As great reward to me and my close associates, at the end of August, art workers in Lithuania gathered at a special event[1] [1] dedicated to questions about conditions for art workers in the visual arts sector. The event was directly related to establishing the Trade Union of Art Workers (Meno darbuotojų profesinė sąjunga) which was initiated by me, the artist Agnė Jokšė and the curator Vaida Stepanovaitė, as part of a greater 1 May Labour Union. It is a significant step towards the representation of a very specific sector that has had very little capability to bargain with employers who are most of the time temporary but consistent.
The urge to create an organisation to help in bargaining/negotiating for better conditions and wages in the cultural sector was much discussed after the appearance of Dovydas Kiauleikis’s article ‘Too Many Women in the Cultural Sector’ (Kultūroje per daug moterų[2] [2]) published in the culture magazine ‘Literature and Art’ (Literatūra ir menas). The article mainly focuses on the fact that the cultural sector is full of women, who lack bargaining skills and power, whereas in sectors where men dominate, wages are much higher and the sectors attract much more private investment. The article served as an impulse to get the Union of Art Workers finally up and running. Thus, regardless of its false arguments, the article helped to kickstart an organisation that would make bargaining for better conditions, including fees, grants, and living and working conditions in the visual art world, the main point on its agenda.
Vaida Stepanovaitė, Agnė Bagdžiūnaitė amd Agnė Jokšė. Photo documentation of An Open meeting On the Conditions and Possibilities for Organising Art Workers in Lithuania by Inga Juodytė
The miserable funding of culture is not something specific to Lithuania. There is only one country in Europe (Ireland) that has substantially increased its funding for the cultural sector in recent years. Culture attracts very little attention, if any, in the context of national politics and the economy. In 2023, the Lithuanian government allocated 2.7 per cent of its budget to culture. Actually, if we take Eurostat data from 2021,[3] [3] Lithuania was one of the EU countries, together with Latvia, Hungary, Estonia and Malta, allocating the highest percentage to cultural services. Let me add that it was just a miserable 1.8 per cent. General government spending across the EU on cultural services amounted to €71.2 billion, or 1.0 % of all general government spending.[4] [4]
However, the purpose of this article is not only to point out the lack of funding for culture, which is already becoming common and is also actually a conservative or right-wing argument. On one hand, there is a demand for more national art, for all kinds of national civic programmes. On the other hand, there is a demand for a very clear marketisation of the arts; this side is very eager to criticise the use of public money; for them, public institutions and their activities are a waste of time and money.
Last year I had the honour to participate in a cultural forum [5] on creative potential in Šiauliai, a small city in Lithuania, where some cultural workers/operators from different organisations, from cultural incubators to state-funded institutions, gathered to present their activities. After the presentations in the general discussion, I suddenly noticed that everyone was talking of and promoting private funds, immediate results, and the freedom they give to a cultural entrepreneurial spirit. Professor Gintautas Mažeikis went so far as to promote the idea of artists going back to renovated landed estates, like the Renaissance all over again. Therefore, I think that a wider discussion on cultural politics is necessary, as we would not have to go back to monarchist times.
Thus, this article leaves out the never-ending argument on what is and what is not great culture. There is definitely no intention to argue that we should leave the cultural sector to private hands. I think once and for all that we should start seeing public institutions as spaces for the development of deep democratic principles, whereas we can still use them for experimentation and critical endeavours.
Pre-statements had to be made in order to further develop important questions and the problematics of the visual arts sector in Lithuania, and the examples and cases of organising art workers in other countries. First of all, I will try to establish the context for why organising art workers in Lithuania is necessary. Secondly, I will give some examples from Sweden, the Czech Republic and Estonia. Then I will look into the cases of Ireland and Latvia. Last but not least, I will attempt to rethink the solidarity and obstacles of organising.
What is the situation of workers in the visual arts today? The case of Lithuania
Let us focus for a moment on artists in Lithuania. In 2022, the researchers Karolina Šulskutė and Kristina Mažeikaitė were commissioned by the Lithuanian Council for Culture to conduct research on a fair wage for artists working in the field of art during the period 2019 to 2021.[5] [6] According to the research, there were around 10,500 professional artists working in Lithuania, and around 6,000 of them lived and worked in Vilnius.
The research showed that it was common practice to pay those in performing arts projects. Meanwhile, in other fields, the practice varied. In the visual arts and the applied arts (design, architecture), renumeration for artists was rare and low. In the visual arts, the prevailing practice was for creative work to be funded solely by grants, while project funding was allocated to the management costs and other costs related to the project.
