CREATIVE INDUSTRIES: IN THEORY AND IN PRACTICE

 

By Elena Zelentsova and Nickolay Gladkeeh

 

With participation of Alexei Goncharik, Mikhail Kaluzhsky, Olga Lopukhova, Anna Maniuk, Elena Melville, Anastasia Prokopchuk, Alina Saprykina, Marina Khrustaleva.

 

The experts who kindly agreed to be interviewed on creative industries are Anatoly Golubovsky, Mikhail Kaluzhsky, Irina Korobyna, Eugenia Linovich, Olga Lopukhova, Igor Luts, Maria Privalova, Elena Tupyseva, Marina Khrustaleva, Olga Shishko. 

 

The authors thank Prof. Justin O'Connor for his consultations, materials and professional interest in developing creative industries in Russia.  

 

© Nickolay Gladkeeh, Elena Zelentsova, text

© Elena Zelentsova, compilation

© Authors of cases and interviews

М., Classica ХХI. 2009

 

Creative industries, creative economy, creative class and creative city – At the beginning of the 21st century all these concepts are widely used by theorists and practitioners all around the world. Based on the concept of intellectual property, creative industries sector includes design, fashion, cinema, publishing, media, the Internet, software etc.

 

“Creative industries: in theory and in practice” is the first Russian book about the creative industries phenomena and its role in modern economic, social and cultural development, describing both the international and Russian experience. The book includes many case studies, examples of the role of culture and creativity in developing territories, and also includes a series of interviews with Russian experts, a guide to who’s who in the creative industries, and a comprehensive glossary. This book is aimed at creative industries specialists, students and professors, public officials, politicians, consultants and anyone who cares about the Russia’s future.

 

For the English version of the Creative Industries Agency website we are publishing some extracts of interest to English-speaking readers.

Translated by Irina Sherbacova, Elena Ivanova. English version was edited by Paul Webb

 

Introduction.

Creativity Changes the World

 

How can a person go through a crisis? How can a big country overcome a crisis? How can the world conquer crises which are becoming more and more global?

 

There is no simple answer to these questions. A crisis is a challenge that urges every person and large group of people to find, substantialize and apply new, unconventional solutions. But what is the source of them?

 

Alexander Piatigorsky, a recently deceased Russian philosopher, professor of the London University, said that there were three wrong reactions to external circumstances - accommodate oneself to, struggle with or ignore them. What is the right reaction? The philosopher answered:

 

«One can not set the opposite against time, as well as circumstances.… In reality, to overcome something important and disturbing inside yourself, something that you'd like to destroy outside, you have to use a weapon unknown to no one, even to yourself. You should introduce to your mind and your language some things that just do not exist in time. Some strange workarounds should be used, which are efficient because the one who uses them can not completely understand them. For if s/he managed to understand them, s/he would not succeed in anything.» (Piatigorsky, 1990).

 

In other words, efficient solutions are always creative. In order to change the situation and oneself, one should create something that has not existed before, that does not follow merely from previous knowledge and calculations. Later, we look back and try to reflect what it was and how it was done, but the moment of insight connected with an intuitive perception of the situation and providing a sudden clue, is an unavoidable part of the process.

 

Creativity as the highest form of creation, has always had a halo of mystery around it. Sometimes we can understand what has been created but hardly ever can we understand – how. Insights descend from above and resist explanations. Pushkin said “You can not sell the inspiration” - it can not be sold and hence can not be bought. It is possible to sell a product – “manuscripts”, but the creative process is outside the market's control.  

 

However, at the turn of the third millennium a man thinks up something more sensible – if creativity is not subordinated to the market, it is possible to subordinate market to creativity and it gives results. What one can’t manage can be stimulated. Whole cities become not only territories of life, business and trade, but also creative spaces. Various companies, involved in creative technologies, such as Google, design their offices as youth clubs or cozy homes, since such environments stimulate new ideas. Some experts, for instance Leif Edvinsson from Sweden, the author of Corporate Longitude: Navigating the Knowledge Economy (Edvinsson, 2005) suggest taking into account the creative capital of employees and the creative component of a company while making financial and accounting estimates. However difficult is to command the elements of water, wind and fire, humanity managed to domesticate them, at least partially. Isn’t it time for us to book another element as an asset?

 

We’re used to linking creativity with the arts. And quite naturally – since prehistoric times art has been a reserved area for creativity and creative people. Anticipating, we shall note that music, literature, cinema and other areas of arts are mentioned in our book more than once, but from rather unexpected point of view – as cultural and creative industries. And the subject matter of this book is creative economy and associated creative policy, and in an extended sense – creativity as an environment for contemporary people’s lives.

 

In the middle of the 20th century Claude Lévi-Strauss, a French anthropologist, divided cultures into “cold” and “hot”. “Cold” cultures rely on slow changes and preservation of existing order, meticulous following traditions and rituals; while “hot” cultures value fresh approaches and development (Charbonnier, 1961). It can hardly be argued that it is the art in all its forms that feeds the “hot” cultures, and globalization, irrespective of our attitude towards it, does not give “cold” cultures any chance for survival. But creativity today is viewed not only as a cultural factor, but also as an economic one.

 

In 1970s Daniel Bell, a US sociologist, defined three levels in the development of society: pre-industrial (agrarian), industrial and post-industrial. The major driving force of the first stage was a manual agricultural labor, of the second – technical machinery usage, and the last one he called the “information society”, as it is driven by information and special knowledge competition (Bell, 2004).

 

What did we witness at the end of the 20th century? The world has entered into the post-information stage. This means that a monopoly on information, however super-confidential, including military and commercial, can only be held for a very short period of time. Information awareness still remains a competitive advantage, but a tactical, not a strategic one. On one hand the level of technology and organization is so high that a new invention is implemented and marketed in a very short time. The changes are so rapid, that one generation can witness several impressive technological revolutions. On the other hand, the global spread of computers and the development of the Internet gave unlimited and immediate access to information for everyone.

 

Than what could be a strategic competitive advantage under these circumstances? The answer has already been given: the constant ability to generate new ideas, i.e. creative ability. Information and knowledge still remain basic, but subsidiary resources.

 

Who is this book for?

 

This book was written for Russian people. Traditionally many of us still remain blissfully unaware of and indifferent to events in the outside world. Russian culture in general stays “cold” (by Lévi-Strauss) and confident of its own ability. Raw materials export policy, adopted by the Russian government, is not in need of the support and development of our culture, science and creative potential.

 

Richard Florida in the foreword to the Russian edition of his book the Creative Class gave his estimate of the creative class numbers in Russia: 13 ml, which is less than a half of the country’s working class (29 mln). In absolute numbers of creative profession workers, Russia is in second place after the USA (38 mln), but by the world creative index, which is a combination of various indicators of technologies, talent and creativity, Russia holds, by Florida’s estimation, the 25th place (Florida, 2005).

 

We believe that this low estimate can be attributed not to the intellectual potential of the Russian creative class, as to the absence of adequate demand for it in the Russian political and economic system.

 

Let’s ask ourselves: what kind of creativity is now in demand? Even without drawing a dividing line between such different spheres as culture, science and technologies, a general answer would be: it’s creativity which supports symbolical domination of the state powers.

 

In particular, our mass culture is wrongly accused of imitating western patterns. It imitates them only in form, being incapable of producing modern viable and competitive forms. In substance, Russian mass culture is ideologically based, and reflects, on one hand, values and fears of a feudal absolutist state such as paternalism, firm hand ruling, geopolitical aggressiveness, appeals to unite to meet external threats, suppression of opposition, lookout and eradication of internal enemies, on the other hand – specific values of local capitalism, e.g. the possibility of making quick money and assuming an extravagant lifestyle and the ability to defend hard-won prosperity by force, if need be.

 

Science and technology also serve as symbolic manifestation of the state ambitions rather than for the satisfaction of social needs. Both highly technological industries and small and medium-sized business - the basis for the middle class – are underdeveloped.

 

It is not surprising that the products of such a culture, unlike raw natural resources, do not have and will never have universal and subsequent export value. Quite naturally our export in the intellectual sphere consists of “raw materials” only – the country is losing bright brains and skilful hands for good.

 

But after all, Russia naturally enters the creative economy “from the grassroots”, though without state support. Some wealthy businessmen and municipal authorities provide financial support for regional programs and creative projects. No doubt, this kind of support is often ostentatious, aimed at a demonstration of one’s powers in the feudal lands (this is possible only in the cultural sphere, as federal authorities do not take culture seriously). Nevertheless more and more often these initiatives are formed with the understanding of long-term perspectives.

 

Creative clusters are building up in Moscow, St Petersburg and gradually in other big cities. Several organizations and agencies work in partnership with experts and municipal authorities from other countries. Several books by Charles Landry, Richard Florida and other experts on creativity have been translated into Russian. Universities include courses on creative industries in their curricula. But this is not the main point.

 

We are witnessing a creative revolution for millions of common people. Access to IT technologies gives anybody – from schoolchildren to housewives – the possibility for self-expression, which is very attractive and provocative. It’s quite easy to set up a personal page in a social network, a blog or a personal web-site. One would have thought that writing of letters was doomed with the appearance of the telephone, but e-mails caused its miraculous revival. A person not talented in drawing, writing music or poetry, can, with little effort, create his own playcast combining somebody else’s picture, text and soundtrack into something new and personal. People with above-average creative abilities can take full advantage of new technical instruments.

 

But the possibilities are not limited to those provided by the Internet. If you don’t have anything, you still have your body, which can be decorated as you wish using make-up, body-art, tattoos or piercings. If you have enough money, you can experiment with your dress. Then with your car, not only developing its technical characteristics and comfort: for instance, aerographics are becoming increasingly popular in Russia.

 

The significance of this revolution has still to be thought out. But the authors would like to take the liberty of expressing a controversial idea: The creative revolution puts an end to the era of consumption. Industrialization provided an almost unlimited number of finished goods and the customers’ activity was limited to choosing the better quality item. In the modern world, the means for creativity are the goods in most demand. People prefer user generated content to certified cultural products. This term, however, is controversial: the appearance and active usage of user generated content turns a user into a creator. Not just the web-pages of some bloggers - experts in literature and music who have become more popular than traditional literature and music reviews, and Wikipedia has started replacing traditional encyclopedias. Tourists and travelers do not trust travel guides and booklets anymore, it’s far more important for them to read what other people write on the Internet about a particular country, hotel or place of interest. The success of the “Wiki-knowledge” phenomena has given an American journalist James Surowiecki (Surowiecki, 2007) the idea of analyzing the abilities of the collective potential of large groups of people.

