WHERE ARE THE ARTISTS IN THE BUDGET?
Gauteng, the Arts Budget Question, and the Cost of Being Grouped Together
The Creative Passport is reminded of a fundamental truth about the Cultural and Creative Industries in South Africa:
The problem is not only funding — it is how funding is structured, prioritised, and accounted for at provincial level.
Gauteng, often seen as the heartbeat of the country’s creative economy, offers a useful case study — not because it is unique, but because its challenges mirror what is happening in many provinces.
The Provincial Arts Funding Paradox
One of the most pressing realities practitioners must confront is this:
Provincial departments do not receive a dedicated Treasury allocation specifically for arts development outside of education-related budgets.
Unlike sectors that benefit from:
• Conditional grants
• Ring-fenced allocations
• Sector-specific funding instruments
the arts at provincial level are largely funded through the equitable share — a pool that must be divided among multiple directorates.
This means that arts and culture must compete internally with other priorities for the same limited resources. The result is predictable:
• Arts development becomes discretionary
• Long-term planning is compromised
• Funding becomes reactive rather than strategic
The Cost of Being Grouped: Arts, Culture and Heritage
A recurring question raised in Gauteng — and echoed nationally — is whether grouping Arts, Culture and Heritage together under one programme is quietly killing the sector.
On paper, the grouping appears logical. In practice, it creates serious distortions.
Heritage institutions such as:
• Museums
• Libraries
• Archives
often have:
• Fixed operational costs
• Established infrastructure
• Legislated mandates
When budgets are tight, funding inevitably flows toward institutions that are easier to justify administratively. Living artists, practitioners, and creative workers are left behind.
The result is a situation where grants exist — but they overwhelmingly support buildings rather than people, collections rather than creators.
Arts vs Sport: A Budgetary Reality Check
When one compares annual provincial allocations, a pattern emerges across multiple provinces, including Gauteng:
• Sport enjoys clearer funding lines
• Sport benefits from conditional grants and visible performance indicators
• Sport is politically easier to justify due to mass participation narratives
Arts and culture, by contrast, are often expected to:
• Transform
• Create jobs
• Preserve heritage
• Drive social cohesion
without equivalent budget protection.
This imbalance is not merely financial — it is ideological. It signals which sector government believes produces measurable value.
The Disappearing Artist: What Happened to Bursaries?
Gauteng once had a more traceable system of support for artists through structures such as the Gauteng Arts and Culture Council, including bursaries for artists to study and develop their practice.
With the centralisation of bursary administration, the system has become opaque. Today, it is difficult — even for officials — to answer basic questions:
• How many artists are currently receiving bursaries?
• From which disciplines?
• At which institutions?
• With what outcomes?
When support becomes untrackable, accountability disappears. And when accountability disappears, artists disappear from policy conversations.
Grants Without Practitioners?
Another concern repeatedly raised is that provincial grants do exist, but they are largely channelled toward:
• Museums
• Libraries
• Heritage infrastructure
These are important institutions. But when grants consistently bypass:
• Individual artists
• Independent collectives
• Community-based practitioners
the sector stagnates.
A creative ecosystem cannot survive on buildings alone. It survives on people, skills, mobility, and sustained creative practice.
Gauteng as a Mirror, Not an Exception
What is unfolding in Gauteng is not an anomaly. Similar patterns are visible in other provinces:
• Arts development without a dedicated Treasury line item
• Over-reliance on equitable share
• Arts overshadowed by sport and heritage
• Weak tracking of practitioner support
The danger is that provinces become administrators of institutions rather than developers of artists.
Questions That Can No Longer Be Avoided
As we reflect on Gauteng’s experience, several difficult but necessary questions arise — not only for Gauteng, but for all provinces:
• Why does arts development not enjoy a dedicated provincial funding framework outside of education?
• Is grouping Arts, Culture and Heritage still fit for purpose in 2026?
• Why is sport consistently prioritised over arts in provincial budgets?
• How do provinces track who benefits from bursaries and grants — and who does not?
• At what point do museums and libraries stop being the default recipients of arts funding?
Until these questions are answered honestly, the Cultural and Creative Industries will continue to exist on the margins of provincial governance — visible in rhetoric, invisible in budgets.
A Final Reflection
Gauteng has talent. Gauteng has infrastructure. Gauteng has demand.
What it lacks — like many provinces — is a funding architecture that treats artists as developmental assets rather than cultural afterthoughts.
The conversation must now move from whether the arts matter to how provinces structurally choose to fund them.
Because without artists, there is no culture to preserve — only buildings left standing.
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