WHERE'S OUR SEPP OR GREG?

I never thought I’d be singing Mr Blatter’s praises.

Well here goes ….. every time he does something however strange (“racial taunts? Get over it… shake hands”) he not only gets away with it, the world nods in acceptance. Sepp is a God. Forget the clay feet. He’s very important. Honestly.

In sport people get feted and invited on to Question Time – hence Greg Dyke, now heading up the FA, will be good for football.

But in the Arts and Culture it’s harder.

Invite Alex Beard, Charles Smith, Nicholas Penny, David Pickard, Loretta Tomasi or Alan Davey to talk and you’ll get fewer takers than if you got Alex Ferguson, George O’Grady, Lynn Davis or the man who ought to be running rugby, Clive Woodward.

Give me a bit of glamour.

Make me feel the flutter you get with a star like Ian Botham or a successful business head like a Tim Leahy or John Browne. Make the journalists excited. But we can do even better.

Look what Kevin Spacey did for the Old Vic – astonishing. If you ever heard him talking about the theatre you’d have to be inebriated, unwell or suffering from jetlag not to be captivated and impressed. Even the poor in the audience were reaching in their pocket to fill the Old Vic coffers when I last saw him.

So imagine Danny Boyle as spokesman for the Arts.
Imagine Simon Rattle.
Imagine Daniel Day Lewis.

What the Arts and Culture needs is a champion (or even a team of champions) who gets the attention of media, politicians and business alike.

Sport by definition is not elite - Greg Dyke makes Alan Sugar almost look upmarket.

Art, on the other hand, fields either the elite like Lord Aldington or unknowns who are probably elite.
Most of all, sport has always recognised the importance of the media and of audiences and the fact that the bigger the audience the more you can charge – a season ticket at Arsenal costs just under £2,000 or the same as 25 tickets for the best seats of the best plays in London.

Imagine Arséne Wenger as head of an arts establishment.

And the funny thing is great sportsmen can sometimes make it in the Arts – Eric Cantona for instance – but the reverse seldom if ever happens. If we want to raise the profile and funding of the Arts and ensure the Secretary of State for Media and Culture is the job politicians really want, rather than feeling it’s somewhat worse than Overseas Development, then fill the jobs with highly paid stars.

I can see it now

Royal Opera House lures Plácido Domingo as new Chief.
Charlie Saatchi poached to run the Tate
Helen Mirren to rule the National – hmm!

The day the arts hits the headlines like that is the day it’ll win.

Written and first published for the Business of Culture