 

Creativity has two roles: it is a means (development of instruments) and a goal (self-actualization of an author). We have already experienced this second part of creative economy. But we’ve experienced it as mere consumers. We have not entered the world economy as creators of means, as generators of ideas, as developers of new possibilities for humanity in spite of the unquestionable creative potential of our country.

 

The authors believe that this book will be of use both to people involved in the creative professions, students and teachers, and to decision-makers – authorities, politicians, consultants, who think about the future of Russia and of the possibility to turn from the raw material-oriented model of development to the modernization one.

 

Creativity is a complex and multiform process, and we know quite little about it. But thanks to it, a man finds and uses a weapon “unknown to no one, even to himself” (A.M. Piatigorksy), which neither struggles with time, nor accommodates time or ignores time. It changes the times.

 

Objectives and Structure of the Book

 

The structure of this book is defined by several goals of the authors.

 

The first goal is to familiarize Russian readers with some of the historical and economic factors connected with the development of cultural industries (1st chapter and part of 2nd chapter). Today we can see that the theory of creative economy has a complete and defined concept and its own genealogy. The authors give a review of international publications on the subject, most of which remain unknown to Russian readers.

 

The second goal is to present existing practices and programs of cultural industries development in Russia (3rd chapter) and abroad (2nd chapter). The creative economy is not just a concept, but primarily a new type of activity deeply connected with urban development programs. Clearly, creative industries practice needs to be described and shown through description and analysis of specific cases and practices.

 

And the third goal is to introduce a new set of sources and terminology; hence we have included not only a bibliography and notes for further reading, but also a list of influential people and a glossary.

 

The book includes a number of examples – cases of specific companies and creative spaces, which seemed important to us as illustrations of theoretical and practical statements in the text. These examples are not exhaustive from a geographical standpoint – the book does not contain cases from various countries which might be of interest to readers, such as India, Singapore, New Zealand, Brasilia or Lithuania… Information on particular regions can be found quickly and easily on the Internet. As for the Russian cases, our list is incomplete as well, as the situation changed very rapidly, and the size of the book prevents us from writing about everything worth mentioning. The authors believe that within the period of publication of this book new creative initiatives will emerge in Moscow, St Petersburg and other Russian cities.

 

Lost in Russian Translation

 

Historically the term “creative industries” is a modification of the term “cultural industries”. This expression sounds strange to a Russian ear, almost like an oxymoron – a combination of words with opposite meanings, such as “white blackness”.

 

In the Russian mind, creativity is, on one hand, chaotic and uncontrolled, and on the other hand is linked to higher spiritual values, while industry is the mass production of material goods, associated with management, conveyer belts and calculation. This concept was also accepted by western intellectuals of the industrial era. We’ll show how this antagonism has gradually vanished. For a western mind this sharp contrast between culture and business, the artist and market had vanished by the 1960s at the latest. In Russia any discussion on “culture coming to the market” would mention these contrapositions, going back to 19th century romantics and supported by Soviet ideology, which considered the bourgeoisie as being soulless by definition, and any distinguished artists being victims of exploitation and critics of the capitalist society.

 

Translation of the key notion of this book into Russian is quite a problem. In the modern Russian language there are two words with a similar meaning to «creative» - one is a Russian word “tvorchestvo”, another is «creatyvny», which is a barbarism – a direct linguistic borrowing from English. The «creativny» barbarism has become fashionable in the recent years. Although the Russian words “tvorchesky” and barbarism “creativniy” have the same meaning, their styling differs.  

 

“Tvorchesky” in Russian is closely related to traditional culture. A “Tvorchesky” profession is a painter, actor, musician, probably a scientist or an inventor, but definitely not a businessman or a manager. There is a hint of irony in the Russian language: our “tvorchesky” people are odd, unreliable and unpredictable, “unworldly” persons, but they are justified by their talents and liberal professions.

 

A “Creativny” person is the one with creative abilities, able to generate something new, and so far this word does not have any additional meanings. “Creativny” professions are something modern, like a designer, manager, political technologist, image-maker and copywriter. And this is not incidental. “Creativny” appeared in Russian in the 1990s, when changes in the socio-political system in Russia gave rise to new professions.

 

This is a more modern word, not bearing local associations, which leads Russian publishers and translators of C. Landry, R. Florida and like-minded authors to talk about the foreign “creativny” industries, “creativny” city, “creativny” class, etc. At the same time usage of the barbarism slows the process of accepting these definitions in contemporary Russia. After careful deliberation the authors have decided to use mostly the Russian word “tvorchesky”, leaving “creativny” as a synonym for lexical and stylistic diversity.

 

Another reason for such a choice was that organizers of the first Russian programs on promotion of creative industries in Russia have used a Russian word “tvorshesky”. This decision has been made out of desire to promote local practices, a new type of activity. How do new words appear in a language? Words are established not by dictionaries, but by existing practices. This desire to create a Russian pool of practices has forced the Russian managers to make this decision. While academic educational programs tend to use the word “creativny”, the original Russian word “tvorchesky” is used to speak about Russian projects, Russian programs and practices.

 

Chapter 3. Creative Industries in Russia

 

Cultural Industry as a Part of the Soviet Ideological Machine

 

The development of the public sphere in Russia was hampered by particular set of historical circumstances. In the 19th century these were the results of serfdom, i.e. predominance of rural population, slow migration, illiteracy of the majority of population and strict press censorship; in the 20th century – the October revolution followed by total state control over development, replication and distribution of cultural products. Industrialization took place in culture, however not from “underneath” but from “above”: the cultural industry was shaped as an instrument for brainwashing the population and “cultural workers” themselves.

 

Authorities regulated both the subject matter of the artworks and honoraria of writers, painters, etc. Creative work was rewarded according to compliance with state policy, not with consumer demand. A tacit table of rank had been formed to make sure that authors of “ideologically committed” cultural products received maximum benefits, while ideological defectors were doomed to poverty. This confirmed the romantic image of a “hungry but free artist” established in the public mind in the 19th century. For many years the Soviet regime made the creative community believe that wealth was a sign of ideological corruption and poverty and non-appreciation by the powerful are the qualities of a truly free artist.

 

Ideology dominated not only in literature, arts and media. Even such “commercial” and “non-political” types of creativity as folk-crafts were taken under state control. In the 1930s large centralized enterprises similar to industrial manufacturing plants were set up. Some of them function today (e.g. ZAO “Obedinenie Gzhel’ or ZAO “Khokhlomskaya Rospis” ). Because of this industrialization, folk-craft trade traditions were broken and substituted with a surrogate, which is in low demand nowadays.

 

From Officialism to Underground: Germs of the Cultural Market

 

Some liberalization of cultural life happened in the post-Stalin period: the easing of censorship, partial restoration of international cultural contacts, the emergence of a new generation of writers and painters using wider variety of permitted themes and forms. In the shadows of the official culture, an underground one started emerging half-legally or illegally in opposition to the ideological dictatorship. “Samizdat” (underground press in the USSR) and “Tamizdat” (foreign books and periodicals) were distributed on a large scale.

 

The rudiments of market relationships appeared together with this unofficial culture. Painters sold their work – they were in demand primarily with foreigners (diplomats, foreign employees and professionals working under contract in the USSR, and tourists) and with local collectors who were willing to take the risks few and far between.

 

Concerts in private apartments, the emergence of tape-recording, singer-songwriters and then the appearance of “Russian Rock” triggered a certain kind of music business with a system of illegal tours and concerts, illegal ticket sales and illegal manufacturing of music instruments. Alexander Novikov, author and performer; Zhanna Aguzarova, leader of the Bravo group; Alexei Romanov and Alexander Arutiunov from the Voskreseniye group and many others were persecuted not for ideological reasons but for their attempts to “do business” in the sphere of music (article 153 of the Criminal Code of the RSFSR – Private entrepreneurial activities) during the final years of the Soviet era (Smirnov, 1994). The foundation for music producing and cultural management in our country was created in these illegal and semi-legal circumstances.

 

Perestroika and glasnost, resulting in an information explosion on the scale of a “cultural revolution” and the subsequent end of Soviet power leading to market reforms opened a gate to the development of creative industries in Russia.

 

At the turn of 1980s-1990s, Russian artwork became extremely popular in the West and enabled Russian painters to freely display and sell their artworks abroad. Many of them achieved considerable commercial success. Private galleries and commercial fairs sprang up (the “Art-Myth” in 1990-93, “Art-Moscow” since 1996, “Art-Manezh” since 1996).

 

But the development of cultural industries ran into problems when it met the firm stereotypes in public minds perpetuated during the Soviet decades, the major one was a fundamental opposition between culture and commerce, between arts and businesses.

 

The contradiction between culture and commerce cannot be doubted, and often leads to conflicts. But paradoxically its image with Russian people rests not on a real understanding of the contemporary situation, but on two other “pillars”: the Soviet ideology, describing “a tragic fate of an artist in a capitalist society”, and the real Soviet experience dogmatically forbidding an artist to be financially successful other than by serving the powers in the symbolic environment.

 

Emerging of Creative Industries in Russia

 

These “pillars” have presented an obstacle for promoters of creative industries at the beginning of the new millenium. Representatives of cultural communities and organizations were against the unification of “creativity” and “industry”, of “business” and “culture”, as they saw it as a highway to losing cultural values, national and local identity to predatory capitalism. Justin O’Connor, who participated as an expert in a pilot project on creative industries development in St Petersburg, noted that these:

 

“…grow out of a shared belief that art, heritage, patrimony, and national culture might use the techniques and methods of Western commercially savvy cultural institutions, but that these are national treasures whose core identity must be preserved, away from commercialism, consumerism and predatory global capital.”(O'Connor, 2004).

 

Even the artists, who tend to public recognition and commercial success, proudly declared that they cannot and do not want to be “sold” for money. Somehow the notion that artistic products can be sold to common people escaped them. The only source of wealth was through politics and business, not through art.