Low rewards dominated in all areas. Literature was the area with the lowest remuneration paid. Overall, the average renumeration per artist per project in all fields was below €800.[6] [7]
In the same research on a fair wage for artists, concerning the funded projects, the most common forms of remuneration were in performing arts projects, in music, dance and theatre (more than 80 per cent of projects in these fields provided remuneration). In the visual arts, photography stood out, with 71 per cent of photography projects providing renumeration.[7] [8] Design, fine art and architecture were the least likely to provide remuneration (in art and design it is paid in about every third project, and in architecture in less than every other project).
In other research on the gender pay gap[8] [9] in art fields also commissioned by the Lithuanian Council of Culture, the researchers Kamilė Čelutkaitė and Kristina Mažeikaitė pointed out that a wage gap exists in all fields of art. However, in the visual arts, approximately 14 per cent of male creators earned a higher income (more than €1,200 per month), while there were no female artists in this category at all. Most women, around 50 per cent, earn up to €600 per month.[9] [10] This means that most artists were in a critical situation regarding a substantial income that would keep them out of absolute poverty.
Travelling to Northern Ireland and visiting art institutions there, I realised that all the funding that goes to the cultural sector comes from one source, the British Council, a situation practically identical to Lithuania, where artists and art institutions depend on one main funder, the Lithuanian Council of Culture. Thus, if a meeting of art workers happens during the application week, the topics of conversation are very predictable. It is already quite common to speak about time spent on writing projects, the extra hours spent on calculating budgets, and the anxiety and the sense of desperation after getting negative results. However, looking at the results of the research mentioned above, the competition resembles a race to the bottom.
An interesting phenomenon that is also visible in the research on a fair wage for artists presented in 2022 and commissioned by Lithuanian Council of Culture is that the public sector (budgetary institutions) tends to pay artists less than non-governmental institutions.[10] [11] While workers in public sector art also have to struggle for better wages, in terms of stability, the situation is very different in comparison with NGOs. However, wages do not go much above the minimum wage, but in terms of space, the cost of maintaining it are taken care of by the state. Some state institutions do depend on the Ministry of Culture, and others are funded by local authorities. There is still a lack of research in terms of the differences between national and local authority institutions in terms of workload, the pressure of applying for additional funding, and the constraints on developing the content and autonomous strategy of the institution. All this affects the working environment of low-wage art workers in the public sector. Nevertheless, public institutions could have all the conditions to hire artists, to pay decent wages and promote their work to the public, but the reality is different.
Some museums, cultural spaces on a national or city level, away from the capital city, lack the human resources, the board for consultation and the institutional strategy that would actually serve artists in all fields, especially the visual arts. Museum collections are often left untouched for decades, or if they are renewed, then the design and architecture of the exhibition are decided by the director of the museum and museologists.
Anyway, it is more than sad to read the closing conclusions of research on a fair wage for artists in Lithuania. For researchers, it is natural that public funding cannot ensure a constant fair remuneration/wage for all creators, and therefore can only contribute to a few creators at different stages of their work. Therefore, only a fully functioning ecosystem, i.e. active cultural organisations seeking to generate income or attract additional funding, active creators, an active population participating in cultural activities and paying for cultural services, and other active market players, such as patrons, collectors, etc, can contribute to the well-being of creators.
The inability of researchers to see how the Lithuanian Council of Culture could actually ensure measures for artists to be fairly paid arouses a certain despair. It is clearhat not all artists can be paid at the same time by the LCC, but if there is a percentage limiting the administrative costs of projects, would it be hard to set a limit for the art worker’s fee? It happens very often that the funding that is usually received for a project is reduced by half or less. Then the institution or organisation is often compelled to reduce the artist’s fees in order to have the full project implemented.
Photo documentation of An Open meeting On the Conditions and Possibilities for Organising Art Workers in Lithuania by Inga Juodytė
Recipes for a better future before the pandemic
Obviously, the situation of visual artists and workers in the visual arts in Lithuania is no exception in Europe. A similar situation exists almost everywhere, which requires more self-organised initiatives, associations and demands in order to have more power to negotiate better conditions for workers in art. Let us take a look at more examples closer to home in terms of the region or geographically.
The Czech Republic
Spolek Skutek in the Czech Republic is an independent non-governmental organisation that unites artists, curators, art theorists, critics and others who are active in the field of the visual arts, and aims to defend the rights and interests of its members, and encourages discussion on pressing issues (such as the social situation of artists, art in public spaces, etc) with public bodies and the public in general. The campaign ‘Call against Zero Wage’ in 2012 was one of the starting points for founding the association, which tried to fulfil a role that was traditionally played by unions.
