A recent spate of e-mails to ambit and other e-mail lists about the NAN pilot project in Scotland prompted a question from Leigh French and Paula Larkin of Variant about the Scottish Artists Union, and it's role in providing a platform.... This is a response from Scottish Artists Union which i forward to the ambit list :
Since being constituted in 2001 the Scottish Artists Union has hosted public meetings at The STUC - Glasgow, Talbot Rice - Edinburgh, the DCA - Dundee, Glasgow School of Art, Grays School of Art, Ben Nevis Distillery - Fort William (Hi arts) The Cowane Gallery - Stirling, Limousine Bull - Aberdeen, to name but a few, and has also held meetings in artists houses and non-arts venues across the country. Although providing a general public forum for debate is not one of our main aims, promoting the work of the Union and raising awareness about issues affecting it's members, and the wider arts sector is. With recent research showing that 82% of Scotland's artists earn £ 5000 or less per annum from their arts practice (exactly the same result as Arts Council research showed in1995, with visual artists being by far the worst off across all the art forms) the need for shared information and a strong representative voice has never been greater. The SAU are concentrating on Rates of Pay & have published the first ever comprehensive Rates of Pay document for the visual arts, which we are using to negotiate with the SAC & COSLA, the council for Scottish local authorities. We intend to challenge the practice VAT being charged to artists by commercial Galleries, a motion put forward by one of our members at our last Annual conference in Dundee. We intend to improve the conditions of artist in the public & private sector, with many developments already being made in these fields through collective bargaining. We are in direct contact with Equity & the Musicians Union who successfully negotiate Rates of Pay, provide contracts and liability insurance, as well as access to Lawyers & other legal matters that arise affecting their members. (it is worth noting that it is now almost impossible for visual artists to obtain public liability insurance cover. Glasgow City Council recently set a precedent by stating that artist must provide their own cover of £2 million, and more and more galleries and organisations now insist that artists provide their own cover, when working under their auspices) SAU lobby's on behalf of visual artists, applied artists and arts workers, protects and extend artists’ rights, and negotiates a wide range of benefits for it's members. SAU continues to lobby the Scottish Executive and the Scottish Arts Council. We have already seen an increase in the visual arts budget, although total funding for this sector via SAC is still only 3.2 million per annum for the whole of Scotland, showing a lack of parity across the arts. The SAU represents it's members, and the concerns of it's members. This is done by representing them at a national level within the Trade Union movement, as a member of the STUC and by negotiating directly with funding bodies and government agencies. We are the first ever Trade Union in the U. K to represent visual and applied artists. We have already negotiated a wide range of benefits and artists discounts which far outweigh the cost of joining. We continue to push for a better deal for artists in Scotland. This can only be achieved through the collective will of Artists and arts workers. By being a registered Trades Union with the aim of affiliating to a larger Union, the SAU aims to provide benefits and cover to it's members that would otherwise not be available to individual artists. We are currently in a unique position as a Union, only representing Artists based in Scotland, with other Unions having a UK demographic. We intend to create a debate throughout the UK highlighting the fact that all artists in the UK outside of Scotland are unrepresented & effectively disenfranchised. Every profession & trade in the UK has a representative Trade Union that works for the interests of it's members, who benefit from the support of other established Unions & from the TUC. Until now, the visual arts sector has managed to ignore this basic right, leaving it's practitioners to work under draconian conditions, and being vulnerable to the whims of funders, dealers, buyers, commissioners and galleries. The SAU is at the forefront of this debate & will continue to push forward with the collective will of its membership We urge all Artists based in Scotland to become members of the SAU, and to benefit from the changes we are already seeing take place. Guyan Porter - President Gerry Morris - Vice - President on behalf of the Scottish Artists Union Scottish Artists Union C/o Equity 144 Union Street Glasgow G1 3QQ [EMAIL PROTECTED] www.sau.org.uk To join the Union, get your membership card, get the benefits and develop the agenda, as well as instantly becoming part of a growing artistic network that already has links throughout Britain and the wider world, simply write to us at the above address, or apply online ------------------------------------------------- a m b i t : networking media arts in scotland post: [EMAIL PROTECTED] archive: http://www.mediascot.org/ambit info: send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] and write "info ambit" in the message body -------------------------------------------------
