The Value of Nothing: Aesthetics, Creativity and Cultural Economy

Justin O’ConnorMedia, Film and Journalism

Monash University

Oscar Wilde

Lady Windermere’s Fan:

“What is a cynic? A man who knows the price of everything and the value of nothing. And a sentimentalist, my dear Darlington, is a man who sees an absurd value in everything, and doesn't know the market place of any single thing.”

Elionora Belfiore

“Defensive instrumentalism” and the legacy of New Labour's cultural policies (Cultural Trends, 2012)

Radical Shift

• “this account does nothing to explain the widespread perception, in the cultural policy field, that today’s form of instrumentalism has brought about a dramatic and radical change to the established relationship between government and the business of supporting the arts”.

Radical Shift

This is a ‘radical shift’, a new kind of instrumentalism that has brought about ‘a traumatic and dangerous break with how things used to be’.

1998: New Labour

‘ those industries which have their origin in individual creativity, skill and talent and which have a potential for wealth and job creation through the generation and exploitation of intellectual property ’

(Department of Culture, Media and Sports, 1998)

Creative Trident

Creative occupations in creative industries

Non-creative workers in creative industries

Creative occupations in non-creative industries.

Australian Employment

UK Employment

Creative Industries

Creative Occupations

“Embedded Creatives”

NESTA: Creative Workers

“ a role within the creative process that brings cognitive skills to bear about differentiation to yield either novel or significantly enhanced products whose final form is not fully specified in advance”.

NESTA: Creative Intensity

UNESCO: Cultural Economy

Ecosystem

Cultural Economy Approach

1) not simply about ‘the economics of culture’ but an attempt to understand how this complex sector holds together, how it creates and circulates value(s), and how it might form an object of governance.

2) the challenge is to ensure the quality of, and equitable access to, a wide range of cultural goods and

services. Doing so is a commitment to, and strengthening of, the core values of cultural citizenship within an economically advanced liberal democracy.

Service Sector Classifications

Spillovers

Spillovers

T H Marshall 1949: Social Citizenship

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‘the right to a modicum of economic welfare and security to…share to the full in the social heritage and to live the life of a civilised being according to the standards prevalent in society’

Stefano Harney: Unfinished Business

“Art is closer to people than at any other time in history. People make and compile music. They design interiors and make-over their bodies. They watch more television and more movies. They think deeply about food and clothes. They write software and surf the net of music videos and play on-line games together. They encounter, study, lean and evaluate languages, diasporas and heritages. There is also a massive daily practice in the arts, from underground music, to making gardens, to creative writing camps. And with this there is production of subjectivities which are literally fashioned, which are aesthetic, which are created….There is a massive daily register of judgment, critique, attention, and taste”.

In Hayward, M. (2012) Cultural Studies and Finance Capitalism

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