Resource allocation for "the arts" post-capitalism

[Fawkes]

How would it work? Sure, resources will be distributed in a more egalitarian fashion and production will increase, but these things will nonetheless always be finite. How is it going to be decided on who gets resources for what particular artistic endeavors?

Although this is applicable to all artistic mediums, I'll focus on film because it is, generally speaking, the most expensive of readily used formats. So, if someone(s) wants to make a movie, how would they go about securing the resources necessary to do it?

I mean, it's easy to say that they could just pitch their ideas to some community council or whatever and the best ones will be decided upon, but that wouldn't work. Film is a multimedia art form that, more so than any other, is incapable of being expressed in terms other than its own. In other words, you can write the most detailed screenplay ever, but that doesn't even come remotely close to the final movie. Also, you could make the most detailed storyboard possible, but a 2 hour movie is composed of roughly 172,800 still images, there's just no way to replicate it. So, if its impossible for an accurate depiction of the filmmakers' vision to be stated, then resources can't really be allocated on that basis.

Another option would be to have it just be a lottery. While that is a "fairer" method, what's to stop immense resources being put toward (wasted on) another Transformers just because some car chase and explosion junky won the lottery?

Any ideas?

[Lunatic Concept]

Well due to the increased production and distribution of goods post-capitalism, we would simply have to work shorter hours- so have more time for such things. Im not sure how relevant this is but in the words of Robert Tressal:
"For every one labour-saving machine in use today, we
will, if necessary, employ a thousand machines! and consequently there will be produced such a stupendous,
enormous, prodigious, overwhelming abundance of everything that soon the Community will be faced once
more with the serious problem of OVER-PRODUCTION.
`To deal with this, it will be necessary to reduce the hours of our workers to four or five hours a day... All
young people will be allowed to continue at public schools and universities and will not be required to take
any part in the work or the nation until they are twenty-one years of age. At the age of forty-five, everyone
will be allowed to retire from the State service on full pay... All these will be able to spend the rest of their
days according to their own inclinations; some will settle down quietly at home, and amuse themselves in the
same ways as people of wealth and leisure do at the present day - with some hobby, or by taking part in the

organization of social functions, such as balls, parties, entertainments, the organization of Public Games and
Athletic Tournaments, Races and all kinds of sports.
`Some will prefer to continue in the service of the State. Actors, artists, sculptors, musicians and others will
go on working for their own pleasure and honour... Some will devote their leisure to science, art, or literature.
Others will prefer to travel on the State steamships to different parts of the world to see for themselves all
those things of which most of us have now but a dim and vague conception. The wonders of India and Egypt,
the glories of Rome, the artistic treasures of the continent and the sublime scenery of other lands.
`Thus - for the first time in the history of humanity - the benefits and pleasures conferred upon mankind by
science and civilization will be enjoyed equally by all, upon the one condition, that they shall do their share of
the work, that is necessary in order to, make all these things possible."

[graymouser]

Film can be viewed as a series of interlocking craft professions. Like any craft, I think what you'd need to do would be to have it run by the workers' councils associated with that particular industry, in coordination to the higher body of councils that is planning the whole complicated state production. So the film industry would be represented by councils which would collaborate with the planning group to figure out what kinds of films need to be made, and work would devolve from there onto the screenwriters, directors, actors, designers, and the technicians (lighting, sound, effects etc) that are necessary for such an enterprise.

The real catch would be how they'd figure out which screenplays they wanted to produce. I'd imagine that the screenwriters would have their own council, and in coordination with the council in charge of the film industry would put forward a number of screenplays that they feel are worth producing. Some could be put forward even for a plebiscite - why not just poll the people about what they want to see? Others could be chosen by the councils. The key would be thoroughgoing democracy while still having some control by the councils, so not just any guy off the street could be in the screenwriters' council and draw a wage from it.

[blake 3:17]

I'm wary of too many commitees deciding on what kind of art is produced and distributed.