 

Another important task was the enlightenment of the Russian cultural community. The Creative Industries Development Center in St Petersburg, set up in 2001, and Cultural Policy Institute, set up in 2002 and who developed a project on cultural industries in the regions between 2003 and 2005 along with with the Ministry of Culture of the RF and the European Council, are the pioneers in promoting cultural industries in Russia. Both organizations have worked in close collaboration with international organizations and European experts, primarily with the British agencies EUCLID and Comedia, adopting and adapting their experience of working in this field. Since 2005 the Creative Industries Agency has been another active player in the field.

 

In recent years, a number of researches on creative industries in Russia have been published and a number of projects implemented. Fundamental works by C. Landry (Landry, 2005; Landry, 2008) and R. Florida (Florida, 2005), books and articles on various aspects of creative economy (Nordstem, Ridderstrale, 2002; Pahter, Landry, 2003; McIlroy, 2005; Pine, Gilmor, 2005, etc.) have been published in Russian. There have also been original Russian publications on the development of creative industries in Russia, such as publications by the Cultural Policy Institute as part of the series Cultural Strategies: Expert’s Club (the New partnership formats, 2003; Creative Industries in Russia, 2004; Creative Industries: Assembling Model, 2005) and research on the creative conversion of former industrial spaces in Moscow and other Russian cities (Zelentsova, Gladkeekh, Pushkina, 2008). Several conferences and forums have been held to discuss cultural industries development (2004, 2005, 2006 – the Culture Plus international forum, Moscow; 2008 – Imagination Factory international conference, Moscow, etc.).

 

A “Creative Industries” specialty was included into the curricula of the Cultural Management Faculty of the Moscow School of Social and Economic Science in 2008. This program has formed the basis for educational and methodological material on “Cultural (creative) industries” prepared for the Academy of National Economy under the Government of the RF within the framework of the Innovative University national project (Zelentsova, 2007). Since 2009 the teaching of creative industries has been actively supported by VINZAVOD the Moscow Centre for Contemporary Art - a popular Moscow creative cluster.

 

Creative Industries in Contemporary Russia

 

It is no coincidence that the development of creative industries in Great Britain started with mapping, i.e. the systematization and evaluation of available enterprises and resources. The absence of this stage makes designing impossible. There have been some non-systematic and incomplete attempts to conduct mapping in Russia.

 

Official data analysis is a difficult task because of the existing statistics system. It should be noted that Russia is not an exception here. When the first mapping attempts were made in Great Britain in 1997 – 1998 (before the introduction of the State program for creative industries support), the state statistics system proved to be poorly designed for this sort of information, and the researchers were forced to do everything “manually” and build up the picture through small pieces. Researchers from Singapore, Hong Kong and other countries came across the same difficulties.

 

Some information on creative industries development in Russia can be found in the Creative Economy, UN Report, 2008.

 

According to the Report 7,3% of the Russian population, involved in production cycle of Russian creative industries, produce 6,06% of the GNP, versus 8,49% of employed producing 11,12% of the GNP in the USA. This low efficiency (almost 1,5 times lower than in the USA) could be explained by the fact that in Russia related sectors, not the “core” of creative industries are primarily developed, and there a cost estimate of creative and intellectual potential is lower (e.g. assembling production lines). Similar situation can be seen in Philippines (4,92% of the GNP – 11,92% of employed), Mexico (4,77% of the GNP – 11,01% of employed), Bulgaria (3,42% of the GNP – 4,41% of employed) and Hungary (6,67% of the GNP – 7,1% of employed). So at the moment Russia is a “factory” producing goods based on “outside” technologies, which are consumed together with production of major industries or are supporting this consumption, and not a “laboratory” for creative goods production.

The UN Report statistics show that the creative industries sector in Russia remains undeveloped, regardless of a great creative potential of the country, which is not taken into account in strategic development at the state level. Creative industries development would allow the country to change the structure of the foreign trade balance and become less dependent on energy resources and raw materials prices fluctuation. The share of Russia in the world GNP is a little above 3% (On the Results of Global International Comparison Program of GNP in 2005, 2007); the lion’s share in it belongs to mineral resources (from 65% to 70%) and metals (about 17%).

Elena Melville

(Based on Creative Economy. Report, 2008)

 

The authors turned to Russian experts experienced in several sub-sectors of creative industries to get their appraisal of the current situation. We asked them the following questions:

 

What is your assessment of the Russian market (in design, advertising, etc.)?

- Who are the major stakeholders in the sector?

- Are there any associations or unions advocating the sector’s interests?

- What are the major problems and difficulties?

 

Needless to say that the following interviews do not represent a complete and decisive picture. The reader will see which ones are more impartial and which ones are more judgmental. More than that, all the interviews were given at one particular time; the fall of 2009, and influence of the economic crisis tended to emphasize the negative points of the subsectors and economy on the whole.

 

We hope, however, that the interviews help the readers to get an idea of difficulties and potential of creative industries in Russia

 

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Advertising

 

The Russian advertising market is very young by historical standards (less than 20 years old) but rapidly growing. The advertising industry in Russia is quite a substantial branch of the Russian economy. In 2008 the volume of the advertising market in Russia reached, according to the Russian Association of Communication Agencies (RACA), RUB 267 bn.

 

Its structure is similar to the markets of developing countries: the lion’s share belongs to TV advertising, as television is the most effective channel for advertising campaigns on a national scale.

 

On the other hand, the Russian market is developing in line with global advertising trends, for example, the share and importance of digital communication channels (the Internet, mobile marketing, etc.) is increasing. We can safely say that the Russian advertising industry is entering a new digital era.

 

The major stakeholders are the same as in the world market – the leading transnational holdings. They service about 80% of the budgets of biggest advertisers (who are often transnational corporations themselves) and lead the development of the advertising industry. We can say that Russian advertising is one of only a few Russian industries well integrated into the global economy. It is fair to say that the key Russian advertising holdings have Russian management and staff.

 

Our professional association – the RACA (Russian Association of Communication Agencies) was established in 1993. All the biggest and most professional agencies are members. The Association is divided into committees and commissions according to members’ profiles: creative, media, btl, etc.

 

The Association, consolidating about 170 national and local agencies, is not homogenous, and this reflects the structure of the advertising industry. The market players are so far unable to systematically advocate the strategic interests of the industry.

 

This emphasizes the immaturity of the industry, which, contrary to IT, does not have tax or other preferences irrespective of an equally high share of intellectual labor. The development of highly intellectual industries should be supported by the state if it wishes to do away with the raw material export economy.

 

In 2004 leading advertising agencies initiated and supported the Art Directors Club of Russia (ADCR), set up with the aim of increasing professional standards and the quality of creative work. Its members include the leading players in the advertising industry.

 

Advertising festivals also have an important role in developing the advertising industry. The major one is the Red Apple Moscow International Advertising Festival, which also suffers from lack of state attention and support. Being the oldest (organized for 19 years) and most prestigious advertising forum, Red Apple remains inferior to international advertising contests in terms of status and quality of presented works.

 

The main problems of the sector are similar to those of other industries: insufficient number of professionals and the lack of a specialized educational system. Although many universities have advertising faculties, the quality of education leaves much to be desired. Recognizing the necessity for professional education in the industry, the BBDO Company in partnership with the British Design School has launched a new educational project – the Communication Academy Wordshop.

 

The Wordshop Academy was established on the basis of the Wordshop BBDO, a project aimed at helping young professionals to start a career in advertising. The project has been a major success and over the last 3 years more than 300 students have taken part in it, with many of them going on to work for some of the country’s key advertising agencies.

 

The Academy’s goals are more ambitious. We want to not only create a unique educational system, but also to form a future elite of professionals employed in the advertising and other media industries.

 

A particular problem of the advertising industry is, perhaps, that the advertising market grew very fast during the last decade (by 25 – 30% annually). This was too fast for the infrastructure to follow. This lead to a rocketing of careers and salaries of the employees in the advertising agencies , at times seemingly unconnected to their experience, knowledge and achievements and giving false hopes to others working in the industry.

 

A lack of healthy competition in the labor market caused comparatively low professional standards. I deeply regret that Russian advertising rarely wins international festivals.

 

Igor Luts,

Design

 

Serious research and work in the field of design started as early as the end of the 1950s. The leading role here belonged to the Decorative Arts in the USSR magazine, first published in 1957, and the All-Soviet Union Scientific Research Institute for Industrial Design, established in 1964 at VDNHk (Exhibition of Economic Achievements of the USSR). Methodological work by leading researchers at the Institute including O.I. Genisaretskii, G.P. Shedrovitskii, et al. have been internationally recognized (Theoretical and methodological Research in Design, 2004). Today this sector attracts political attention and much is expected from it regarding the competitiveness of Russian products.

 

First of all, a few words about the market. Object design in Russia follows the same path that the clothing market used to follow: at first one could choose between Turkish run-of-the-mill and outrageously expensive Valentino, then some average (to tell the truth, below average) trademarks appeared – but the choice is limited when compared to the world market and clothes are more expensive. A limited number of expensive concept shops, local designer shops (also expensive en mass) and T-shirts with pretty prints as basic original and non-expensive products entered the market.

 

Object design is shared by IKEA, local marginal producers of a non-expensive variety, a number of showrooms and shops presenting Italian designers, and a small number of high concept products and expensive names.

 

It is generally thought that there is not much demand for the designer products. Our magazines have, for several years, delivered a kind of fantasy environment of inaccessible stuff, sometimes offering a choice between the Armani casa and Krasny Kub (Red Cube).

 

I belong to the part of object design market which I believe to be the most viable – that is a non-expensive imported design and rare Russian goods which strive to be cheerful and positive. This segment tends to be humorously-oriented; a popular (but shrinking) object part of the Respublica network, showroom and internet shop «boomboomroom.ru» and its multiplying clones have offered non-expensive fun goods, and have succeeded.

 

Many designers selling their goods have adopted this style. They produce pillowcases with whimsical designs funny ice moulds, magnets, printed bags, etc. The most remarkable trend is the production of kitsch, which is sometimes sweet, sometimes horrible, but brings easy money. Unfortunately inside this trend there is another one – replication, and often simple plagiarism.

