The Stage

Low pay a problem for dance sector - ACE

Published Friday 25 September 2009 at 15:09 by Lalayn Baluch

Arts Council England has raised concerns over the “sustainability” of careers and leadership within dance, after research revealed that 23% of people working in the sector earned less than £5,000 last year.

The funding body’s Dance Mapping report - the largest piece of research of its kind – described the dance workforce as “highly educated”, with 62% of people in the sector holding a degree.

However, it also revealed that 38% only earned between £5,000 and £20,000 in 2008/9.

ACE fears that the low pay will affect the sustainability of careers, leadership and the ability for “potential dance champions to emerge”.

Responding to the findings, ACE director of dance strategy Janet Archer, said the sector needs to “generate the confidence to value itself and position itself assertively”.

She said: “[Dance] artists and producers will often elect to work for nothing or very little, in order to get things done. It should not be acceptable for talented people to rely on passion alone to fuel their work.

“We have many outstanding dance leaders working in the field. Unfortunately, many choose to leave to pursue more realistic career options.”

Archer said that ACE acknowledged that dance needs more investment, and that more should be done to help and support dance artists and create opportunities for them to work.

“Dance is highly trained profession and yet the bleak reality is that personal earnings from dance continue to be low,” she added.

“Training provision should be adapted to generate more entrepreneurs, producers and leaders, as dance graduates need to become employers and educators as well as performers and dance makers.”

Archer believes that even if new money is not made available, the dance workforce should be given assistance to enable it to be more successful when applying for ACE’s Grants for the Arts programme.

Meanwhile, the research also reported a positive picture of the dance industry. It revealed that 40,000 people are employed through the sector, and that the number of people studying dance has increased by nearly 100% in the last five years.

It also revealed that dance’s contribution to the overall strength of the economy is growing, with 45% of the workforce engaged with film, television, digital production, webcasting and music video.

According to the figures, around half of dance artists live and work in London and the south east. Archer said that while this reflects population figures, ACE needs to address the fact that parts of the country have “patchy access” to dance.

Dance Mapping was informed by research conducted with more than 1,400 artists, companies and promoters working in England.

It will be used to help create ACE’s new national arts strategy, which will be published in 2010.