Monday, November 12, 2012

...the BIG BANG


So here are some of your thoughts on part one of manifesto - all red and green - and yes of course, in glorious Black and White too!


                   It's here for you to digest and  g r o a n   o v e r   - what, no bullet points - no action plan - a nice little framework perhaps?

     No, NO a thousand times NO. You can pick one of those up from any fly-by-night, five-a-day, quick fix consultants. In for a penny, in for a pound. £

                   Grease me palm with your hard fought-for coffers and I'll tell you what you want to hear. Elixirs, miracle cures? The arts'll solve it all - heal your wounds, cure your aches and pains and tuck you up in your bed at night?

                                                        Instrumental - temperamental?     Fine art - pop art? Reductionist - Irrationalist?

         It's a point in time. Histrionics? Maybe  -  but born full-term and bursting for a fight. 

                   Enlightened and Romantic without a seconds glance back to your bean counting gibberish..."we want to weight it, measure it and standardise the little beauty."

        Oh, but the market my dear,  the fragile economy, the BIG things, the STUFF... the words and important THINGS about our fiscal state - of policy being informed by the finest STUFF...you know: research informed policy!       Yes that's it, policy made on the basis of the finest research - ahhh the randomised controlled trial - the GOLD standard...a model of pharmacological impartiality and rigorous analysis - the midas touch.
        Oh yes, that's the one - only it's not - and has no pretensions to be - it's a baby; a big FAT baby, born of a 1000+ loving parents! 

                           A thousand mothers and fathers thrown into the gene pool...the progeny and lineage are all messed up. There’s my none-too-perfect DNA and yours too.

                         Beautiful hybrid eh?

     ...and is it a Northern child, ruddy cheeked and all flat vowels? Is it European? Eurasian? Venusian? It's an exotic little fellow...and it's still mutating....

                                 Have a cup of coffee - a glass of red - better still, a bottle of water

        Go On...A Toast!        To you, and you and us...

            Where to now for this baby? We need to bring it up, of course...how we do it - well, its for us to decide...

                                 mmmmmmm, how will we do it?

   SCENARIOS, SCENARIOS - lets start to imagine some scenarios


                           S C E N A R I O S:  in arts, health and wellbeing JANUARY 2013  across our
     GLORIOUS NORTHERN LANDS...
                                 dates coming soon...