City of Culture goes to highest bidder shock.
In a general sense, this is what fills me with despair.
Even before the Wasps announcement, the reports are always about how much cash winning the bid can bring into the city. Culture is not about money. Culture is about preserving and building on what makes up a local identity, the intangible benefits to good feeling, and goodwill.
The Labour government tried to open culture and heritage up to more by making entry into certain museums free, and that was a welcome step to making it accessible. It shouldn't be commidified and packaged however, it shouldn't be about who spends more.
And that's not some snobby way of looking at it either. There is a place for the Warwick Castle approach to culture and heritage. But it shouldn't be all-encompassing. Just because something doesn't bring money in doesn't make it insignificant in the state of a place. Things we take for granted as always there add to our sense of self, our sense of place and that happens away from the big McDonald's sign across the street. The old cinema buildings show a brave new world, an entrance into a time of technology, light, simulations - the ruined castles show the legacy of barons, bloodshed... beauty. The timber framed houses in Spon End show a way of life that is no more but they all echo into making up what should be a dynamic, vibrant city taking elements from all. The follies lost in woods show man's place in not only his current life, but his awareness of how he fits into the past.
Don't reduce it to a balance sheet.
And it's sad, so sad, that a city of culture tag is all about the money!