The Globe and Mail

In 2008, B.C. Premier Gordon Campbell presented Vancouver Moving Theatre’s Terry Hunter and Savannah Walling with an award recognizing their work for the arts in the Downtown Eastside. A year later, the Campbell government eliminated their annual gaming grant, cutting $45,000 from the tiny company, amounting to a 20 per cent budget cut overall. As a result, the two, who run the company out of their home, are considering scaling back the annual Heart of the City Festival that helped them win the award, possibly cutting it from 12 days to five.

“This has really pulled the rug up from under our feet,” says Hunter, whose company has been based in the Downtown Eastside since 1983. “The challenge for us right now is how are we going to make a living and keep on doing the work?”

Since August, arts groups across the province have been in a fight for their lives, recovering from the shock of a one-two punch from the provincial government: First, gaming grants were cut. Then funding for the B.C. Arts Council was slashed from $19.5-million in 2008/09 to a projected $2.2-million by 2011-2012, according to the service plan presented in last year’s budget.

When the province brings down its new budget tomorrow, the arts community will be watching closely.

“I hope that they have found a way to make this right,” says Vancouver Opera’s general director James Wright. “I think everybody in the arts community understands that we all have to sacrifice a bit … but we don’t understand the extreme cuts. If those hold, there’s going to be organizations in great, great peril all over the province.”

The cuts have already had an effect. The historic Pitt Gallery in Vancouver shut its doors and borrowed space elsewhere. The Nelson and District Arts Council lost its one staff member. Programming has been cut. Patrons are being urged – sometimes begged – to donate.

In November, the bipartisan Standing Committee on Finance urged the government to restore funding to 2008-09 levels.

“I’m hoping that they’ve taken [that] advice,” says Amir Ali Alibhai, executive director of the Alliance for Arts and Culture – which is planning to reduce its hours, due to the cuts. “I’m not expecting that there’ll be that 90 per cent cut that was shown in the service plan. I believe there will be some [restoration].”

The Finance Committee recommendation followed a fierce campaign waged by the arts community. There were protests. People wore grey and were asked to replace their Facebook profile pictures with a grey square: a depiction of a world without the arts. A website was launched featuring artists such as Margaret Atwood and Douglas Coupland offering their thoughts.

“I just didn’t think I could live with myself if I didn’t do anything,” says Lindsay Brown, one of the people behind the Stop BC Arts Cuts website, and a board member of a gallery that lost its gaming grant.

The site now features a video of Montreal-based artist Rafael Lozano-Hemmer, whose light installation Vectorial Elevation was brought to Vancouver for the Cultural Olympiad, calling his own project “obscene” in light of the arts cuts.

The juxtaposition between the provincial cuts and the well-funded Olympics and Cultural Olympiad has some artists shaking their heads, while it has given others hope.

“We’ve seen what happens to our community when there’s cultural activity going on,” says Alibhai. “Hopefully that doesn’t go unnoticed by those making the decisions.”