Simple and obvious solutions would be a rapid expansion of collective studios, free education for the arts (both for producers and consumers), and an expansion of museums and libraries. Grants for artists of all types should be expanded organized by arms length granting bodies.

I haven't thought through it very much, but some market like decision making bodies could make sense in a non-market world. A few friends have done things via Kickstarter which I think is quite useful and non-bureaucratic.

[Kotze]

As I already said (http://www.revleft.com/vb/showpost.php?p=1992658&postcount=5), the alternative is that the stuff is paid for by the public and the widespread copying is made legal. This also makes it easier for the hobby enthusiasts who want to do translations, update software, remix music etc. (...) The financing of film, text, audio, software will be done by the public, project pitches will be made to juries sampled from society (society as a whole as well as specific subsets, like youth) and these juries (with former winners taking an advisory role) will decide which projects to finance. The voting will be proportional, which means that minorities will get to finance some projects, too.
I mean, it's easy to say that they could just pitch their ideas to some community council or whatever and the best ones will be decided upon, but that wouldn't work.Why wouldn't that work? Oh, there he goes:
Film is a multimedia art form that, more so than any other, is incapable of being expressed in terms other than its own.I think there would be more truthiness to it if you said that about video games, but go on.
In other words, you can write the most detailed screenplay ever, but that doesn't even come remotely close to the final movie. Also, you could make the most detailed storyboard possible, but a 2 hour movie is composed of roughly 172,800 still images, there's just no way to replicate it. So, if its impossible for an accurate depiction of the filmmakers' vision to be stated, then resources can't really be allocated on that basis.There's basically always a gap between the first sketch and the final thing, not just with movies. There are often some not so nice surprises when you compare the vision of some "genius" architect with the flawed engineering of the concrete thing, like with Frank Lloyd Wright's Fallingwater, yet houses exist. There are basically always assumptions about common behaviour not stated in contracts and also some unforeseen situations that happen, yet contracts continue to exist.

That statement with 172800 stills is particularly stupid, as if some special-snowflake übermenschen start to make a movie out of nothing, because they just can't communicate their grand vision to you sheeple. Do you believe that when Spielberg and friends made Jurassic Park they made the expensive computer animation according to somebody's ultra-precise (yet somehow non-communicable lol) vision, without any approximation before to get a better idea of what works? What they did, of course, was that they checked out various ideas for scenes with old-fashioned and much cheaper stop-motion. Do you believe when Disney makes an animated feature that they don't use sketches, that they instead start with perfectly animating the first second, than the next second and so on? They have of course several steps of approximation. They do rough animated sketches to get a better impression of what will work before they draw every detail. So when an investor, whether private or public, comes along, artists have ways to demonstrate their skills without showing a completed 2 hour movie.

Visions aren't just imprecisely communicated, they are imprecise, and they get successively more precise through working with the material, and so does the communication of those working on it. Stuff getting financed before it is complete is not exactly uncommon. Those financing it need a bit of imagination and those pitching it need some sketches/mockups/prototypes. Movies aren't that special, what comes out of basic research is much less predictable.
I haven't thought through it very much, but some market like decision making bodies could make sense in a non-market world.When I buy ice cream, I have ice cream, not you. When it comes to the production of stuff that can be copied at virtually no cost, you can have market-like mechanisms by introducing copy restrictions, artificial scarcity. If there are no copy restrictions and stuff is made based on donations, that's not a very market-like mechanism. If copy restrictions are a no-no (and to me, they are), it's a bit problematic to entirely rely on donations becauses of the free-rider problem. Besides, if you want that everybody is able to support a movie in a less involved way than as unpaid actors or whatever, how could that happen in a world without capitalist relations? If you do not want that individuals are able to hire, how can you prevent it while still allowing individuals to donate money to other individuals? In a world where individuals can't hire labour, having professional artists — that is, people who concentrate on that work and get paid for it in labour vouchers and don't have to beg for money like hobos — needs something a bit more bureaucratic than Kickstarter.

