Essential Foundations: The Case for Cultural Infrastructure
What is “Cultural Infrastructure” ?
The museum where you seek refuge from the city, the library that provides you access to new ideas and community programming, the cultural district that introduces you to novel experiences and ways of being: all are examples of “cultural infrastructure.” These are buildings, structures, and spaces where culture is consumed (e.g. galleries, venues, cinemas, historic sites, etc.) and produced (artist spaces/workshops, rehearsal spaces, recording studios, production studios, etc.) Spaces devoted to the production, exhibition, and consumption of culture are simultaneously imperative and underappreciated. Without innovative and well-maintained cultural infrastructure, artists are unable to reach the full potential of their practice, audiences are unable to engage with cultural experiences in the spaces most attuned to them, and social cohesion and collaboration is unable to grow organically. And yet, cultural infrastructure is too often neglected and distinguished from those built components of our society considered critical, such as roads, hospitals, water & energy reserves, and more.
Recent investments
Recent efforts by governments and organizations have begun to shift the conversation in positive directions with funding measures designed to shore up cultural infrastructure. In Canada, for example, federal and municipal initiatives have identified the increased need for cultural infrastructure on the local level: the Canada Cultural Spaces Fund seeks to “contribute to improved physical conditions for arts and heritage related creation, presentation, preservation and exhibition” in a variety of locations nationwide, while the City of Victoria, British Columbia’s Cultural Infrastructure Grant provides funding to nonprofit spaces for the purchasing of specialized equipment, facility upgrades, and feasibility research. These sorts of investments dovetail with the findings of AEA Consulting’s Cultural Infrastructure Index, which found that, in 2023, 192 major cultural infrastructure projects were completed globally, representing US$8.58 billion of investment. Another of the Cultural Infrastructure Index’s findings speaks to the evolving understanding of just what constitutes cultural infrastructure in the present tense: while museums and galleries received the largest amount of investment, notable increases occurred in performing arts centers, multifunction art venues, and cultural districts.
Much of Sound Diplomacy’s work with a host of international clients is invested in this identified need for multifaceted spaces that blend a variety of divergent cultural uses, alongside more traditional museums and art galleries. The Andy Warhol Museum’s POP District, for example, is dedicated to expanding the museum’s programming from the gallery space to the streets of Pittsburgh, with cultural community hubs, educational spaces/creative incubators, and arts-centric recreational spaces. Up-and-coming arts nonprofit Terrain is currently exploring the feasibility of a cultural hub for downtown Spokane, Washington, in line with state and municipal plans to bolster Washington’s creative economy and revitalize Spokane’s downtown core, respectively. And the Delaware Arts Alliance’s recently launched Creative Economy Advancement & Tourism Expansion (CREATE) Plan is working to respond to inequitable access to cultural infrastructure across the First State with recommendations to foster the growth of cultural hubs in each of Delaware’s three counties.
These developments speak to an evolved understanding of arts and culture, not as a welcome additive to human experience practiced in one’s free time and with whatever paltry funds are left over from intensive austerity measures, but as an essential component of community and economic development that requires dedicated, stable, and thoughtful investment in the spaces required for artists to grow and thrive.
Cultural infrastructure at risk
Despite these positive developments, cultural infrastructure remains at risk across the globe as conflict and climate change endanger the very spaces in which human expression thrives and heritage is preserved. A recent Human Rights Watch report on the destruction of cultural heritage as a result of armed conflict details a number of painful examples. These include the significant damaging in 2020 of the Ghazanchetsots Cathedral, “an important 19th-century Armenian church” and concerns that “the centuries-old al Qahirah Castle in Taizz,” Yemen, “had been so damaged due to bombing in 2016 [...] that it could collapse in the future, not only destroying a cultural landmark but also endangering nearby homes.” The Nova Music Festival became a site of catastrophic destruction on October 7, 2023 and subsequently over 200 “libraries, religious sites and places of ancient historical importance” have been destroyed or damaged in Gaza. The Delia Arts Foundation’s center in Gaza, which provided essential studio and recording infrastructure and professional development programs for Palestinian musicians, was leveled and looted in May of 2023. Elsewhere, the Ukrainian Ministry of Culture reports that 1938 objects of cultural infrastructure have been lost since the beginning of that conflict. Recent scholarship has begun to assess the degradation and destruction of cultural infrastructure due to anthropogenic climate change, with the 2018 National Museum of Brazil fire just one prominent example.
Though the study of these losses has primarily focused on built infrastructure, intangible cultural heritage, that is those “traditions or living expressions inherited from our ancestors and passed on to our descendants,” is also under threat, particularly as it pertains to Indigenous knowledge and culture on every continent. Arts and culture are of immeasurable benefit to our communities, our economies, and our social well-being, but they need well-considered, dedicated, accessible, and safe spaces in order to grow and thrive. Cultural infrastructure is essential infrastructure.
While it is encouraging to note investments in the West to shore up support for cultural infrastructure, a larger conversation about the critical nature of this infrastructure needs to be had on the world stage in order to protect those spaces and communities threatened by war and climate change. In the process, we may grow to understand that multifunctional cultural spaces are the first line of defense to combat increasing social upheaval whilst further enriching education, expression, resilience, and community cohesion.