Goals/Purposes

1980: Goals at the beginning:
As you read under ‘history’ in 1980 key people in each country were co-opted onto a steering committee, ideas and possibilities were put forward, and targets for a European seminar were formulated.
These can be summed up in the following manner:
1.It was the declared intention that the diverse cultures of the continent of Europe should all be represented, and as such spokespeople from as many nations as possible were invited to be members of the committee (now called the Council) and to take part in deciding which artists and teachers were to be invited.
2.The seminars were intended to be ecumenical (or ‘inter-denominational’), insofar as this is possible. Due to necessity, for the first few years the makeup of the Council, and indeed the majority of the first people to attend, were from the Protestant evangelical wing of the church in Europe. It has been a major problem to find representatives from all the denominations. This was partly out of suspicion from churches about a new entity and partly out of theological suspicion, especially when such an organisation was bound to affect the young people of their congregations. For conservative evangelical churches anything relating to the arts, let alone the performance arts, was considered ‘of the world’, (even demonic in the case of some rock music *4); for those of a Catholic tradition, sacred music was one thing but the new ‘Christian arts’ were seen to be an invention of evangelicals. It took a number of years before Catholics could be convinced of the purposes and aims of the Christian Artists movement, though later they became widely represented both on the Council and also by artists, teachers, and registrants.*5)
3.It was decided that the Seminar would aim to attract practitioners from all artistic disciplines. This proved impossible in the early days, as the seminar could only grow according to what was acceptable among Christians and in the churches of Europe. In the early 1980s new and contemporary styles of music were becoming more widely used amongst Christians but there was little understanding of the use of fine art, and theatre or dance in the church were still an anathema in some denominations. The integration of these other art forms proved to be a slow process.

Goals decided by the board after evaluating annual data:
The Seminar has worked with the following underpinning goals over the years, which have met with varying success:
1.To support artistic innovation.
2.To inspire quality. Goals 1 and 2 remain an ongoing challenge.
3.To promote acceptance of all art-forms by the Christian sector (which includes Churches, Christian organisations, etc.) Significant strides towards Goal 3 had been made by the end of the 80s. For example Christian festivals like Greenbelt or Flevo began to include the visual arts, whilst their musical basis remained pop/rock. Even large denominationally based conferences included youth music, mime, dance and the visual arts. For the man on the street, thinking about which event to attend, the differences between the CA-Seminar and any other large Christian gathering were disappearing, and so the question was being asked ‘why go to Christian Artists?’. This widening acceptance of art in all its forms has become a major reason for the reduction in participant numbers.
4.To promote acceptance of Christian artists and their work within the secular world and civil society. During the 90s a growing acceptance of Christian artists and their work developed, but this will take time to fully come to fruition. The work of CA with the unions and in political spheres is seen as vital in accomplishing this goal.
5.To promote acceptance by the Christian sector of formal studies in the arts. At the end of the 80s talented young people increasingly saw the need for a good education in their chosen art-form. It was not feasible to attain real quality and integrity by means of just a few workshops. In the 90s Christian students were attending academies, art and dance-schools, conservatoires, etc. The days of the well-intentioned amateur appear to have passed. By fulfilling this goal, CA saw fewer participants coming to the Seminar for purely ‘educational’ reasons. However, since 2003 more and more new students are coming for ‘masterclass’ experience.
6.To create an international meeting place. CA has always aimed to act as a cultural bridge and, with a growing need for intercultural understanding, the challenge for CA in this respect is greater than ever before. Again, the border-breaking activities to make contact towards central and Eastern Europe since 1981 should be mentioned here.

The Association
The CA-Seminar became a ‘movement’, and this movement gained structure as a formal International Association (1991). The goals of the Association are numerous but include: *9)
1.promoting fellowship, unity, understanding and cooperation
2.encouraging and stimulating the improvement of artistic skills
3.producing publications and establishing data-bases and networks - ‘the voice of the movement’ - to act as a link for regional and national groups
4.being international - Europe needs to hear what this group is saying
5.acting as a Union which speaks for it’s own interests, when Christian artists face intolerance or unemployment
The Association quickly became an ‘umbrella’ for over a hundred member organisations, ranging from the cultural division of Solidarity in Poland to DAKAB, the section for art and training of the Christian Labour Movement in Belgium, from music production companies like Séphora in France to Rosa in the Czech Republic. It also embraces longstanding Christian organisations such as Youth for Christ and Youth with a Mission and the YMCA in Norway.

Having over 4,000 affiliated members by 1992, the Association had become the fastest growing member of the Christian Trade Labour Union in the Netherlands. Also, by acting as a trade union, new doors were opened to it’s influence, e.g. it is a member of the European committee which has been studying and preparing EU ‘cultural’ policy and has been consulted regarding cultural policy for the Dutch Christian Democratic Party. The Association is also recognised by the World Confederation of Labour. In 1993 the Dutch section became officially recognised as CNV- Kunstenbond, having 7010 members in 2005, and so became a key player in the Dutch cultural landscape.

The Symposium
Out of the Association’s new areas of influence came the next major development in the movement’s history, that of an annual symposium beginning in 1991. The Board stated in a letter to all members of the Association: It had become very clear that, besides stimulating the development of the artist (his skills and personal life), we had to start thinking about his living and working conditions: his methods, his social status, his problems, which were sometimes the result of a political decision, etc. We became aware of the great need to study the political and social dimensions in which artists have to live their lives.

The objectives of the symposia (that is, the new CA-seminars since 1993) are to bring together leaders from trade unions, Christian political parties and associated arts organisations to discuss topics such as European culture, the role of Christian artists and, in view of the growing unification of Europe, the possibility and desirability of a common, concerted policy for the arts at a European level. The aim of having such a symposium was to “initiate ideas with the aim of contributing to a common European endeavour to support the arts and thus participate in a renewal of European culture”, and of “connecting creativity with social and political processes” *10). There has been much discussion in the intermittant years about the role of Christian artists in fostering a renewal of civil society based on a Christian perspective and world view, given the new realities of the emerging democracies of Eastern Europe and the demise (and discrediting) of old models such as the Christian Democrats in Italy. But both cultural and political models are changing - Socialist Realism has been superceded by an explosion of creativity in the East, and art produced on a foundation of Christian belief also directly challenges the emptiness of post-modernism which prevails in much Western European thinking and art.

New relationships have thus been developed which have linked those involved in the creative arts with those involved in issues of social and political concern. From 1991 to 1993, the Symposium was incorporated into the main annual Seminar, but was only open to invited delegates. In 1994 a significant change took place - namely the Seminar became the Symposium, so that all teaching had to be upgraded to masterclass level. A new model was created to stimulate learning, thinking and therefore creativity. The programme now comprises an in-depth morning lecture, followed by discussion groups and plenary sessions and ‘hot-house’ debates. The evening concerts/presentations remain, through practical workshops/masterclasses in the afternoon. Thus these annual gatherings are more directed to the discussion of the role of the arts, specifically from a Christian world-view, in a rapidly integrating Europe. The Symposium receives support from the European Commission and financial support from EZA (Europaïsches Zentrum für Arbeitnehmerfragen) and has published papers following each Symposium under the umbrella title Art AD 2000.