Cullen Defends the Arts

Martin Cullen, the Minister for Arts, Sports and Tourism, appeared on the RTÉ Radio 1 show, Arts Tonight, on September 28.

He discussed with Vincent Woods future strategies for the Arts in Ireland, and stressed that he does not intend cutting the Artist's Tax Exemption, getting rid of Culture Ireland, or the Irish Film Board.

He promised to publish a recent DKM consultant report that indicates that the added value from the Arts was over €11.8 billion in 2008. He pointed out that Cultural Tourism is expected to grow by about 15% in the coming years, and added:

Why at a time when we have hard facts in front of us would we be undermining where we are world leaders? And we're not world leaders in many areas. But clearly in the whole area of artistic endeavour, in the general area of culture and arts, we are world leaders, and that's something that has to be minded and guarded.

Interviews about the National Campaign for the Arts

Here is a video of interviews conducted by Darragh Doyle last week, upon the launch for the National Campaign for the Arts. It includes discussions with Tania Banotti, Irish Theatre Forum; Bill Whelan, Composer; Colm Toibín, Author; Anne Enright, Author; Donal Gleeson, Actor; Fiach Mac Conghail, Director of the Abbey Theatre; Lenny Abrahamson, Filmmaker; Loughlin Deegan, the Dublin Theatre Festival; Don Wycherly, Actor; Sarah Bolger, Actress.

Art Can Make us Proud

The National Campaign for the Arts website has published the speech made by Roddy Doyle at the Theatre Forum / Ulster Bank Dublin Theatre Festival event for Dublin TDs and Dublin City Councillors, which took place on September 24 2009.

It's called Art can make us feel proud of who we are, and in it Roddy lays out the case for how arts funding helped his career, and the career of those he worked with, to bring stories to Irish people about their lives.

Well-aimed support from the Arts Council, Culture Ireland, the Irish Film Board and from Dublin City Council can have, and does have, an enormous impact – sometimes years later. This week, one reason we feel proud of our city is because we come from the same place as Brendan Gleeson. I’m delighted – and very lucky. Because I saw – I experienced – Brendan acting in a play I wrote called BROWNBREAD. The play was produced by The Passion Machine, with support from the Arts Council, 22 years ago. I wrote it, Brendan acted in it, Paul Mercier directed it. At the risk of sounding arrogant, it was money well spent.

Texts Don't Grow on Trees

Texts Don't Grow on Trees – the Authors' Rights Awareness Campaign

The European Writers' Congress has launched a campaign which over the next two years, aims to raise public awareness of Authors' Rights. Texts don't grow on trees; they are the works of authors.

At a time when new digital distribution models are being developed worldwide – many libraries and publishing houses are already digitising their catalogues for publication on the web – the campaign focusses on the danger to authors' rights that this poses. This is not a dream of the future but is happening now, and very soon many protected texts will be freely downloadable.

Easy access to texts is good for everyone, including writers, but the dangers must not be overlooked. Plagiarism is already well established as a negative consequence: In our universities, tutors have been aware for some time that students have been copying and pasting from the work of others on the internet. The novel How Opal Mehta Got Kissed, Got Wild and Got a Life by Kaavya Viswanathan was called back by her publishing house Little, Brown and Company shortly after publication when it was discovered that great parts of the book had been copied from other novels.

In this age of easy availability and access to texts, authors' moral and copyrights are being overlooked; either wilfully or through ignorance. There is a growing and rapid desensitisation to the fact that behind every work there is an author; who's livlihood and reputation rests upon the recognition of their authorship. Freedom of access is increasingly being confused with freedom to take without permission or payment.

As authors we want our campaign "Texts don't grow on trees" to sensitise our public to our rights and their responsibilities. Unlike the music industry, we don't want to threaten prosecution or wage war on people. Rather we want to open a dialogue with them in order that they understand and accept our position: Yes please download our texts, but please also respect our moral and copyrights and our right to be remunerated for our work.

Even the most advanced copy protection technology is inferior to the understanding and good will of our public. The best copy protection is that which we can place in their consiousness. We call it Respect.

This campaign needs your support, because it is your campaign too. Spead the message. Go to - www.yourauthor.org - download the banner: put it on your website and even in your emails. Thank you.

For the European Writers' Congress
Adi Blum
Graham Lester George

Authors Rights

The Authors' Rights Awareness Campaign is promoting a new campaign to promote authors' rights.

The 23 April is the UNESCO World Book and Copyright Day. By celebrating this Day throughout the world, UNESCO seeks to promote reading, publishing and the protection of intellectual property through copyright. For this reason the European Writers' Congress (EWC), the federation of 55 writers' associations in 29 countries of Europe, has started a campaign which is called "Texts Don't Grow on Trees".

You can support the campaign by signing the online petition.