A WIN-WIN SCENARIO FOR THE CULTURAL SECTOR
The self-repayment of cultural institutions is one of the most complex and most discussed subjects. The co-founder of the London company CultureLabel Peter Tullin is confident that the problem of the contemporary cultural sector is not a short supply of ideas, but rather the strategies designed to turn them into reality and that are capable of generating commercial revenue. “At the heart of our thinking was the start-up mentality of creating something out of nothing: forming the structures, alliances and strategies to leverage the assets,” admits Tullin.
Even in the midst of an economic downturn, the demand for quality cultural products is booming. It is enough to recall the Leonardo da Vinci exhibition in 2011at Londonэs National Gallery (tickets being resold for up to £400), or the fact that the Tate Modern gallery was designed for two million visitors a year and now caters for close to 6 million.
The heads of cultural organisations should think big and defy the downturn. Some of the world’s most productive ideas emerge at the intersection between art, technology and entrepreneurship. Innovation in each of these sectors is fast-paced individually, but it is more important to put these trends together to create new opportunities. Peter Tullin offers the example of Kodak that invented the digital camera but did not fully embrace the digital revolution, which ultimately lead to its inevitable financial downfall. Cultural organisations should ask themselves this question: if we did not already exist, would we build us again?
Close to the cultural sector, Amazon has created the biggest library in the world of eBooks that can be used by readers in the USA free of charge for a limited period. But ten years ago, who would have believed that e-books would be the most popular sales product on Amazon?
In an environment, where change is a constant, it is very difficult to survive, let alone thrive. Many questions remain. How to create a global network that works together and rapidly? Where to find partners for these tasks? One way or another, the main goal of contemporary cultural strategy is uniting different worlds, and a creative approach is the only solution.
Based on www.theguardian.com