Beyond the Golden Age

2007 seems a simpler time in hindsight. The Global Financial Crisis seems to mark a clear turn, whether it began that summer or at any number of earlier signs ignored. In the long tail of the Great Recession and political fallout that continues more than a decade later, the effects are still being tallied and felt. In popular dramatisations and documentaries, there is a predictable focus on the big- shorting wolves of Wall Street, with less scope for wider, more complicated cultural shifts. In these retellings, the dot- com bubble around the millennium's turn was followed by a sunny period of growth, ostensibly regaining the stability of the 1990s, while actually feeding a new frenzy of speculation around sub- prime mortgages. In August 2007, a run on the UK bank Northern Rock and the lowering of the US Federal Reserve interest rate, which had been rising since 2003, were the first harbingers for those of us outside trading circles of the worldwide economic crisis to come.

In the story of the Great Recession, the fate of arts funding is often overshadowed by more urgent crises in social services, healthcare, and other support structures. When it is discussed, there is often a sense of cultural production at the mercy of global finances. In March 2007, UK prime minister Tony Blair delivered a speech in the Turbine Hall of London's Tate Modern, suggesting that ‘the last ten years’ might be seen as a ‘golden age’ for the arts, thanks to his government's cultural investments. With prophetic irony, he addressed concerns by those who might be ‘nervous that the golden era may be about to end’, amid worries about an upcoming spending review or the cost of civic projects like the 2012 London Olympics. ‘All of us in government take great pride in what has been achieved this past decade’, he assured the artists, patrons, and journalists present. ‘We have avoided boom and bust in the economy. We don't intend to resume it in arts and culture.’

Two months later, Blair announced his resignation, precipitating a period of national turmoil that continues in the Brexit crisis.