Activists discuss way forward for creative sector

CULTURAL activists have shared differing opinions about the strategies that can be implemented to make Trinidad and Tobago’s creative sector more economically viable, particularly on the international scene.

While some believe there is a paucity of government policy to effectively guide the sector, others argued the onus was on creatives to devise their own cultural policy before approaching the government.

Tobago Performing Arts Company’s (TPAC’s) interim CEO Jared Prima believes the country does not have enough policy “to guide and to frame what this creative industry is and what it is poised to do in an international space.

“Perhaps it still starts from us, the ones who are challenging, to perhaps begin to create the work that requires certain types of policy because sometimes in the creation of the work we see what is needed,” he said.

From its perspective, Prima said, TPAC has done “a number of different types of products that certainly have challenged certain things and have placed the question about policy within the space.

“So perhaps other organisations can do similar things, and let’s create the need for policy.”

He spoke on June 1 during a multi-disciplinary panel discussion about moving the orange economy forward at the Shaw Park Cultural Complex.

The discussion formed part of the TPAC’s FOURCE festival, which showcased the island’s cultural heritage in the areas of film, dance, music and drama.

Other panellists were TPAC’s artistic director Rayshawn Pierre-Kerr, dance and movement co-ordinator Shakeil Jones, Naparima Bowl CEO Marlon De Bique and Music TT’s general manager Melissa Jimenez.

Pierre-Kerr, who recognised the efforts of the cultural practitioners who nurtured and mentored her, argued that governments are not responsible for creative practice, but can help to shape it as a commercially viable product.

She said, “One of the things I recognised as a young creative, from very early, just by observing the space, I had a very clear sense of what I am good at and what I want to offer the world as a social entrepreneur from my own creative practice, because governments are not responsible for cultural practice.

“It is the individual creative on the ground who does it, who performs it. Governments can shape it. So I want to kind of ‘Sankofarise’ as a perspective the thing by looking inside first so then we can deal with the external perspective.

“If we spend some more time – because we like to throw brand around – that individually we offer, perhaps we will be very clear on what we want to sell.”

Pierre-Kerr alluded to the work of a cultural studies lecturer who conceptualised the term “creative clustering” to demonstrate her point.

She said creative clustering does not involve government interference.

“It causes the same community groups, the same people who have like skills, people who operate within the same frameworks of cultural practice, the small pan group, the small group of dancers, an encore (dance theatre), a ‘youthquake,’ who understand that they can train resources, who understand that I have a technical skill that other groups may not have and I am going to intentionally bring you into the room.

“Because in a space like Tobago, where cultural policy is thrown up in the air, but it does not exist, I foresee that we may be waiting another 20 years to look at, from a real tangible way, a cultural policy that is very concerned with the bottom.

“And the real approach has to be to let us look inside, let us sit with it long enough to make sense of it and then talk to the government, because at a point in time, we would have already been en route to figuring out what it is we want to see about our art in the space.”

For De Bique, the issue is not so much about inadequate policy as about ill-designed policy, which is drafted “without or not enough of the right people in the room when it is done.”

He continued, “I think where government could be a lot more effective is how they lean away from the policy, look at more framework type things and leave you to kind of work it out – but within parameters – and then focus on the real elements of production that affect all creatives.”

De Bique said if an individual is a performing arts practitioner, one of their biggest budget or line items is marketing.

“So if that is subsidised in a type of way with all of the media houses, you inculcate a sort of environment where a media house could charge you less because you are a performing-arts entity. You will find that budget just cut in half one time.”

He believes if all of the production cost elements could be managed and subsidised, it would make the actual work easier.

“I think that is one of the things that the government can have their hands in – an integrated approach to creativity among state agencies, whether it is a ministry or with linkages with offshoots.

“So when it reaches to importing your goods, they understand clearly what that is and it goes through quickly. So you are eliminating the red tape and bureaucracy that is so unnecessary in the production of the work.”