By Rasmus Stochfleth Nielsen
At the beginning of 2020, the Council for Visual Arts in the Municipality of Copenhagen announced that it — as the first arts council in Denmark — will introduce gender quotas for the municipality's art purchases. In the press release, Mette Sandhoff Mansa, council member and museum manager at the Kastrupgaard collection, justified the council's decision as follows:
"Ideally there would be no need for quotas, but we have been talking about this for years without achieving real equality. Therefore, we are now putting this radical tool into use both to secure our own visibility towards both male and female artists, and to inspire our colleagues in the industry to follow suit”.
Copenhagen Municipality's gender quotas caused a political stir. Some were critical, others welcomed the initiative. But did you manage to inspire colleagues in municipal arts councils around the country and get them on board?
BILLEDKUNSTNEREN have contacted four of them now, a year and a half after Copenhagen took the lead in the quota debate, to find out if they want to follow the capital's example.
Top: Mo Maja Moesgaard: (De)power. 2016. The work, which is shown in section here, was purchased by Copenhagen Municipality's Council for Visual Arts, 2020. Photo: Anders Sune Berg.
Aarhus: Quota thinking without quotas
In Aarhus, people are not deterred by the idea of gender quotas, says visual artist and spokesperson for Aarhus Municipality's Fine Arts Committee, Katja Bjørn:
"We have watched with great attention what has been done in Copenhagen, although of course with their budget and focus on purchasing art they are somewhat in a league of their own."
Aarhus Municipality's Visual Arts Committee bought earlier this year one of the works from Iben West's series DAMASCUS, 2009. Photo courtesy of the artist.
In the four years Katja Bjørn has been a member of the committee, fair gender representation among the artists who are selected for decoration tasks or whose works the municipality buys has been a central focus, she says.
Although the issue has been discussed, the committee has not decided to introduce gender quotas. And quotas would probably not change that much, says Katja Bjørn: From 2018, when the current committee
joined, and to date, the committee has purchased works by 14 female artists for a total value of DKK 476.400 and works by 10 male artists for a total amount of DKK 394.906. The committee has an annual purchasing budget of DKK 300.000, which must be used on works by artists living in the municipality. The committee is currently missing still to spend around DKK 200.000 of the budget for 2021.
"Yes, we are a bit busy", admits Katja Bjørn, who adds that the gender distribution will probably tip back into a more balanced rent at the end of the year. The numbers she provides BILLEDKUNSTNEREN about, is taken from an inventory that a committee colleague has kept, and which the committee has regularly consulted in order to ensure broad representation in the committee's purchases and projects.
Going forward, these distributional aspects of the committee's work will be made more manageable in a newly developed database. The database will be available to anyone interested in following the municipality's artistic investments. Among other things, the initiative must help to ensure that the Visual Arts Committee of Aarhus Municipality continuously keeps an eye on all diversity parameters. Not just gender, explains Katja Bjørn:
"Right away, gender is the easiest parameter to take into account. We have a responsibility to ensure that with a relatively small amount we also ensure diversity when it comes to ethnicity, age and artistic media and professionalism," she says.
Odense: Gender balance tipped without push
Gender and diversity aspects do not receive the same attention in the Odense Arts Council. This is what Anders W. Berthelsen, who is a member of the city council for the Social Democrats and politically appointed chairman, says. Even so, the picture when it comes to the gender distribution of artists for decoration projects and purchases is roughly the same as in Aarhus.
This appears from a calculation that the municipality has made on the basis of The visual artist's inquiry.
"Surprisingly enough, the report shows that in recent years there has been a skewed gender distribution in favor of female artists when we buy art according to the 1% scheme for the public space in Odense," says Anders W. Bertelsen.
Anita Jørgensen's decoration of Byens Bro by Banegården in Odense is one of the projects realized with funds from the percentage scheme. Anita Jørgensen: Auroraholes. 2016. Photo: Torben Petersen.
The so-called 1% scheme means that in connection with municipal construction projects, 1% of the amount is set aside for artistic decoration. The funds can either be used for the specific project or pooled for more suitable projects. The report Odense Municipality has made in connection with The visual artist's inquiry, shows that in 2020 and 2021 Odense Arts Council has advised on 11 works under the 1% scheme. It has involved 13 artists, nine of whom have been women.
Previously, the advisory task was with the then Odense Art Council, which in 2020 merged with Odense City's Art Fund and became Odense Art Council. An estimate from the period 2014-2019 shows a slight preponderance of male artists in the projects: 13 men against 11 women.
"I will be the first to admit that we have not been good enough. When we choose by seeking out the art in galleries and the like, fewer women and fewer ethnic minorities are chosen.”
– Michael Mansdotter, chairman, Aalborg Municipality's Art Fund
The Odense Arts Council has not considered introducing gender quotas, nor is it something that Anders W. Berthelsen will advocate for in the future. The Arts Council could be forced to take action, he believes, if there was a clear predominance of male artists' works and projects under the council's auspices. The fact that there is currently a clear distribution in favor of female artists is appropriate, he believes, considering the historical backlog. And he hopes that Oden's Arts Council can continue to keep aspects such as gender, ethnicity and the like completely out of the equation:
"If you are faced with a project at a school, a street charity or whatever it is, it is, in my view, most decisive that the artistically and architecturally most suitable work and project wins. The name, the gender or whatever it may be, is, as I see it, not so decisive," he says.