In general, to prevent that Capitalism comes back, individuals can't be allowed to transfer their electronic buying points to other individuals, the only allowed donation from individual to individual — aside from maybe a minuscule exception in your electronic account for occasions like when you have the trots and ask your neighbour to go buy you something — can be in the form of concrete involvement.

[blake 3:17]

I think you are to something. A bit more detail please.

[Robocommie]

Something I have always been in favor of for these kinds of things is the idea of community access societies, or clubs. Essentially, if you want to be a film-maker, you join one of these communal organizations which would corporatively own the production equipment, the cameras, the stage lighting, the boom mikes, film stock, etc. Anybody could be a member of these organizations, it'd be like signing up for a library card, and like a library loans out books, this group would loan out equipment for a certain amount of time.

Anybody could then be a film-maker. Or a musician. Or a painter. There would be kilns that anybody could use to fire pottery, there would be metal shops for anyone who wants to do something with welding, you name it. And those individuals who are simply more talented or skilled with naturally gain notoriety.

The workers collectives that run theaters will decide what films they want to screen based on whats good or whats interesting, community art galleries can decide what they want to put on display, so on and so forth.

[Kronsteen]

With the elimination (or just weakening) of the distinction between alienated and unalienated labour, the conceptual distinctions between 'work', 'hobby' and 'art' might break down.

The idea of gaining self-expression or fulfilment from one's job is pretty much an absurdity under capitalism. But afterwards?

[psgchisolm]

What about musicians? Like orchestra/symphony/philharmonic players. Like trombone players per say. Would they get the most resources?:thumbup:

[caramelpence]

The most remarkable thing about the art that came out of the Russian Revolution - cubism, new forms of musical expression such as orchestras playing without conductors and factory sirens being used as part of musical performances, avant-garde literature - is that, looking at it, listening to it, you know it was only possible because there had been incredible social and political transformations in Russian society. The point is, human beings change through the experience of struggle and collective liberation. I am generally hesitant about drawing up institutional guidelines for the future and this is especially true of what we currently consider art, because, based on past revolutionary experiences, the changes that occur in human psychology and social relations as part of any revolution are such that it is difficult and even dangerous to make detailed plans about how we will handle art - and whether art will exist as a recognizable and distinct kind of activity - in the future.

If there is a need to make projections, then I would love art to be integrated into other spheres of life (our housing complexes and workplaces should be placed of beauty and artistic expression) and resources should be open to all so that artistic creation and expression is maximized. I'm thinking of widespread facilities that have the best in artistic resources and can serve as spaces for individual and collaborative projects of all kinds.

[Jose Gracchus]

How should I know? Something for workers to decide via self-management.

[eyedrop]

I hope that full-time artists are eradicated, part time artist are generally cool folks, but "professional" artists are the most stuck up and arrogant specimen of the human race ever produced. Especially towards people who work for a living.

[blake 3:17]

The most remarkable thing about the art that came out of the Russian Revolution - cubism, new forms of musical expression such as orchestras playing without conductors and factory sirens being used as part of musical performances, avant-garde literature - is that, looking at it, listening to it, you know it was only possible because there had been incredible social and political transformations in Russian society.

I'm sympathetic to the bulk of your post but for historical accuracy, Cubism wasn't Russian and predated the revolution (and the First World War!) and other forms of literary, artistic and musical avant garde forms predated the revolution too. The most anarchic came out of opposition to the War, while certain others -- most especially Italian Futurism -- were pro-War and proto-fascist. Russian Futurism was quite left wing.

I'd recommend Peter Berger's Theory of the Avant Garde and a fine response to it, Fascist Modernism by Andrew Hewitt. Berger's basic thesis is that the avant garde was a project of breaking down distinctions between Art and Life, etc, with a fairly Left bent. Hewitt picks up the thesis but shows how pretty extreme Rightists were able to do the same thing.