‘Class Celings’
I read the ‘Class Ceiling’ report co-chaired by Nazir Afzal OBE last night with great interest. One of the standout points was that young people need a map, not a maze into the arts and that there should be a stronger empty property/affordable space strategy.
The rest of the report was a little hit and miss for me. I found some recommendations, such as embedding class in legal protected characteristics, misguided. Not because class-based exclusion isn’t real, but because formalising it in this way risks professionalising struggle, outsourcing responsibility, and creating another layer of gatekeeping rather than dismantling existing ones.
I’m a working artist from a working-class background with 18 exhibitions under my belt since 2022 and the founder of Victorious Voices, a national scale art project, and Manchester Photography Collective, a photography community of 400 photographers. I have encountered everything this report has mentioned from lack of education holding me back and my accent working against me. I have wilfully refused to tone down my working-class origins because I am not ashamed of them. Working class artists are undoubtedly denied access to funding, opportunities and jobs that would make life comfortable, but I disagree with the notion that we are vanishing.
We are vanishing from spaces that do not want us and do not accept us, perhaps. But that is not disappearance, it is institutional refusal. I saw the writing on the wall when I started this creative path, which is why I created Manchester Photography Collective and is one of the reasons it thrives. It’s the reason why our exhibition Where We Move Together at the Marriott V&A, featuring 40 talented photographers, is going to be a smash event.
I found it interesting there was no mention of Forever Manchester and other organisations that do tremendous work for the people of Manchester in this report. Perhaps that plays into the unwritten divide and unspoken cliques that operate throughout the arts sector in the city. I find the talk of a ‘Class Champion’ interesting, as there are people clearly trying to angle themselves into this position. I view it as adding another layer to the problem that the report wants to eradicate rather than removing power from those who already hold it.
I wonder how we are defining The Arts? Is it the younger generation of ‘creatives’ who are partying on the scene and collaborating with brands that masquerade commerce as art? Is it the artists with something to say, but no means to say it? Is it someone who doodles in their spare time? Because depending on who gets to define art, you also decide who gets legitimacy, funding, and visibility.
How does class fit into all of this? Because the working class are not some great big puzzle to solve. They are people who breathe oxygen, with their own thoughts and ideas, who are denied access. That’s it. That’s the problem.
If people genuinely care about working-class participation in the arts, stop commissioning reports about us and start resourcing the people already doing the work. Fund the organisations that are building access without permission. Pay artists properly. Back projects and artists when they emerge from outside your usual networks.
Give us money. Give us jobs. Give us acknowledgment when we create national scale projects and the problems vanish. It’s a simple solution that requires people to relinquish their privilege and power, which they will never do. So, we don’t grovel for acceptance, and we don’t ‘vanish’. We build our own spaces with purpose and community at the heart of the engine.
