How mistaken one can be! Normally, debates about the Bavarian Cultural Fund are to be expected. The arguments exchanged in the state parliament about this funding model, which is intended to support Bavaria’s free cultural scene outside of the metropolises, are well known: some would like the money to be distributed more evenly across all government districts. The others would rather open the pot to Munich and Nuremberg artists, because the municipal funds are never enough for the many freelance creative people in the big cities, but there is usually money left over in the fund pot.
And the AfD? She always reflexively criticizes individual funding applications that run counter to her worldview. For example, the performance of a children’s play, which is on the application form as “The Bremen Town Musicians” – i.e. clearly gendered – or a new “World Change Festival”, about whose possibly suspicious organizers “nothing can be googled”. That is why the release of the entire cultural fund is not rejected, but one is abstaining, it was said on Wednesday at the meetings of the budget and culture committees.
Markus Blume (CSU) attended both for the first time in his new position as Minister of Art. He replied to the vague right-wing allegations: “Not only what you like yourself is eligible for funding. We would fail in our task if we made the yardstick what we think is suitable or pleasing. In many places, culture is also an impertinence and it has to be also be. This in turn is also the basis for the cultural state of Bavaria to be able to develop at all.” The first appearance of the minister leaves behind a sovereign, contemporary image.
What Blume had to distribute is also impressive. The effects of the Corona crisis on the number and form of cultural events can still be felt. But the fund will support 120 art and culture projects as well as investment measures throughout Bavaria in 2022. A total of more than five million euros will be distributed. 4.2 million euros will go to large-scale projects (funding amount in excess of 25,000 euros), and another 830,000 euros will go to 69 smaller cultural projects. And they are diverse: they include amateur music and artistic music cultivation, contemporary art and museum work as well as theatres, archives, libraries and literature.