 

Many things in our internet shop (limitedunlimited.ru) have a flavor of humor, but we also address conceptual design. So far, it’s evident that the demand fluctuates from the desire to buy something funny and interesting to sound ideas. At the same time we see a kind of mistrust and reluctance to pay so much for designer goods. During the last “crisis” year, the demand for non-expensive products increased substantially.

 

The graphic design market is much more understandable and normal, as demand for web-sites, advertising, typography, corporate designs and logotypes has been formed and is growing. But this growth is extensive rather than qualitative, as the mass products are either old-fashioned or replicate western examples.

 

Major stakeholders – if we’re not listing simply good designers – seem to be conceptual rather than showing good financial results (although this happens sometimes).

 

In the field of graphic design there is Sergei Ivanovhich Serov - the President of the Golden Bee International Biennale of Graphic Design and the head of the High Academic School for Graphic Design. Sometimes he is accused of being old-fashioned and clannish, but he still leads the field

 

Artemiy Lebedev and his studio are either deeply loved or hated, but from my point of view they do two very important things – popularize and promote the notion of design and, moreover, produce and sell their own designs. Both activities require strength and determination, and others will be able to follow the pioneers.

 

Young creative agencies such as the Redkeds, Firma, Neil and others, are growing rapidly and adopting new working practices.

 

The SmirnovDesign Company (industrial design and researches) is a “true” industrial design firm, making dull but useful things, such as pins and columns. The studio also provides design consultations. If they are able to promote a wise and strategic approach to design this would be a major success, this is why their work is worth following.

 

The Zoloto (Gold) Company (formerly Ostengruppe) is probably the model of a star design bureau. Excellent graphic works and concepts of objects – furniture, utensils and toys – with distinct style.

 

Yaroslav Rassadin is a chief designer of the noted Marussia project, the first Russian sport car, as well as the author of numerous design concepts, one part of which has already being used by international companies and another is waiting for production far too long.

 

I can also mention Slava Saakyan, Roman Krikhely, Andrei Logvin and a number of others.

 

There is no particular need in associations and unions: regular customers, “jungle telegraph” and a few tenders provide enough work for designers and we do not need institutional frameworks. The number of participant for the Design and Advertising exhibition (launched in 1995) keeps going down: in 2003 there were 320 participants, in 2007 – 213, in 2009 - 114. In 2006 when Putin unexpectedly said that we need design for the economy development some activity have started: the Ministry of Trade and Economic Development had developed a concept, and the Astra Rossa Company and a designer Pirozhkov turned into “a bit of a star”. The last piece of news is planning a Design Center in Perm, but so far the project has not started and it’s too early to make judgments.

 

The British Higher School of Art and Design has become a major supplier of seminars and educational activities in the design sphere in general. Unfortunately, a normal work, “as there” (abroad) is a rare joy for Russian professionals.

 

The Design Act festival is so far the only one necessary and important here, though not at all revolutionary for the world. It’s an “assemblage point” of good and latest design. There is no almost any market, but there is a feeling that it’s emerging, as thousands of people come to the festival.

 

The main challenge of the sector is that it’s not an industry so far.  

 

The majority chooses to have production in China. But not everybody can afford it because of complex negotiations and necessity to order large lots. To produce in Russia is often an impossible task - new or well forgotten technologies, high percentage of wastage, low quality of materials and high prices. As a result many things become, contrary to the original plan, expensive and not large-scale, as they are produced by small, often manual businesses, of china, wood or metal. In the West the main customers of the design companies are industries, while in Russia designers struggle to persuade the companies’ managements of their usefulness. The State support in the form of compensation for designers’ costs to the companies is long under discussion, but as long as we have not seen it working it’s useless to talk about this.

 

Set aside traditional blames for old-fashioned methods and backwardness of most of educational institutions, their curricula do not reflect contemporary structure of the design industry.

 

Auto designers from the Urals State Architectural and Arts Academy or female students from the Stroganovka Art School assembling wooden stools have very week connection with reality during their education. They do not study production processes, do not work manually nor have workshops; therefore they’re unable to invent tangible projects. More often than not they neither have this opportunity afterwards. Anyone who would fancy calling oneself a graphic designer can do so. There are no standards for any of the specialties.

 

Lack of trust and understanding of design by the customers (clients or buyers) has two reasons: first, it’s a long-established complex of “real firms’ goods” – any foreign projects seem more attractive and its’ somehow a pity to pay the same amount of money to domestic designers; second, the role of a designer is not defined and varies from an artist to a technician doing what he had been told. Hence maestros and novices can be paid the same money for a project, and event absolute stars have to persuade customers to trust them in choosing fonts and colors. An established Russian custom not to pay for ideas is similar to unwillingness to pay for design (“why is this so expensive, this is just plastic?”). Absence of criteria accepted by designers themselves remains one of the reasons that the price of a project is still subject to an agreement. Of course, this is always so in principle, but there should be some mutually accepted external frameworks for designers or designer bureaus. Nothing similar to a designers’ labor union exists.  

 

Maria Privalova,

Partner of the LimitedUnlimited designer agency, Curator of the forum of the Design Act festival

 

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Architecture

 

While the pre-crisis architectural market was one of the fastest growing in the world, today it is declining sharply.

 

Spontaneity and irregularity are the characteristics of the Russian market which developed in the 1990s. Moscow, St Petersburg, Nizhny Novgorod and cities connected with the mining industry were its main activity points. The pre-crisis architectural market was lopsidedly oriented towards private capital while ignoring social problems. Making money at the expense of society.

 

Modern investment and real development business, which used to be of a speculative nature and added dynamism to architectural activities in the country, has almost vanished. State financing of project activities ground to a halt. The situation in the architectural project market is close to antibiosis.

 

I believe that the major stakeholders in the market are private project bureaus which appeared as an alternative to the gigantic project institutes of Soviet times. Through their early projects and participation in professional contests these bureaus have quickly established themselves in designing and constructing modern high-quality architecture and have taken leading positions in the market. Their major competitors were organizations and project bureaus with the right connections and channels to receive grants, permits and approval. Personification is one of the characteristics of market relations, when names and professional prestige of the leaders are more important for the customers than the ability to get all necessary approvals in no time. Among them are A. Bokov, A. Skokan, M. Khazanov, V. Plotkin, S. Skuratov, B. Levyant, Yu. Grigoryan, S. Kiselev, Ye. Pestov, M. Rerberg, N. Yavein, etc. Characteristically all of them are located in Moscow, St Petersburg and Nizhny Novgorod. It should be noted that the professional level of Russian architects is in line with the international mainstream, and they are in demand globally, if the playing field is level.

 

The Union of Architects of Russia (UAR) with its regional branches and the Union of Architects of Moscow (UAM) were the oldest professional unions blooming in the Soviet times. With the development of market relations they became less influential, but in crisis times showed signs of revival. The Unions become the center of gravity for the professionals, helping them to survive.  

 

A new form of self-regulating organization has recently been designed for framing, securing and protecting professional activities, assuming the role of the state in the Soviet times.

 

Independent non-commercial organizations, and the Center for Contemporary Architecture (C:CA), which I head, also promote “the architectural sector” to the international cultural and professional environment, presenting Russian architecture and its authors in exhibitions, lectures and most important international professional events.

 

In Soviet times the state was the sole customer and the distribution scheme of an order was transparent. An architect, working under directions “from above” in the form of government orders, cooperated with the government. Under market conditions customers have been decentralized and established relations have collapsed. Professional positions have shaken. The state authorities being primarily preoccupied with economy, business and management, do not understand the real role of the profession and do not use its potential in state policy. This is a serious mistake, as urban planning and strategies for territorial development are integral and very important parts of the policy.

 

Professional opinions are not taken into account in lawmaking and in approving principal documents for the legal framework of architectural and urban planning. Thus, the new Town-Planning Code of the RF envisages division of the territory of the RF into unattached separate fragments, which makes strategic planning impossible. The state task of defining a strategy for Russia’s sustainable development is relegated to putting into commercial practice the territorial resources of Russia.

 

A Law on Self-Regulation mechanically introduced into architectural and urban planning, widens the gap between architects and authorities and therefore weakens the professional positions of the guild. Substitution of professional contests by tenders, valuing not the best professional decisions, but purely economical or pragmatic components, add to the decline in architecture and its status.

The crisis aggravated the problems of the architectural profession and could lead to losing a whole generation of architects, who are now unemployed and will quickly “emigrate” to allied professions or abroad.

 

Irina Korobina,

PhD in Architecture, Director of the C:CA, correspondent member of the International Academy of Architecture, adviser to the Russian Academy of Architecture and Construction Sciences

 

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Cinema and Television

 

In the early 1990s the film industry and film distribution were in acute crisis and only started to overcome their problems in the 2000s - a number of commercially successful projects emerged and several films appeared on the international market. After the crisis of 2008, private film financing has practically vanished and the struggle for financial resources predetermined the split of the Union of Cinematographers in 2009. A serious problem for video and DVD production is the uncontrolled pirate market. Television is one of the oldest sub-sectors of creative industries in Russia. In Soviet times it was organized on industrial principles, then diversified, but in the 2000s, in spite of a great number of small and middle-sized companies, the monopoly of such giants as the Direction of ORT Information Programs and the Rossiya State Broadcasting company has been restored. A lack of competitiveness hampers the quality of TV programs which can only operate in the internal market.