Tereza Stejskalova, one of the initiators of Spolek Skutek, says in an interview[11] [12] that their organisation is usually based on general assemblies and working groups dealing with different problems, and one of the groups was working on setting up a DIY nursery to help young artist parents.
Until today, the organisation has been focused on issues faced by art workers in the visual arts field. In 2022, they carried out two questionnaire investigations on the livelihoods of artists and female artists. After the research, they presented the data to different art institutions and galleries, while also discussing it with artists themselves.
Sweden
Until today, everyone has been talking about the MU agreement, which is mainly seen as a huge step up in the struggle for fair exhibition fees for artists. In 2009, the Swedish government adopted a new agreement for remuneration to artists to display their work. The MU agreement is a ‘participation and exhibition remuneration agreement’, which covers payment to artists for the display of work, as a kind of ‘rent’.[12] [13] This is additional to other kinds of financial compensation for exhibitions, such as transport, installation, publication, etc. The agreement makes it clear that all the work the artist undertakes at exhibitions, before, during and after a show, is to be governed by a written contract and remunerated outside the framework of the exhibition fee. However, almost all institutions in Sweden paid the minimum exhibition fee. According to a report from 2011, only 26 per cent of institutions consistently paid the required minimum fee or more.[13] [14] Nevertheless, the MU became an example throughout Europe to adopt a similar model of fair pay that would make institutions, and also society, think of the amount of work that artists put in for exhibitions and other projects to happen.
Estonia
According to the cultural researcher and curator Airi Triisberg, in the last decade, the visual arts sector in Estonia has gone through two different cycles of debate addressing un(der)paid labour. The first cycle was 2009 to 2011, as a collective organising process, and coincided with an international wave of self-organised movements of art workers mobilised in the aftermath of the global financial crisis.[14] [15] The current cycle (from 2019 onwards) has been led by individual experts, advocacy organisations, and the Ministry of Culture. Airi Triisberg, together with Maarin Ektermann, consulted nearly 70 colleagues to develop a fair pay proposal that would consider the particularities of the Estonian tax system. However, as Airi contends in a recent article, not much has changed since the fair pay proposal was published.[15] [16] Only two institutions have partly modelled their fee tariffs according to the proposal. Further, Airi claims that Tallinn Art Hall linked their artists’ fees to the minimum wage for cultural workers, but the workload calculations are unrealistic (for the preparation of a large solo exhibition, artists receive a payment for only three months), and so the artists’ fees are actually closer to the national minimum wage, which is roughly half the average.[16] [17]
Airi Triisberg. Photo documentation of An Open meeting On the Conditions and Possibilities for Organising Art Workers in Lithuania by Inga Juodytė
It should be noted that Airi Triisberg was also the key speaker at the Union’s (Trade Union of Art Workers) event in Vilnius, where they had a presentation on art worker organisation in Estonia. They were seeking to problematise the wage as a constant measure of working in the art sector. Also, Airi was sceptical of the trade union’s role in terms of self-organising in the arts. However, in the recent article, they conclude that the political pressure that is needed to improve working conditions in the art sector will be stronger when exercised collectively by a multitude of art workers: artists, curators, writers, designers, educators, archivists, builders, exhibition guards, cleaners, etc.
The key moment, if to pursue Airi Triisberg’s line of thought, is to work in solidarity with each other. It is a cliché which cannot be easily denied that artists are individualists who are used to working alone. It is still mainly related to a very old 19th-century image of the solitary genius that, ironically enough, makes us very dependent and incompetent at negotiating with workplaces, galleries and other employers.
A crisis does not necessarily cause us only problems. The 2008 economic crisis taught many of us how to assemble and protest. The pandemic emphasised the human need to socialise, and the meaning of free time that can be used for culture and art. It also showed that art has to be funded and supported in order to exist. State institutions discovered that there were more ways to help art workers in need.
A meme found on Hettie Judah X account (https://twitter.com/HettieJudah [18])
What the pandemic brought to art workers
The neoliberal model states that everyone has to solve their problems individually. It can still be very visible in different sectors and labour organiations in general in Lithuania today. Nevertheless, I am personally convinced that the pandemic situation made the problems of the cultural sector much more visible. It became clear that the survival of many artists was directly dependent on one or another temporary project which helped them through. It often happens that most projects are funded by the Lithuanian Council of Culture. Thus, cultural politics plays a key role in the lives of art workers in Europe.
