Set Aside

Reflections on culture and rural England

The countryside has an image of stability in a changing world but anyone who knows much about rural England knows that the truth is more complex than that. It changes as much as the city, sometimes faster, sometimes slower, but differently, in ways that reflect its geography, demographics, economy and its culture. Today, for instance, the rural population is growing fast: in the East Midlands, it grew by 8.7% in the past 10 years, compared to a 5.2% increase in towns, and with the highest rates of growth in the most remote areas.

Rural areas have also seen changes in their distinctive cultural life, including a strengthening of voluntary activity, new museums and heritage venues and innovations in the arts through site specific and temporary projects. Far from being limited to second-rate work in uncomfortable places, rural audiences increasingly have access to a cultural offer special enough to attract visitors from the city.

These changes raise many questions. They challenge easy assumptions about town and country, about who lives where and why. They test ideas of cultural production, consumption and value. They confront big ideas like climate change, migration or food, whose effects are often particularly evident in the countryside. And artists, rurally based or not, are responding to these new opportunities.

‘Set Aside’ is an occasional series of reflections on culture and rural England, commissioned by Culture East Midlands (www.culture-em.org.uk) and the National Rural Touring Forum. The authors come from different backgrounds and have different perspectives. They have been given a free hand to write about something that seems important to them in this changing interaction of land, people and culture.

The pieces are short - something to read in a coffee break perhaps - and opinionated. We hope they’ll prompt questions, discussion and, perhaps, responses. Please let us know what you think of them and suggest other contributors or issues to consider. The media tend to simplify things, and rural issues are no exception: we’d like
these papers to make things that bit more complicated.

Download the pieces -

Keep Theatre Live by Gavin Stride  Director of Farnham Maltings, a regional council member of Arts Council England, South East and Chair of the Independent Theatre Council.

FOUR STAR: The decline of the rural garage by Jenny Graham an artist working in Somerset. 

Rural Arts: What that means where I live by John Holden Head of Culture at the independent think tank Demos, and a Visiting Professor at City University, London.

 IN The FOG: working on "White open spaces by Sonali Bhattacharyya writer and one of the contributors to the stage play 'White Open Spaces', a co-project between the Pentabus Theatre Company, BBC Radio Drama Birmingham and the Avon Writing Foundation.

Field of View: by David Fine

Why Art and Farming: by Georgina Barney and Helen Thompstone

Discussion forums about these papers -

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