 

The cinema market, along with many other Russian markets (save for the laundry powder market), is a little or quite (according to different estimates) lopsided. It is not at all balanced and thus outside effects (like a crisis) are tragically perceived or really depress some of its segments. The structure of today’s market is non-industrial, even though the cinema is an absolutely industrial sphere in the rest of the world. When the industry is properly structured, it has regulation and self-regulation mechanisms; each type of product maker has his own niche; the consumers’ market is well structured; influential and obligatory infrastructures and channels for international communication in the area exist. As for regulation mechanisms in the film industry – it can be state support for national non-commercial films and stimulation of film distribution oriented to the development of quality audience. We do not have these. The state often supports commercial projects which should be primarily objects of market self-regulation. One of the principal means of reproduction of quality European films is the established practice of co-productions, and production of multicultural and Europe- and American-oriented films. We neither have not foresee these, although some non-governmental agencies are making first attempts to join in this kind of activity. Influential expert (critical), educational (film education starts in elementary school, like in Great Britain, and professional education of European level), and distribution infrastructures are not established. And so on at all points. The structure of commercial film distribution of sorts is developed but not completed; alternative film distribution of quality non-commercial films does not exist. All these have caused the decline of Russian cinema, the haphazard and nonsystematic participation of our films in significant international festivals, re-invention of the film industry as a way to obtain grants and defraud the government. However, there is evidence that quality low-budget projects on contemporary life can produce a return rate comparable with the US film industry’s one. One producer of the Lubov-morkov’ epic has earned several million dollars of net (!) profit for the film and its sequel from distribution in Russia, sale of rights to many countries and DVD sale. Characteristically, the same producer, Renat Davlet’yarov, curates the third 2morrow film festival, made up by a filmmaker Ivan Dykhovichny and well-known in Europe as an art house films space. I can say that the infrastructure for festivals in Russia is gradually building up. Selectors from all major film festivals come to the Kinotavr festival which has been redesigned to European standards.

 

We will be able to tell something intelligible about the TV market in Russia only after a really extensive content offer would emerge with establishment of digital environment. Now we can talk about the monopoly of the big channels, “the big 3” – the 1st channel, Rossiya and NTV.

 

Substantial cashflows, (and this is not only advertising revenue), allow them to make high-quality and attractive programming. Simultaneously these channels gradually lose their audience (in the capital, as well as in the provinces). This audience, primarily young, capable, solvent and attractive for advertisers, switches over to either the Internet or niche formats or paid channels. Young people watch TV very selectively and rarely turn to the monopolists’ production. We have a complicated situation, as the basic audience of “the big 3” consists of middle-aged social losers, ageing women, etc.

 

The major stakeholders in TV market are the 1st channel, owning a large number of paid digital channels, and VGTRK, which has and will have new niche digital projects.

 

In the commercial high-budget Russian film market the absolute leaders are the 1st channel, Rossiya and TNT. STS made some attempts under A.Ye. Rodnyanskii. It is TV channels that are able to generate a substantial budget and organize promotion of film.

 

Independent producers involved in both commercial and non-commercial projects, such as Ruben Dishdishyan (the Central Partnership), Sergey Sel’yanov, Nikita Mikhalkov, Renat Davlet’yarov, Elena Yatsura, Ruman Borisevich, etc. follow them.

 

The immaturity of associations and unions is one of the central infrastructural problems of the film and TV industries. Professional guilds in cinema are gradually becoming active, i.e. guilds of producers, operators, non-fiction films and TV. The Union of Cinematographers, traditionally uniting actors and filmmakers, has been fully discredited, and long ago became useless to anyone apart from pensioners and fans of post-Soviet collective property. The Union might cease to exist at any moment. Almost no young filmmakers who participate in international festivals belong to the Union. As for television, there is only the TEFI Academy, which tries to maintain the professional expertise of TV products’ quality. But TEFI is also entangled in contradictions and has lost three major players – the VGTRK, NTV and TNT.  

 

Anatoly Golubovsky,

PhD in Art History, Senior Editor of the Strim-TV TV Company

 

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Literature and Publishing

 

This is the oldest sector originating from the most famous and popular form of Russian cultural heritage. When the iron curtain in literature was taken down and censorship lifted, the publishing sphere entered a renaissance era – most international bestsellers have appeared in Russian translations almost immediately. We do not, however, see the reverse process – international promotion of Russian literature.

 

According to the Russian Book Chamber statistics, in 2008 in Russia there 123,336 titles were published with a total number of 760.4m. copies, which exceeded the 2007 figures by 13.4% and 14.2% respectively. The volume of the Russian book market in 2008 reached, by different estimates, between $2.2 bn and $3.0 bn. According to official statistic , the publication of books and brochures since 2000 has increased by 75.5% by titles and 40.2% by number of copies with annual growth ratio 9.4% (titles) and 5.0%. The officials from the Rospechat (Federal Agency for Press and Mass Communications) suggest that the Russian publishing business is “a profitable and dynamic economic sector”.

 

Actually in the pre-crisis period the sector looked quite prosperous. Quantitative data (both in titles and in number of copies) grew, several book fairs were held annually and Russian publishers took active part in international fairs. For a number of years large non-core businesses invested in publishing and bookselling. A not very efficient, but representative, system of industrial organizations (the Russian Book Union, Book Guild, and Publishers Association of Russia) was set up. New leaders appeared in the market (the Eksmo, AST, Prosveshenie, Rosmen, Drofa, Azbuka-Atticus, and Olma-Media). Professional press existed, the state extensively promoted reading.

 

The financial crisis revealed the weakness of the book industry. It is quite possible that publishing suffered more than any other creative industry in Russia. In summer 2009 the book sales fell dramatically, by 20-30% compared to the previous year, by 50% in some regions. Cash returns from booksellers to publishers fell.

 

The crisis has emphasized the major problem in the Russian book industry – this is a seller’s market, not a publisher’s.

 

One of the key problems of the industry is both a lack of book stores and insufficient size of those that exist. In the regions there is one book store per 66,000 people, in Moscow, one per 20,700 people, in St Petersburg, one per 22,230, in Sverdlovsk region, one per 117,200, and in Voronezh region, one per 138,700. The average figure for Russia is 48,300 people per book store. As a comparison, in the USA there is one book store per 3,000 people, in China – one per 9,620, in Great Britain – one per 13,790. It should be noted that the above figures are one of the few factors that we can directly compare. Publishing in Russia is a non-transparent business, major publishing houses do not publicly reveal their incomes, sales volumes and ownership structure, so it’s difficult to say how the Russian book market looks internationally.  

 

Furthermore, the amount of space in bookshops is still lower than it used to be in the RSFSR before 1991, contrary to the fact that the number of published titles in 2008 exceeds the Soviet times number by 2.5 times. Only the very biggest stores (less than 50 in the whole country) are able to stock more than 70000 titles. Taking into account the unwillingness and unpreparedness of booksellers to deal with limited editions, “non-mass” and “non-format” literature, and with retail margins amounting to 200%, we can claim that book distribution is actually a barrier between publishers and readers. The most vulnerable group consists of small, specialized publishing houses. And in the bookselling economy a publisher doesn’t get any money until, the book is sold.

 

As for other problems in the industry, we should note its excessive centralization (the share of Moscow and St Petersburg-located publishing houses amounts to 70% by the number of titles and to more than 90% by the number of copies) and a lack of qualified staff (particularly of translators and book designers).

 

The future trends in Russian publishing business over next few years are related to the growing market for audio and digital books and the problem of copyright and pirated editions.

 

Mikhail Kaluzhsky,

Producer for special project of the Corpus publishing house

 

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Performing Arts

 

The majority of performing arts groups are state or municipally financed, and this has both advantages and disadvantages. At the same time the network of non-governmental theaters, conducting their own festivals, is expanding.

 

Modern performing arts include genres which have developed over the last 20 or 30 years, such as contemporary dance, contemporary circus, indie music – mainly post-rock, electro, etc., contemporary theater and live art. I personally have worked in the field of contemporary dance since 2000, but have had the chance to follow “neighboring” genres. I won’t talk about traditional performing arts, such as classic dance, academic theater, etc.

 

Modern performing arts had their first opportunity for development in the 1990s. This was mainly an ideological opportunity, and less concerned with the financial or infrastructural elements.

 

Some genres are still npticeably absent (contemporary circus and live art) or only exist in a downsized version (contemporary dance, indie music) supported by individual enthusiasts and private initiatives.

 

Russia has a rich post-Soviet heritage – classic ballet (essentially from the romantic period), dramatic theater (predominantly based on the Stanislavsky system), classic music, pop dance and traditional circus.

 

The creative process in the performing arts and presentation of the product is much more costly than in the visual arts. Quite a number of specialists take part in the staging of a play or the recording of an album, and this process also requires large premises. As a rule, ticket prices do not reimburse production expenses. This not a disadvantage, but a characteristic which should be taken into account.

 

In contrast with the visual arts, modern performing arts is unattractive for the business. If the price of a picture, sculpture or installation generally goes up with time, performing arts products are “perishable”. For this reason without special support, organizational and protection measures by the state, it’s hard to to be positive about the efficient development of this sector.

 

It’s premature to speak about the contemporary performing arts market as a well-formed phenomenon. There are just a few players in the field. It’s just possible to name private initiatives and projects, giving an informal and almost ephemeral picture of modern performing arts. After almost two decades of artistic freedom in Russia no infrastructure for contemporary performing arts, consisting of higher educational institutions, spaces for staging and performances, information centers, associations, etc., has been set up. We have to hope that Russian enthusiasts have enough energy, professionalism and finances to continue.

 

Elena Tupyseva,

Director of the TSEKH Dance Theaters Agency

 

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Visual Arts

 

The Russian arts boom in the late 1980s and early 1990s has brought to life dozens, even hundreds of galleries for visual arts. After the recession following this boom, when Western buyers had had their fill of Russian arts, their number decreased, leaving only the most successful and professional ones in operation. It is no coincidence that the Vinzavod creative cluster is primarily linked with modern art galleries – its organizers believe that sector to be the most competitive and promising in Russia both in the internal and external markets.

 

The Russian art-market emerged in the early 1990s and is now quite local and feeble. There are a couple of dozen potential buyers – collectors, and about the same number of sellers – gallery owners and art dealers. All operations revolve around two or three dozen top names – V. Dubossarsky and A. Vinogradov, O. Kulik, K. Zvezdochetov, S. Bratkov, V. Mamyshev-Monro, V. Koshlyakov and a few others. A short-term revitalisation of the market between 2004 and 2008, when modern art became fashionable and passed into the category of glamorous show-culture, was followed by another depression caused by overall economic problems in society.

 

The biggest stakeholders in the art-market are: E. Zakharov (Triumph Gallery), A. Salakhova (Aidan-Gallery), E. Selina (XL-Gallety), V. Ovcharenko (Ridgina Gallery), S. Popov (Popoffart), and V. Frolov & Co (former Partners Gallery) – the sellers. Among the buyers are V. and E. Semenikhin, I. Markin, M. Baybakova, D. Zhukova and R. Abramovich, V. Bondarenko and about 15 genuine collectors of modern arts.