In my modest opinion, and many would probably agree, the level of funding that was assigned during the Covid-19 pandemic to art workers and the state benefits the artists received, downtime allowances to self-employed workers, and similar help, should have stayed until now, and continued. We are still at a point where the intensified cultural life we have today in Lithuania is an outcome of the financial benefits the art workers received during the pandemic, but soon it will be over.
We have Ireland as a great example, where funding for culture was not cut after the pandemic, but actually increased. In a speech made during the conference ‘People in Organisation: Experts and Ambassadors?’, Maureen Kennelly, the director of the Arts Council of Ireland, said that the Covid-19 pandemic had contributed to a turning point in the consciousness of policy-makers about culture. It had already led to a 40 per cent increase in the Council’s funding in 2021 (€130 million), maintained over the whole period 2021 to 2023, and to a steady increase in the amount of funding (the Council’s budget is expected to reach €150 million in 2024).[17] [19] She mentioned that Catherine Martin, the Irish minister for culture and the arts, who approved the Council’s budget for 2023, discussed the objectives of the record budget, which relate to the recognition of the value of the creative community to society.
In an interview, Maureen Kennelly contended that the situation for artists in Ireland also stands out because last year the culture minister introduced a pilot basic income scheme for artists. This is an experimental initiative, which she hopes will continue. At the moment, around 2,000 artists across Ireland receive €325 per week in various forms. According to the director, this funding allows them to concentrate solely on their artistic activities. The three-year programme has received investment of €100 million, and has made a real difference.[18] [20]
While Ireland can be taken as an example for most countries of how to appreciate art and culture, it is definitely not the case in the Baltic States. The case of Latvia is even more exceptional, since in Lithuania and Estonia grassroots initiatives, that somehow reveal, analyse and improve the conditions for art workers, already exist.
According to Haralds Matulis, the general secretary of the Latvian Council of Creative Unions, Latvia still has a strong right-wing liberal mindset: if you choose this profession, it’s your choice. In his opinion, Latvia is the most right-liberal economically of the three Baltic States, which has never had a Social Democratic government. Politics, ideology and the analysis of events in the Latvian media are all about the liberal struggle for itself.[19] [21] If you have a problem, it’s only yours.
Nevertheless, some good practices can be found in Latvia as well. Every year, half a million euros are available to distribute to self-employed people who happen to be without projects and money for three months, but this support is available once a year. It works as an equivalent option to unemployment support. Matulis sees it as a helpful tool for artists who do not have a regular income, but he notes that it is highly taxed and needs to be increased.[20] [22] In Estonia, a similar measure exists: for example, if an artist has no income for a month, they can apply for six months of minimum wage support, which includes health care, and after six months they are entitled to apply for another six months of support. In total, there can be 12 months of minimum wage support.[21] [23] According to Airi Triisberg, once someone receives this support, they cannot apply for it for two years. So if you are still experiencing financial difficulties, you need to find a solution.[22] [24]
A conclusion of hope, or the need for visibility
According to the Slovenian sociologist and performing arts theorist Katja Praznik, to take on the perspective of art as labour means to recognise that it should be valued in economic terms and recognised as labour, and not as some divine intervention offered for the benefit of society as a free gift.
Luckily, the establishment of an art workers’ union can lead to a process of unveiling and demystifying what we call the creation of an artwork. It can also reduce the competitive element, which lowers the labour costs of all art workers, while we are chasing the stick of the most successful artist. Here I should quote Hans Abbing:
A system like this, which rests on the poverty of many of its participants, is reproduced by everybody involved, including the exploited. One way or another every group has some interest in its maintenance or believes it has an interest. The distinction that follows from the association with art does not only go to a well-to-do art establishment or to art lovers in general, it also goes to poor artists. Moreover, given their low income their rejection of commerce is sometimes more credible than that of other participants. Poor artists may well be aware and even proud of their special position. But for many of them, and most of all those who have been poor for some time, the symbolic benefits do not take away hardship. Seen from outside it are people in the establishment and art lovers who benefit most from the low incomes in the arts. They, de facto exploit artists and can be blamed for this.[23] [25]
Hans Abbing states clearly that nothing good comes from symbolic benefits, the idea that artists are somehow above all earthly necessities. Poverty is not sexy, and maybe the time has come to even negotiate a basic income.
In this article, I have tried to articulate the best ways to move forward, and how to move away from the neoliberal explanation that only freedom in the art market will save us all from poverty. Ireland’s example exposes the mere necessity of representatives of the government to rethink the meaning of professional culture, but it is a two-way process.
