With banks, bondholders and bailouts monopolising media attention, it’s easy to forget about non-economic election issues. That’s why a new campaign group wants to put the arts back on the agenda.

There are 1,000 fly-posters on the streets of Dublin at the moment, which cast a cold eye on the typical politician’s election mugshot.
“Politicians spend €100,000 on a poster campaign that is bland and crude and regarded by most people as litter,” says Aaron Copeland of the Upstart artists’ collective (no relation to the famed 20th century composer we assume!). “We aim to put creativity and the arts at the centre of any election debate and highlight the important role of the arts in society.”
When the dissolution of the 30th Dáil was announced, Upstart commissioned and duplicated the 500 artworks now adorning lamppost-space which would otherwise be given over to Eamon Gilmore, Micheal Martin and the rest.
Some of the results aren’t clever. The poster with the slogan “Homeless, Jobless and Speechless” is a particularly unfortunate case. But a lot more of them are brilliant. One Soviet propaganda-style poster, all jerky angles and grim socialist-realist greys and browns, shows a tiger being stabbed with the pointy end of a tricolour-flying flagpole. Under the mock-Cyrillic slogan, ‘BACK’, a man – standing on the poor Celtic Tiger – points in the wrong direction. The tiger looks like he’s in a lot of pain.
Another shows Brian Cowen giving Bob The Builder a piggyback, as himself and the Monopoly man stroll around an Escher-type cube with no beginning and no end. (No idea what it means, but it looks cool.)
Musicians have come on board too, with Nina Hynes, Hoarsebox and More Tiny Giants among the artists who are rumoured to feature in the web campaign, due to go live in a week’s time.
Copeland, an English teacher and the publisher of a poetry and graphic design magazine, accepts that Upstart’s message is a hard sell, at a time when many people are living in real fear of poverty.
“There’s a push and a pull to things. The push is into economic realities. But you can’t be focused on that all the time and lose sight of what the economy is for – to enable you to live a fuller life.
We’re just trying to push the arts as a complement to the political campaign. It’s not something different or separate from pragmatic economics. Basically, creativity nourishes the practical side of life and the practical side of life nourishes the arts.”
Copeland believes most politicians hold the arts in low regard, as exemplified by the revolving door at the Department of Arts, Sports and Tourism. The ‘Ministry of Fun’ is regarded as the lowliest of all cabinet portfolios – which gives the lie to TDs’ talk about the crucial importance of culture to the tourism sector.
“It shows there is no priority in relation to the arts that they all regard the job of Minister as a demotion,” Copeland says. “That’s unacceptable for a society that proudly regards itself as a creative culture. That’s why people come here. They probably don’t come here for anything but the culture of Ireland.”
Unlike the National Campaign for the Arts, a highbrow affair which lists everyone from the Abbey Theatre to IMRO among its supporters, Upstart is not primarily about arts funding. There’s no doubt that handouts from the Arts Council have shrunk significantly in recent times, but rather than blandly condemning the cuts, Copeland hopes Upstart will stimulate debate on the issue.
“On the one hand, money is necessary. You need money in the arts. On the other hand, arts funding sometimes creates a complacent artist and artists are supposed to be critical. We’re trying to promote thought on this. Of course funding cuts in the Arts Council budget are not what you want to see – but on the other hand, the best art can be created in a recession.”
And that’s what the Upstart campaign is really about: Copeland and his colleagues reject the idea that the arts should take a back-seat while Ireland sorts out its recession.
“It’s a mindset all of us are guilty of – we look for easy solutions and easy answers. Through the arts we can properly explore the fact that life is not easy.”