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Semi detached, Installation Tate Britain, 2004
Michael Landy

Tate Britain
Until December 2004


News & Issues

VAGA members will find additional stop press information, information of professional interest, conference listings, VAGA news etc within the members' area.

Page last updated: 15 November 2004

Please click on the entry for further details.



Contemporary Collections - Reflecting Today & Investing in the Future [added 15/11/04]


VAGA response to Museums Association Collections Inquiry

The MA inquiry “Collections for the future” as a timely reminder of the central importance of collecting and collections to everything that museums and galleries do. In the words of Sir Nicholas Goodison, “The objects and the public benefit that they can provide are a seamless whole.”



An Unprecedented Level of Interest and Appetite for Contemporary Art [added 19/10/04]


As London is hailed as the second largest art marketplace in the world after New York, leading dealer Jay Jopling makes the case for tax breaks for collections."If there was a real change of thinking from the government with regard to tax breaks on bequests and donations, it could have a very pronounced impact. I believe this could single-handedly explode the market and also provide a huge cultural legacy for the nation."(Jay Jopling, Director, White Cube.) Whilst Arts Council England used the occasion of the internationally aclaimed Frieze Art Fair to launch Market Matters - the distilled and palatable result of an extensive research report looking at the structure and dynamics of the art market.



Eight out of Ten People Rank Having a Local Art Gallery or Museum as Important [added 13/10/04]


New MORI research commissioned by the Museums, Libraries and Archives Council.



Scottish Cultural Commission: Submission from VAGA Scotland [added 8/10/04]


A "generational opportunity – to look seriously and maturely at our [Scotland's] culture and decide the framework for its support in the future". VAGA Scotland has submitted a response to the first stage of the consultation process - looking at Cultural Rights,



The Right to Art: making aspirations reality - Demos essay commissioned by VAGA [added 7/7/04]


" A Right to Art is enshrined, simply and straightforwardly, in the 1948 United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights. But what does it mean in the contemporary world? Can we still talk about 'rights' in this way, and if we can, how is 'the right to art' dealt with in policy and in practice?"

In this essay it is argued that, as a signatory of the Declaration, the British government has a responsibility to make this aspiration a reality.



University Museums Gain VAT Relief Enabling Free Entry


VAGA welcomes the Chancellor's Spending Revew announcement of VAT relief for University Museums, following the increase in visitor numbers to National Museums post free entry, but urges government to look at the full body of recommendations found in the University Museum Group's recent publication, University Museums in the United Kingdom: A National Resource for the 21st Century' and the low levels of funding currently accorded to University Museums by the Higher Education Funding Council for England ,



Galleries in Scotland – rich in innovation and educational provision, poor in core funds and subject to fragmented policy [added 30/6/04]


Contemporary visual art in Scotland is enjoying high levels of public interest following the success of Scottish artists at the 2003 Venice Biennale and the recent award of the Gulbenkian Museum Prize to the Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art. Recent audience research shows gallery visitors prepared to visit exhibitions by new lesser-known artists and take risks in the art they want to see. However, a briefing paper on the publicly funded gallery infrastructure, commissioned by VAGA, indicates that Scottish galleries through lack of resources and the absence of coherent and strategic policy are failing to fulfil their cultural, educational and economic potential.



Regular Arts Attenders increase 800000 + since 2001 [added 3/7/04]


New figures released by Arts Council England show that the number of people who experience the arts regularly has increased by over 800,000 since 2001 – over 60 per cent more than the Government’s target for that period.



Cultural Entitlement for Young People Given Ministerial Backing


At a ground breaking seminar in May, DCMS and DfES Ministers joined together to endorse cultural entitlement - that every young person of school age might enjoy a rich cultural life both within and beyond the curriculum ....



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