 

Unfortunately, no functioning institutions, promoting the sector of contemporary visual arts, were set up after the breakup of the various Unions of Artists under perestroika. On one hand, the Union of Artists, Confederation of Artists Unions, Moscow Regional Union of Artists and the others still exist, but they have no actual influence over the artistic process. The artists call on them when it’s time to renew (not obtain!) a lease for a studio.

 

Real institutions stakeholders in the field of actual arts are the Vinzavod and private galleries on its territory, Garazh Center for Modern Culture, Multi-media Culture Center and its director O.Sviblova, Moscow Museum of Contemporary Arts, The State Center for Contemporary Arts with its limited state financing, and a few other private Moscow galleries.

 

In the regions the most notable player is the Perm Museum of Contemporary Arts headed by M. Gel’man.

 

Among the most acute problems facing the visual arts sector are:

 

 - the absence of a system (no system) for state financing of work by the artists (grant or other basis). The artworks are made by artists either at their own expense (if they have finances) or at the expenses of the gallery owners (if an artist has a good relationship with the gallery owner). For instance, for J.G. Martin’s exhibition at the 3rd Moscow Modern Arts Biennale the pieces by Russian artists were made at the expense of the M. & Yu. Gel’man Gallery (A. Osmolovsky, D. Gutov, A. Brodsky), Open Gallery (Kh. Sokol) or at the artists’ own expenses (Blue Noses Project by the artist B.U. Kashkin);

 

 - lack of grant (stipends) programmess to support artists. Only a couple of dozen Moscow artists can live on income from their works. All the rest have to work – they teach, write articles for websites, do graphic design or make advertisements, etc. As a result they do not have enough time or inner strength to pursue arts seriously and consistently. Most pieces are done for specific exhibition projects – practically on a by-order basis and in a short period of time;

 

- lack of a bid/ application system for independently curated projects. As an example we can name a wonderful project, the New Old Cold War, created as part of the III Moscow Biennale, which was lost against the background of other more expensive projects due to insufficient financing ($ 5,000);

 

 - sponsorship is distributed through personal links and for noted and attractive projects only.

 

Olga Lopukhova,

 

Ph.D. in history, curator, art manger, expert,

 

Executive Director of the “Qui Vive?” 2nd Moscow International Biennale for Young Art

 

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Multi-Media Arts

 

Countries with a high level of technology (the USA, Germany, the Netherlands, Japan) have witnessed the emergence of specialized institutions: media libraries, media centers, media laboratories and inter-disciplinary media institutes. They have become the basis for understanding media-technologies; for the creation, archiving and exhibiting of media arts. They prepare media programs for museums, festivals and permanent and temporary exhibitions of arts and technology, conduct festivals, exhibitions, workshops, symposiums, presentations of media projects and multi-media shows. For 15 years in Russia innovative multi-media promotion institutions, such as the New Media Art Lab, New Technologies Institute, Studio of Egocentric Peculiarities (not currently active), MediaArtLab Center for Culture and Arts, Cinefantom, and School for Photography and Multi-Media named after Rodchenko are all working actively, developing new projects and promoting multi-media.

 

Spaces and types of presentation have diversified: media festivals (the Media Forum at the Moscow International Film Festival has a 10 year history, Art Digital, Art&Programming, Pro&Contra, Cannes Film Festival, Pusto Festival), exhibitions (the V storonu ekrana, curators – Joseph Bakshtein and Victor Miziano; History of Video Arts, curator – Antonio Dzheuza; Arts as Premonition, curator – Dmitry Bulatov), the most recent museum expositions, using multimedia as a mean for thematic expositions development (the Chukotka Heritage Museum Center in Anadyr, Kalashnikov Museum in Izhevsk, Fridlands Gates Museum in Kaliningrad).

 

Unfortunately projects in Russia are often developed in spite of the situation. New media arts are still undervalued by critics and experts, this innovative platform is not always well received by specialists and creative projects (with do not have copyright) are commercially used without the approval of the creator.

 

Media arts technologies are at the same time both widening and limiting the means and forms of displaying creative projects. With modern techniques, video art is highly mobile and can be shown in different environments. Some of the media arts do not require special equipment or spaces for exhibition. The technologies themselves become this space: pirate TV and radio broadcasting projects use traditional channels of mass communications; the global space for net-art is geographically unlimited and interacts directly with the viewer. The same is true for software arts and art projects on CD.

 

Other types of media arts cannot be displayed outside of specifically prepared spaces because of architectural requirements, for technical and organizational reasons (video and multimedia installations, robototechnical performances), or due to other restrictions and environmental standards (bio-art and genetic arts), or because of the huge cost of creating multimedia art. In Russia the process is hindered by technological issues: Can we find a well-prepared specialist to satisfy all the requirements of the Reality-Engine 2, or for fitting displays to the heads or the whole garment Who knows what strength a cable should be to transform the required quantity of visual information into an art work? Which projector is bright enough to use in normal conditions?  

 

But there are no problems that cannot be solved. It would be useful to have more specialized institutions which do not sell expensive and often underdeveloped multimedia concepts on the back of their own interests, but are, instead, able to develop decisions necessary for the culture.

 

This “multimedia package” should be developed in collaboration with western multimedia laboratories, which are much more experienced in implementing complicated technological projects, as well as educating our artists and developing concepts together with leading designers from the multimedia industry.

 

One of the peculiarities of media art, using all multimedia possibilities, is its inter-disciplinarily nature. The history of new technological arts is based on collaboration between artists and technical professionals – leading to the setting up of inter-disciplinary arts unions.

 

The media culture synthesizes different aspects of the video and media arts: cinema, sound, theater, visual image, and text, as well as promoting cooperation between people of different professions. For specialists in various cultural spheres it’s very important to use all the available tools, including those provided by the media arts.

 

For me an indicator of this sphere being in demand is, first of all, the interest of different educational institutions in a “media culture” course of study, this includes advertising agencies (the BBDO), modern arts museums (The Moscow Museum of Contemporary Arts), design schools (The Academy of Communication), cultural centers (Garage), and universities of culture (the Moscow School for Social and Economic Sciences, Russian State University of Cinematography), etc. They all turn to media specialists, including MediaArtLab employees, to read courses, and achieve interesting results. Interdisciplinary projects in various areas are developed using different media, demonstrating not only a technological, but also a creative approach.

 

We can name as an example a project by Peter Greenaway, displayed at the Media Forum in June 2008 in the hall of the former Arma gas-holder factory, where the GazGallery creative cluster is located. The Tulse Luper Suitcases project is very problematic from distribution point of view, but Greenaway achieved brilliant success in related media. In this multimedia performance, attended by 4500 Muscovites, Greenaway used several types of media, both very old and respected, such as books, cinema, photography, and relatively new ones: video, TV, Internet and DVD.

 

Olga Shishko,

 

MediaArtLab Director

 

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Folk Arts and Decorative and Applied Arts

 

Folk art industrialization in Soviet times was very harmful for this sub-sector. In the early 1990s the market was on the rise due to the popularity of Russian art in the West. When we speak about Russian creative industries, especially in the regions, first of all we think about folk art and applied arts. But the real situation is far from a developed, civilized market. Below there are interviews with two experts, one of them working permanently in this area (Eugenia Linovich) and the other having a single, but typical experience (Marina Khrustaleva).

 

Today’s market of decorative folk art is limited to serving foreigners, mainly business people working in Russia and tourists.

 

Despite of the wide spectrum of possibilities in folk trades and arts (weaving, lace making, blacksmithing, woodcarving, ceramics, and different kinds of painting) no one would think of “serous” usage for decorative applied folk art. Their “applied” significance (their potential usage in everyday life) is quite nominal.

 

We think about folk art in Russia only when we have to choose a souvenir for a foreigner or, perhaps, when ordering business gifts. Incidentally, ordering matryoshka dolls from China would probably be cheaper given a large enough order.

 

The Decorative Folk Arts Association of Russia, headed by Gennady Drozhzhin, is trying to make the life of those involved in decorative folk arts easier today. The Association organizes professional exhibitions, initiates state subsidies and supporting programs for folk arts, including the opening of more than 30 shops in Moscow, children’s leisure centers with master classes and lectures, and a big wholesale and exhibition center – Russian Gift, representing more than 240 producers.  

 

Russian Gift, uniting many types of folk arts, has a wholesale function. The bestsellers are Khokhloma, Dymkov’s toys, and majolica, but mainly as souvenirs, not practical objects. Together with artists and designers we are trying to create collections of more practical and relevant objects for today’s customers, combining traditions and functionality.

 

Eugenia Linovich,

 

Development Director of the Russian Gift centers network, Moscow

 

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From my childhood my interest in beauty was of a distinctly applied nature. I always wanted to have a dress like Botticelli’s Primavera, but even the Uffizi Gallery does not, for unknown reasons, offer replicas, and in the research publications of my foreign colleagues I only managed to find the names of the flowers embroidered on the dress. In the Kirillov-Belozerskii Monastery and St Basil’s Cathedral I shocked the keepers by my frivolous suggestions of transferring mural decorations to home textiles, and in the Pushkin museum I froze before ancient glass and pre-Columbian ceramics. Few Russian museums, the New Jerusalem and Yasnaya Polyana among them, have enough courage to develop their own crafts using inspiration from their museum’s objects.

 

In the world of mass production and souvenirs a desire to be surrounded by handmade objects is very natural and nothing to be ashamed of. In the Soviet times, artistic galleries were a source for the arts’ intelligentsia. The Stoganovka, Abramtsevsloye and Khot’kovo produced a galaxy of talents closely aquainted with the with traditions and crafts technologies and educated with the spirit of artistic searching, leading to Abramtsevo and the Higher Art and Technical Institute.

 

In the mid-1990s, the system of arts centers, creative studios, annual symposia and pleniers vanished. Experts, especially in the regions, have lost their professional connections. Everyone struggled to find his place in any new market – souvenirs, interior design, or municipal – making “any old thing”, from fire places to fountains suited to every fancy. The influx of young talent into this sector dropped off considerably; as in many other educational spheres, the old teachers gradually went away and mastership gave way to the inventiveness of contemporary art.

