Excellence in context

Arts North West held a funding and grant writing workshop last week in Glen Innes and one of the questions that came up (and has done so at previous workshops seemingly without fail):

What do they mean by 'excellence' ?

What is the definition of excellence that they could respond to in their funding application was more precisely what they wanted to know. And it is a very good question. I had, fortunately, done a quick dig around on that very question before the workshop so I was able to come up with an answer albeit one that still requires me to pose some other ideas in this blog.

Many people when faced with guidelines or selection criteria stipulating 'artistic excellence' or 'high quality art' are left with more questions than perhaps they started their funding application with.

A standard response on the question seems to be that excellence must be viewed in context.

...artistic excellence is formulated within a particular social context and not inherent in the object per se...

(Remender, P.A and Lucareli R. "In Search of Artistic Excellence: The Social Contruction of Artistic Values". Studies in Art Education: A Journal of Issues and Research. 1986. 27(d) 209-212)

However I was also  thoroughly engaged by Ben Eltham's "In Pursuit of 'Excellence'" article in September 2012 edition of Nava Quarterly on Diversity. In this article he discusses the definition of excellence and how it not even the review of the Australia Council for the Arts. It is true that to do so would create a new round of debate about whether that definition could be applied to all of the art forms that the Australia Council covers.

'[G]iven that philosophers and art historians have been arguing about what art is and what makes it good for centuries, the idea that arts funding bodies can easily identify excellence and fund it has to be questionable to say the very least', says Eltham. But he does ask his readers to address the issue through discussion and that is where I'd like to start.

The notion of excellence is also relevant to that of cultural leadership because leaders are supposed to 'excel' in what they do, to lead by example.  Even though it is possible for community to determine which particular elements of their leadership or the work they produce are the most 'excellent' it can be very difficult for them to explain why.

I try to take it back to the context in which we are examining the excellence and/or the leadership qualities. The 'why' can be fed by the where, when, who, how. If we can pinpoint those, then we are on our way to determining why it is excellent (or why it isn't). I haven't taken this much further than this since last week except to start looking at particular examples and break them down into the context in which they exist or could exist. By looking at various examples I hope to get a better understanding of the parameters by which we can judge excellence. Excellence in context.