Thus, it can be done by making demands in the form of a fair pay agreement, by learning how to unionise better, by creating various collaborations between cultural institutions, art associations and the members of the Council of Culture, by delving into all kinds of laws, by research, by creating questionnaires for art workers, and finally by talking to each other about our conditions of work, what we get paid, and how. Everything demands a lot of resources and free labour, but sharing tasks and doing it collectively can be worth a great deal. Let us make the value of art workers great together.
[1] [26] https://www.facebook.com/events/676613677376326/
[2] [27] https://literaturairmenas.lt/publicistika/dovydas-kiauleikis-kulturoje-per-daug-moteru
[3] [28] Government Expenditure on Cultural, Broadcasting and Publishing Services, EuroStat, 2021: https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/statistics-explained/index.php?title=Culture_statistics_-_government_expenditure_on_cultural,_broadcasting_and_publishing_services&oldid=554580#General_government_expenditure_on_cultural_services.2C_broadcasting_and_publishing_services
[4] [29] Ibid.
[5] [30] Teisingas atlygis už kultūrą. Kristina Mažeikaitė, Karolina Šulskutė. Lietuvos kultūros taryba, 2022 kultūros tyrimai: https://www.kulturostyrimai.lt/wp-content/uploads/2022/06/LKT_SAS_Teisingas-atlygis-uz-kuryba_pristatymas_20220620.pdf [31]
[6] [32] Ibid.
[7] [33] Ibid.
[8] [34] Gender Inequality in the Cultural Sector – Economic and Emotional State of Female Artists. Krisitina Mažeikaitė, Kamilė Čelutkaitė. Lithuanian Council for Culture, 2022 culture research: https://www.kulturostyrimai.lt/wp-content/uploads/2023/04/Gender-Inequality-in-the-Cultural-Sector-Economic-and-Emotional-State-of-Female-Artists_04-04.pdf [35]
[9] [36] Ibid.
[10] [37] Teisingas atlygis už kultūrą. Kristina Mažeikaitė, Karolina Šulskutė. Lietuvos kultūros taryba, 2022 kultūros tyrimai: https://www.kulturostyrimai.lt/wp-content/uploads/2022/06/LKT_SAS_Teisingas-atlygis-uz-kuryba_pristatymas_20220620.pdf [31]
[11] [38] ‘Call Against Zero Wage: Art Workers’ Organising in the Context
of Eastern Europe, conversation with Tereza Stejskalová’ in ArtWorkers: Material Conditions and Labour Struggles in Contemporary Art Practice. Eds. Minna Henriksson, Erik Krikortz, Airi Triisberg, Berlin/Helsinki/Stockholm/Tallinn 2015, printed by Greif, Tartu, pp. 157–170.
[12] [39] Erik Krikortz. ‘Paying Artists: The Unfulfilled Promises of the MU Agreement’ in ArtWorkers: Material Conditions and Labour Struggles in Contemporary Art Practice. Ed.s Minna Henriksson, Erik Krikortz, Airi Triisberg, Berlin/Helsinki/Stockholm/Tallinn,2015, printed by Greif, Tartu, pp.19–34.
[13] [40] Ibid.
[14] [41] Airi Triisberg. ‘Wages for Art Work’ in A Shade Colder, July 2023: https://www.ashadecolder.com/wages-for-art-work
[15] [42] Ibid.
[16] [43] Ibid.
[17] [44] Kokios Lietuvos kultūros tarybos tikimės?, Lietuvos kultūros taryba, 19 October 2023: https://www.ltkt.lt/naujienos/836-kokios-lietuvos-kulturos-tarybos-tikimes-.html
[18] [45] Vilniuje viešėjusi Airijos meno tarybos direktorė M.Kennelly: „Lietuva turi didinti investicijas į meną“, 15 min., 7 October 2023: https://www.15min.lt/kultura/naujiena/asmenybe/vilniuje-viesejusi-airijos-meno-tarybos-direktore-m-kennelly-lietuva-turi-didinti-investicijas-i-mena-285-2122824?utm_medium=copied
[19] [46] Baltijos šalių meno darbuotojai kovoja už orų atlyginimą ir prieš stereotipais paremtą visuomenės nuomonę, LRT, 18 October 2023: https://www.lrt.lt/naujienos/kultura/12/2103144/baltijos-saliu-meno-darbuotojai-kovoja-uz-oru-atlyginima-ir-pries-stereotipais-paremta-visuomenes-nuomone [47]
[20] [48] Ibid.
[21] [49] Ibid.
[22] [50] Ibid.
[23] [51] Hans Abbing. ‘Notes on the exploitation of poor artists’, 2011, p. 7: http://www.hansabbing.nl/DOCeconomist/Exploitation%20of%20Artists%20130918.pdf