 

It so happened that I had to interact with the world of decorative and applied arts. I had a chance to organize exhibitions and master classes in an unusual place for family leisure – in Sparrows’ Bird’s Park, founded in 2005 (www.birdspark.ru). In summer as many as 2,000 people visit the park daily; this figure exceeds the number of visitors to the majority of provincial museums. The souvenir shop within the Park is often overcrowded, but the products on offer are rather haphazard. Some of the goods are bought by the commercial department of the Park; some are brought by casual, one-off suppliers often stamping their souvenirs with the Park logo. This is fine with the Park administration, as the shop is quite profitable, but I wanted to turn this shop into an element of Park’s image, raising its artistic standards.

 

I wanted to position the Park as a place for respectable, informative, ecological and aesthetical leisure, and thus the shop’s stock should be in line with this image. I made up a database of dozens of the artists I knew of, making graphics, ceramics, batik, origami, glass, beads, felt, painted birdhouses and boomerangs. I suggested that they bring to the shop their works which were somehow related to the birds and many of them were very interested. But, alas, in practice I did not manage to achieve a sustainable result.

 

During the two summers of this creative experiment, the “modern crafts industry” demonstrated all of its weak points:

 

 - evidence shows that the souvenirs most in demand are those affordable to school children coming in groups, i.e. items which are sold for 50 to 100 roubles. We sell hundreds of these a day, child psychology making the whole group buy the same product as bought by the group’s leader. But the artists are not psychologically interested in making thousands of identical keyrings or whistles, despite a proven commercial result, thus this niche is occupied by producers from China. Expensive items (upwards of 1000 roubles) can sit in the shop all summer without a buyer;

 

 - many people come to the Park several times during the summer, they tell their acquaintances about it and boast of their purchases. But coming again, they are unable to buy the same thing, for a present, for instance, as most of the artists are unable to make identical items or even work on one theme. Their time is taken up with another theme, order or an unexpected trip for inspiration and, having established mutually beneficial contacts with the Park, they suddenly disappear and show up again at the end of the tourist season;

 

 - mass demand has peculiar but predictable tastes. For instance, in the Park’s shop the images of owls are always the first choice – in every form and at every price; then come eagles and other big carnivorous birds; far behind are parrots, peacocks and pelicans. The artists believe in the statistics, but put their trust in their talent, brushing aside the opportunity to produce goods with owls on.

 

As a result, rare designer items are lost in the massive run-of-the-mill stock. My intention to “refine” the shop and provide an opportunity for great artists has so far failed. Only the irritated catchphrase of visiting mothers: “Come out, we’re not buying anything here! These are the same things as in the zoo, circus and dolphinarium!” make me determined not to give up.

 

Believe me, there are many different things around us, we just do not have enough skills to sell them properly.

 

Marina Khrustaleva,

 

Art critic, Chair of the Board of the Moscow Society for Architectural Heritage Protection, coordinator of arts program of Sparrow Bird Park

 

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New Creative Spaces in Russia – Creative Clusters

 

Russia has not escaped the process of the closure of industrial and military premises warehouses and other spaces of the industrial era, and at the end of the 1990s our country entered the world-wide process of art-conversion. Enterprising people in Moscow, St Petersburg and other big cities have started looking for possibilities to use these premises to satisfy the public’s needs.  

 

The ProArte Modern Arts Institute was the first to occupy the curtain wall of the Peter and Paul Fortress. Then the National Center for Contemporary Art (NCCA) followed with a burst of ideas: the Cronprintz Fort in Kaliningrad, an electric-bulb factory in Moscow, and Arsenal in Nizhniy Novgorod. The Provianskiye Sklady (warehouses) were assigned to the Moscow City History Museum. All these are living proof of the method’s vitality, but dependent on the goodwill of a single, often a pro-governmental, institution.

 

The germs of a “civil” art-conversion first appeared as studios of separate artists in industrial premises (A. Petliura, K. Chelushkin) and temporary, although regular, events. St Petersburg took a leading position: in the Novaya Gollandiya, in the premises of the Karsnoye Zanmya knitting factory, build by Erich Mendelsohn, and in the Ziegel’s watch making factory the Emplacement international project occured three times; in Kronshtadt warehouses, land-art seminars of the Luna Nera group from London and their Russian friends took place several years in a row; in the forts of Kronshtadt the Fortdance raves – one of the most attractive musical events in Russia - were held nine times.

 

It’s quite natural that art-conversion is most pronounced in Moscow, the only Russian city which can be rightly called post-industrial. What are the peculiarities of Moscow artistic spaces and what separates them from the Western ones?

 

The Moscow clusters were established and exist without any support from the state. Most of them are totally private entrepreneurial initiatives of the premises owners. The PROEKT_FABRIKA Center for Creative Industries is a partial exception, as for the last several years it was supported by the Ford Foundation. In contrast with techno parks – centers for innovations in science - set up and developed with direct state support, today’s arts-related innovations rely exclusively on business and charity money. Clearly this should make not only the state authorities, but also cultural managers sit and think why cultural and arts programs are left on the periphery of state interests?

 

An important result of the Moscow creative clusters’ work is the regeneration of deserted spaces. There is nothing specific about it. The world’s experience in city development by means of culture and cultural industries is based on this important “cluster effect”. In Russia, however, with its generally non-systematic, if not corrupt, approach to cities development, the success of creative clusters looks even more impressive.

 

More on new artistic spaces in the “Imagination Factories or Cultural Conversion” research http://www.creativeindustries.ru/eng/analytics_russian/factories_of_imagination

 

The Flacon Design Plant is worth mentioning separately.

 

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The Flacon Design Plant (Moscow)

 

The Flacon Design Plant is a project based in the former premises of the Flacon: Moscow-Paris plant, which used to produce glass. The project encompasses a multifunctional center of modern creative industries in former industrial spaces. The premises are prepared for design-studios offices and clothes show-rooms, design workshops and mini laboratories, shops and exhibition centers.  

 

The project seeks not only to renovate the premises, but also to establish a close-knit community of professionals, interesting and promising people and companies for collective promotion of innovations in design, fashion and industry. As a result the territory of the Flacon Design Plant should start working as a creative cluster representing multiple approaches to arts and business and the creative production of goods and services.

 

The project has started only recently, but a number of key teams have already joined it – the FIRMA design studio, CASA creative bureau, Askar Ramsamov – an architect and one of the founders of the Theories and Practices project, as well as a few other companies and personalities.

 

The renovation of the old plant’s premises is being carried out step by step. In 2010 the central building (6,000 m2) shall be ready for offices and loft workshops. In cooperation with the Archelp architect bureau a front line of one and two storey buildings will be restored for show-rooms and shops. Very soon an architectural competition to redesign a former production building with the area of 3,000 m2 will be held, and various architectural bureau and interior studios will be located there. The building also has a non-standard hall with ceiling height of 14 m for installations, photo and video filming.

 

In late October 2009 the first “smart” space for exhibitions, presentations, lectures, seminars and parties in the Flacon was opened in collaboration with Askar Ramsamov. It has an area of 400 m2, ceiling height of 4 – 7 m and an adjoining car park. Here we plan to unite resources, interests and innovative ideas of all project participants and partners.

 

Anna Maniuk

 

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In Moscow, unlike in the regions, gallery businesses and independent centers like the one described above are quickly developing. But nevertheless the Moscow “cluster” movement could not go unnoticed in the regions, primarily in St Petersburg – a Russian pioneer in mastering creative industry technologies. As early as 1989 a well-known art center was established – Pushkinskaya, 10. The Etazhi loft project is no less famous and there are a number of other initiatives. Unfortunately, in other Russian cities such examples are the exception rather than the rule. The more interesting is an example of the Zavod (plant) creative cluster in Pskov. Dynamism and a great interest in the development of new cultural spaces make it safe to predict that some Russian cities will soon witness the appearance of new creative clusters.

 

Projects on the creative development of industrial heritage are starting to emerge in small towns as well. There the factories used to be local economic mainstays and their red-brick buildings occupy large parts of the cities’ historical centers. There have been plans to develop such projects as the Tram-museum in Noginsk – the Russian Manchester; Town Center – “the craftsmen town” at the brick plant in Mozhaisk; new exposition of the Ramensky museum in a former textile factory; Petropavlovskaya Sloboda at the Big Manufactory in Yaroslavl. I’d like to wish these projects every success.

 

Creative industries and clusters today are mainly supported by private investors. This sector, related to “production of meanings” important for the country, is an engine for the innovative economy. But to develop the sector one should count not only on private, Russian or foreign investments. In today’s world it has become profitable to invest in the education of computer programmers, actors and designers. But to make the creative sector competitive and attractive for investors the state, regional, city and municipal authorities should support them, give them development incentives, primarily financial. Foreign companies are mostly interested in supporting existing potential. Failing to establish and create it, we are bound to keep exploiting natural resources and exporting cheap labor.

 

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Researches on Art-conversion

 

Several groups are engaged in research into the creative development of former industrial spaces. Among them are MARS – The Moscow Union for Architectural Heritage Protection (headed by M. Khruslateva, the New Life project since 2004), P-Arch Agency (headed by A. Zemul, Freedom of Access and PromoProm projects, since 2006, Creative Industries Agency (headed by Elena Zelentsova, since 2008).

 

In the fall of 2005, as part of Culture Plus, the First Moscow International Forum the Moscow Union for Architectural Heritage Protection (MARS) prepared the Light Industry exhibition and the Creative Industries Investments: Long-term Effect from Industrial Architecture Conversion round table. The exhibition showed graphic works by Kirill Chelushkin and a photo album prepared by the MARS: the best examples from around the world of conversion of industrial and military buildings into cultural centers; successful conversion examples; and projects still to be implemented. The last display marked “SOS” displayed a number of Moscow historical industrial complexes doomed to be demolished or reconstructed – candidates for thoughtful conversion with the participation of authorities, businesses, architects and “new life” concept developers.

 

At the end of May 2007 within the frameworks of the ArchMoskva International Exhibition of architecture and design, the P-Arch agency held a roundtable To Live, Work And Rest In A Plant. Conversion Of Industrial Buildings In Russian Environment. The roundtable was a result of the PromoProm project; it was complemented by four tours to former plants and factories showing different conversion strategies. There were tours to the Yandex Company headquarters, Novospassky Dvor business quarter, LeFort business center and Red October factory. Architects, developers and project customers acted as tour guides, these tours have become regular since then.