Aalborg: Female artists underrepresented
In Aalborg, the equality and diversity debate occupies a little more space in the consciousness of chairman of Aalborg Municipality's Art Fund, Michael Mansdotter. Nevertheless, statistics are not kept here either on diversity among the artists whose works are bought or chosen for decoration tasks.
Nanna Lysholt Hansen: The Chthonic Ones. Concretes, nail polish. 150x120x40 cm. Aalborg Municipality's Art Fund / Sculpture Park Aalborg, 2021. Photo: Mille Holtegaard.
However, Michael Mansdotter is not averse to using the quota instrument in the future to ensure broad representation. Because as it looks now, the municipality suffers from a clear under-representation of female artists:
Michael Mansdotter estimates that there is a gender distribution of around 70-30 or 80-20 in favor of the male artists. He lies down flat and acknowledges the responsibility that Aalborg Municipality's Art Fund has to put an end to this unequal distribution. The responsibility has, he himself emphasizes, only grown as the art fund's budget more than doubled from DKK 350.000 to DKK 875.000 annually at the start of 2021.
“I must be the first to admit that we have not been good enough. When we simply choose from there by seeking out the art in galleries and the like, fewer women and fewer ethnic minorities are chosen," he says.
Aalborg Municipality's Art Fund has not officially taken a position on whether gender quotas could be the way forward, says Michael Mansdotter. His personal opinion is that gender quotas can be problematic. However, he recognizes the need to ensure equal opportunities for artists of all genders, which Aalborg Municipality's Art Fund will initially try to realize with a strategic focus on the city's artistic growth layer.
Michael Mansdotter expects that it will have a positive effect on the gender issue, as it is the council's experience that there is a clear preponderance of female artists in the younger part of Aalborg's art environment, he says.
Skanderborg: Small budgets, small leeway
Even in one of the country's smaller municipalities, Skanderborg, people are aware of the gender issues and the municipalities' responsibilities in that context. This is what visual artist Noelia Mora Solvez, who is chairman of the Art Council Skanderborg, tells us. But she reminds us that there is a big difference between the budgets of the municipal arts councils and thus their scope for art policy. If Art Council Skanderborg is to realize an art project, the council must e.g. obtain external funds yourself. '
"My personal opinion is that gender quotas can absolutely be the right way to go. As a female artist, I know how important it is that people in influential positions focus on providing equal opportunities," she says and continues:
"But you also have to think about the framework in which we, as the arts council, have to act. In the Skanderborg Arts Council, we have so little discretion that we have to look at the individual tasks and decide who can best solve them with the means we can make available.”
Noelia Mora Solvez in collaboration with Christoffer Brekne and Jeppe Worning: NATURA VIVA. Art Council Skanderborg, KUNSTPAUSE, Skanderborg Museum 2020.
Like many other municipal visual arts councils, Skanderborg Art Council receives a grant from the Statens Kunstfonds pool for municipal visual arts councils of DKK 50.000, which is conditional on municipal co-financing of the same amount. The tight budget gives limited influence, emphasizes Noelia Mora Solvez.
But if she and her colleagues in the arts council succeed in convincing the local politicians to increase the grant, the council will implement the increased influence with diversity in mind:
"Gender quotas could be one of the tools here," she says.
BACKGROUND
Female artists occupy more space in Copenhagen Municipality's art collection. Thus, from 2016-2020, 86 works by female artists and 79 works by male artists have been purchased.
In comparison, Copenhagen Municipality bought 2002 works by male artists and only 2015 works by female artists in the period 263-120, when the council did not distinguish between gender when purchasing art.
Copenhagen Municipality's Council for Visual Arts introduced gender quotas on art purchases at the beginning of 2020. This happened because the council considered that a more binding focus on doing was needed
up with the skewed gender balance in the area.
Source: Council's annual report 2020.
MEMBERS OF THE MUNICIPALITY OF COPENHAGEN'S COUNCIL FOR VISUAL ARTS 2021
Chairman: Hannah Toticki Anbert, (Village artist, Association of Visual Artists, BKF)
Vice-chairman: Kassandra Behrndt-Eriksen, (Citizens' Representation, independent)
Gyda Heding (Citizens' Representation, Enhedslisten)
Niko Grünfeld (Citizens' Representation, Free Greens)
Mette Sandhoff Mansa (Museum manager Kastrupgaardsamlingen, Danish Museums, ODM)
Michael Thouber (Director, Kunsthal Charlottenborg, Association of Art Galleries in Denmark)
Torben Ribe (Visual artist, Academy Council)
Michala Paludan (Visual artist, UKK — Organization for Artists, Curators and Art Mediators)
The article here is brought in trade magazine Billedkunstneren #4 2021.