rights. Vivarta produces and promotes new analysis and creative advocacy in support of freedom of expression rights, while developing new partnerships and resources online and off to achieve this aim.
Index on Censorship is an international organisation that promotes and defends the right to freedom of expression. The inspiration of poet Stephen Spender, Index was founded in 1972 to publish the untold stories of dissidents behind the Iron Curtain. Today, we fight for free speech around the world, challenging censorship whenever and wherever it occurs.
28 Jan 2015 | About Index, Campaigns, mobile, Press Releases
Index is delighted to be launching a new project, based on its past work on art and offence, that will offer artists, producers and curators help in negotiating controversial issues and free expression.
In partnership with advocacy group Vivarta, Index will produce a series of information packs examining the impact of current UK laws on the arts sector and its freedom to present creative works.
The packs build on work initiated by Index associate arts producer Julia Farrington, who led the 2013 Taking the Offensive conference at the Southbank at which senior arts practitioners addressed questions of self-censorship and offence.
“Arts professionals rarely get any training in legal issues that impact on freedom of artistic expression,” said Farrington, who will manage the project for Index and advocacy group Vivarta. “These guides will should give people more confidence in making decisions, with greater awareness of their legal rights and the role of the police.”
The new guides will be launched in May, with input from professionals working in the arts, civil liberties and legal sectors. They are produced with support from the Arts Council.
The guides come at a time when there is renewed focus on the role of the arts community in promoting and staging challenging works. In 2014, Index led a series of workshops exploring this question with arts professionals in Wales and Northern Ireland. A final such workshop will held in Scotland later this year.
“The shutting down last year of performances like Exhibit B at The Barbican and Israeli hip hop opera The City in Edinburgh demonstrate that artists and venues continue to walk a delicate path when putting on challenging work,” said Index CEO Jodie Ginsberg. “Often fear of opposition or protest forces groups to self-censor. We hope clearer guidance on tackling these issues can help to reverse that trend.”
Additional information can be found here.
26 Sep 2014 | Campaigns, Statements
We the undersigned members of Artsfex condemn an alarming worldwide trend in which violent protest silences artistic expression that some groups claim is offensive. People have every right to object to art they find objectionable but no right whatsoever to have that work censored. Free expression, including work that others may find shocking or offensive, is a right that must be defended vigorously.
We call on artists, arts venues, protestors and the police to work together as a matter of urgency, to stand up for artistic free expression and to ensure that the right to protest does not override the right to free expression. This means that every possible step is taken to ensure that the art work remains open for all to see, while protesters voices are heard.
We must prevent the repetition of recent ‘successful protests’ in which the artist is silenced by threats of violence towards the institution, the work or the artist him or herself, as we saw with Exhibit B in London, and The City, the hip-hop opera by the Jerusalem-based Incubator Theatre company, which was disrupted and consequently cancelled earlier this year in Edinburgh.
Greater clarity around policing of controversial arts events is an essential first step. In the United Kingdom there is nothing at present in Association of Chief Police Officers guidance relating to the particulars of policing cultural events, except in reference to football matches and music festivals.
Controversial art triggers debate – and in the case of Exhibit B there was a huge outpouring of feeling in opposition to the work. A contemporary institution should anticipate and provide for this. Detailed planning such as this is important if the arts venue is to cater for both the artwork and the debate it generates.
We are concerned that unless arts institutions prepare procedures to manage controversy, including to develop strategies for working with the police to control violence, our culture will suffer as a result and become less dynamic, relevant and responsive.
Article 19
freeDimensional
Freemuse
Index on Censorship
National Coalition Against Censorship (US)
Vivarta
For further information, please call 0207 260 2660
About Artsfex
ARTSFEX is an international civil society network actively concerned with the right of artists to freedom of expression as well as with issues relating to human rights and freedoms. ARTSFEX aims to promote, protect and defend artistic freedom of expression, and freedom of assembly, thought, and opinion in and across all art disciplines, globally. http://artsfex.org/