 

In 2008 the Creative Industries agency prepared a research paper, Imagination Factories or Cultural Conversion. New Creative Spaces in Russia (Zelentsova, Gladkeekh, 2008), and in October 2008 the PROEKT_FABRIKA Center for Creative Industries and Garage Center for Modern Culture held an international conference Imagination Factories: New Cultural Territories. European and Russian Experience of Conversion of Industrial Spaces into Centers for Modern Culture and Arts, presenting major Russian conversion projects.

 

Marina Khrustaleva

 

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Current Problems and Difficulties

 

We can say that the subject of “creative industries and city development” has become fashionable. In recent years, the authorities of a number of Russian cities and regions have made clear their intention to initiate programs for creative industries development. Dozens of seminars have been held; regional organizations dedicated to developing cultural industries have been established. But it’s too early to talk about major or, rather, strategic steps towards Russian “creative cities”.

Russia has entered its post-industrial era later than other European cities. Today only Moscow and St Petersburg can be called cities with distinctive features of post-industrialism. It is not surprising that creative industries are concentrated mostly in these two metropolises. Other major cities still bear many more features of an industrial era. Declining production is replaced with other realties. For example, in Ivanovo, a former textile factory has been converted into a trade center with a bowling alley, cinema and sports facilities, not a creative cluster or multi-media center, as if would be in a European town.

 

The world’s creative competition is very strong. The design sector is one of the most powerful and financially sustainable of creative industries. But apart from Vladimir Pirozhkov, who developed the design of the Citroen car and worked for the Toyota design center in Nice, we cannot boast of any key figures in the sector. In advertising, Russian agencies lose competitions to their foreign colleagues even if the contest is for the advertising campaign of a Russian firm. The most ambitious architectural project in Moscow – the Rossiya tower, now on hold for an indefinite period of time because of the crisis, was about to be developed by Norman Foster’s British architectural bureau.  

 

But a way to the world markets begins with domestic locus. It’s very fashionable now to talk about local identity and the incorporation of local cultures into a global context. These are creative industries that produce goods on the basis of a region’s distinctive features – resources, traditions, history, culture and creative abilities, but taking into account world trends and quite often orientated towards the global market. This includes work both on a local level (local authorities, local population – clients, consumers) and process management using international networks and organizations. Unfortunately it’s quite problematic to find any creative “made in Russia” products either on a global or on a local level.

 

Another difficulty of working with creative industries on all levels (political, social, etc.) in Russia is insufficient consumer market saturation, underdevelopment of the service sector and a low level of demand for cultural products. Russian regions are just entering the zone where the “economics of feelings” becomes of importance.

 

Creative industries are primarily small and medium-sized industries. Business freedom is one of the key factors for the development of creative industries. As for Russia, both experts and political figures accept that freedom of business, especially small and medium-sized, has a long way to go. This is true for traditional types of business as well as for those involved in innovations and creativity. The ongoing process of economy “governmentalization” has affected creative industries. For example most of the performing arts organizations today are state funded institutions, in TV the majority of the market is owned by the state, and the number of independent publications, broadcasting companies, etc. is declining.

 

Another acute problem is infringement of copyright legislation in Russia. One of the key tasks of creative industry management is copyright protection (licensing, patents, etc.).

 

Yana Rudkovakaya, producer of the Eurovision-2008 winner Dima Bilan, says:

 

“How can we issue albums knowing that 80% of the market is pirate? If I come to the Nastroyenie shop in St Petersburg and see all the discs, but no legal ones? I take a disk “Bilan. Best” and it has everything by Bilan – from his former life, from his present life and even songs just recordered but not yet published. It’s for sale already… I buy it, take a receipt, with witnesses, film everything and bring to the relevant authorities. And they tell me: “You know, the Nastroyenie shop is related to very serious people in St Petersburg. That is why we are closing the case and you have to deal with this”. I can give you as many examples as you want, it’s everywhere”. (Gladkeeh, 2009).

 

On the other hand, the fourth part of the Civil Code of the RF adopted in 2008, which is formally one of the toughest legislative acts on copyright in the world, reduced the possibilities of small and medium-sized businesses to work with copyrighted products. The fourth part of the Civil Code of the RF gives all rights to the author, not taking into account the rights of consumers. In particular, these legislative changes affected libraries for the blind, preventing them from ordering audio books.

 

Being innovative for Russia, creative industries development is linked to a number of problems and shortfalls. There is not enough understanding of the importance of the creative industries for the country’s culture and economy growth. One of the reasons for this is a weak theoretical base – the creative industries issue has never come up before in tests on contemporary culture and management. Many creative industries have been working successfully in Russia for a long time. But as a rule their managers are not conscious of the specifics of their work, of their possible role and the place of the industries in the economy and city development. Admittedly this problem applies to other counties as well. Professional practitioners in this sphere have not appeared until recent years.

 

Russian initiators of creative industry development programmes have to work on all the lines simultaneously – to conduct researches, explain the nature of the phenomenon, educate professionals, form the cohort of Russian experts, and work through the legislation and taxation bases.

 

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Economic and Legislative Basis for Creative Industries in Russia

 

Creative industries are mainly represented by small and medium-sized enterprises, the share of which in Russia is estimated at 13-17%, while in the USA their share is 50-60%, in China – 55%, in the EU countries – up to 70% and in Canada – 90%.

 

It is possible to evaluate a sector’s development by its share in the country’s economy. In economically developed countries the percentage of small businesses is up to 80% of the GDP. We can judge small business input into the Russian economy by indirect data only (about 15-17% of the GDP), as official statistics (Rosstat, 2009) do not take into account micro-business data. A micro-business is an enterprise with a turnover of up to RUB 60 mln and no more than 15 employees, and can can be classified in the following ways: individual entrepreneur, consumers’ cooperative(a type of NGO) and commercial organizations (with the exception of governmental and municipal unitary enterprises).

 

One can think that the small business sector is underdeveloped because of a lack of legal regulations. It’s true that the federal legislation for small and medium-sized business was not formed until recently: the Law “On the Development of Small and Medium-Sized Businesses in the Russian Federation” (of 24 July 2007 # 209-ФЗ) came into force in 2008. The law defined the subjects of small and medium-sized businesses and supporting infrastructure, as well as the forms and types of support. The law envisages the following measures for small and medium-size business support and development: special taxation, simplified rules of accounting and tax registration, simplified tax declaration forms, privileged modes of settlement for privatized state and municipal property. The law also provides financial support measures for small businesses: tender grants from the government, confessional loans, state guarantees, and obligatory state order placement with small businesses. Additional benefits can be granted by RF subjects, such as on rental of non-residential premises, on providing small businesses with leases for equipment and transport, beneficial Internet access, advertising and information notes, and benefits in online education. But most of these benefits were already in place before the law was passed. Unfortunately, the for-profit NGOs are so far unable to get these benefits.  

 

Another important law for the small business development is the Federal Law of 26 December 2008 # 294- ФЗ “On Protection of the Rights of Legal Entities and Individual Entrepreneurs while Conducting State and Municipal Control (Oversight)”, which came into force in July 2009. The law limits the number of audits by regulatory bodies to one in three years and prohibits simultaneous auditing by different bodies. Moreover, the audit plan has to be published in November of the previous year.

 

It seems that existing legal and economic preferences for the small business should have triggered an outbreak of entrepreneurial activities and rapid development of the sector. But this is not true and the entrepreneurs unanimously say that the measures are insufficient (in particular concerning taxation) and it’s impossible to use these existing benefits because of a shortage of resources (premises for lease, land etc) on one hand and a huge number of those wanting to use the resources on the other hand.

 

Existence of a well worked-out legislative base for the economic instruments of small business support and development is of the utmost importance, but is still not sufficient. The Opora Rossii All-Russian Public Organization of Small and Medium-Sized Businesses conducted research on small and medium-sized entrepreneurship in 2007-2008. More than 5,500 respondents from 40 different Russian regions took part in the poll. The rating of obstacles for small and medium-sized business development (taxation and tax administration was not included) was the following:

 

- lack of qualified staff in the job market;

 

- lack of financial resources (limited budgets, high credit interest rates, high deposit rates – up to 100% of the credit amount, long crediting procedures); and

 

- actions of regulatory bodies.

 

And if it’s possible to legally limit the activities of regulatory bodies, no law, however perfect, can increase the number of qualified personnel in the job market or widen access to financial resources for the small businesses as long as the Russian economy develops by means of the raw material sector.

 

Elena Melville

 

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Territorial agencies for cultural industries development have a special role. The activities of these organizations should be supported by independent professionals forming a creative environment of the cities, non-commercial non-governmental organizations, and small and medium-sized businesses. Their task is to promote entrepreneurship in cultural and artistic spheres. Their activities include information, educational programs and consulting, development of professional networks and inter-network interactions within the creative industries sector, as well as promotion of partnership and business collaboration of cultural industries representatives with other subjects of the modern socio-cultural and economic environment.

 

 

Appeals for preservation of the national cultural heritage are basically appeals for conservation of the way of life bearing many problems and ills of a modern society – social inactivity, corruption and nihilism. Desire to insulate from international experience, closeness against other cultures, languages and life priorities, are dangerous tendencies hampering, among other things, development of culture and cultural sciences. In the global world and global economy such cultural isolation does not lead to cultural identity, but causes cultural phenomena which can be used inside the country only and leading to a dead end.

 

As cultural events are rare, young people tend to turn to international cultural products – cinema, music, fashion, sometimes literature and visual art. Russia in spite of being a country with a great creative potential, has become very slow in “production of its own meanings”, in development of modern cultural standards reflecting aspirations of people living here.

 

At the same time, culture has not yet been recognized by the state as a key issue. The state monopoly of the cultural heritage and the wide network of state cultural institutions seem to be a sufficient and unshakable force to ensure cultural preservation and development. Meanwhile independent artists, galleries, nongovernmental theaters, clubs, magazines, blogs and network societies influence a modern “cultural map”, and become real not nominal notional institutions. That particular societies and institutions become creative industries or a breeding ground for development of cultural entrepreneurship.

 

In the long view the state policy which includes support for the key priorities of the creative industries can become an important source for establishing a modern post-industrial society in Russia.