Stronger Community action in the cultural sector. Communication from the commission to the council and the Parliament, transmitted on 12 October 1982. Supplement 6/82 Bulletin of the European Communities

Bulletin OF THE EUROPEAN COMMUNITIES Supplement 6/82 Supplements 1982 1/82 A new Community action programme on the promotion of equal opportunities for women, 1982-85 2/82 Draft of a convention on bankruptcy, winding-up, arrangements, compositions and similar proceedings - Draft convention and report 3/82 The institutional system of the Community - Restoring the balance 4/82 A Community policy on tourism - Initial guidelines 5/82 Memorandum on the Community's development policy 6/82 Stronger Community action in the cultural sector Bulletin of the European Communities Supplement 6/82 Stronger Community action in the cultural sector Communication from the Commission to the Council and Parliament, transmitted on 12 October 1982 EUROPEAN COMMUNITIES Commission This publication is also available in the following languages: DA ISBN 92-825-3527-4 DE ISBN 92-825-3528-2 GR ISBN 92-825-3531-2 FR ISBN 92-825-3530-4 IT ISBN 92-825-3532-0 NL ISBN 92-825-3533-9 Cataloguing data can be found at the end of this publication Luxembourg: Office for Official Publications of the European Communities, 1983 ISBN 92-825-3529-0 Catalogue number: CB-NF-82-006-EN-C Articles and texts appearing in this document may be reproduced freely in whole or in part providing their source is mentioned. Printed in Belgium contents Preface 5 Introduction 7 I - Freedom of trade in cultural goods 8 II - Improving the living and working conditions of cultural workers 9 The cultural sector and employment 9 Protection of cultural workers 10 National aids 11 Freedom of movement and establishment 11 Cultural workers in the regions 11 III - Widening the audience 12 IV - Conserving the architectural heritage 13 New possibilities for financing conservation 13 Economic and social viability of conservation projects 14 The architectural heritage and the environment 14 Conclusion 14 Annexes 15 / - Record cards for works of art 16 // - Improving the living and working conditions of cultural workers - Specific measures 16 Sheet 1: Collective authors' rights 21 Sheet 2: Droit de suite in the plastic arts 22 Sheet 3: The exhibition of 150 young Community painters 23 Sheet 4: Advanced training through personal contacts 24 III - Widening the audience - Specific measures 25 IV - Conservation of the architectural heritage - Specific measures 26 Summary of action and operations 28 Preface • This communication was adopted by the Commission on 29 September 1982 and addressed immediately to Parliament and the Council. It does not expound a philosophy of culture, for that would imply coming out in favour of specific ideological and aesthetic options, which is something the Community has no right to do. Considering the impact of the economic and social environment on the cultural activities and material circumstances of those men and women who live — or should be living — by their art, the Community has a duty to provide culture with its own specific resources. • Our communication clearly shows that to serve culture there is no need for the Community to encroach on the responsibilities of governments or of other international organizations. Without ruffling any feelings, it simply has to keep firmly within the bounds of competence assigned to it, which are already wide enough. One expression seems to me to epitomize the spirit in which we compiled this paper: instead of speaking about 'artists' we speak about 'cultural workers'. This is intended to show that the Community is concerned with creators (writers, composers, painters...) and performers (actors, musicians, singers and dancers...) seen in terms of their social situation as employees or selfemployed people and not of their artistic personality which is their business and theirs alone. • The credit to the Commission lies in having made no secret of the fact — the very grim fact — that very many cultural workers remain outside the mainstream of social progress. Indeed, we say loud and clear that something must be done, and quickly, to bring them all in from the cold. So, as we consider what must be done to conserve the architectural heritage or assess the impact of the rise of the audiovisual media (television and radio broadcasting, cable networks, machines for private reproduction and copying...), we cannot help but give the first priority to the fight against unemployment, and specifically here to the creation of jobs in the arts. • The media have been brilliantly successful in enlarging their audiences. It is therefore for the governments and regional and local authorities to help to enlarge the audience for other branches of creative art and for the dissemination of culture. The Commission is ready to make its contribution. If the world of books, the performing arts — opera, ballet, concerts or the theatre — and the cinema are to continue to give employment to authors, composers and performers, wider readership and wider audiences must be secured. The problem of feeding the media with programmes is already with us, and will become still more acute with the foreseeable proliferation of television channels and the imminent debut of the European satellite(s). If we allowed those authors and interpreters who can work for the media to disappear, we would end up in a perfectly absurd situation. For what would be the point of having such miraculous means of transmission if we no longer have anything to transmit or are doomed to inanity? • We must help the cultural workers to pull through a particularly difficult time so that they can look forward to a promising future. For they will soon find broad openings not only in the greater cultural demand resulting from the broadening of education and the extension of leisure time but also in the continuing development of the media. \ \ Gaston E. Thorn President of the Commission of the European Communities Introduction 1. The Commission considers that the time has come to take stock of its activities in the cultural sector. Nearly five years have passed since the communication of 22 November 1977 entitled 'Community action in the cultural sector'.1 An initial assessment can now be made. Major developments have occurred and currents of thoughts are emerging, both of which justify further appraisal. 2. The 1977 communication made both the institutions and those involved in cultural life aware of two things — the EEC Treaty covers cultural activities, and the institutions are mindful of the problems of cultural workers. The Commission welcomes the altogether favourable response to its communication from the European Parliament2 and the Economic and Social Committee.3 That paper was based on two findings: • Works produced by cultural workers and services supplied by them are products and services covered by the rules of the common market in the same way as other products and services and can obtain the maximum possible practical benefit through the application of those rules. • Artists who create or perform works must benefit from measures taken under the Treaties to achieve social progress (legislation, assistance from Community funds, Community policies, etc.) like all other workers. The Commission considered, and still considers, that Community action in the cultural sector should be both complementary and subsidiary to what was already being done internationally. There is therefore no duplication with the efficiently run activities of organizations like the Council of Europe, for which the development of culture is a prime objective. The support given by the budgetary authority, Parliament in particular, has been such that the funds set aside for the purpose have increased steadily, from 20700 EUA in 1976 to 706 500 ECU in 1982. The Commission has thus been able to finance a programme reflecting the guidelines set out in its communication. The main thrust has been the financing of 'Community grants', which provide a number of young people with the opportunity to undergo basic or advanced training in various S. 6/82 cultural professions, plus support for a number of cultural events of European interest. 3. The compatibility of this cultural purpose with a Community the nature and objectives of which are defined in primarily economic terms has been under consideration at the highest level ever since the problem first came to the forefront of attention at the Paris Summit of October 1972. Ten years later fresh concern was expressed even more cogently, both in the Memorandum on the Revitalization of the Community presented by the French Government4 and in the draft European Act sponsored by Mr Genscher and Mr Colombo.5 The work of Parliament's Committee on Youth, Culture, Education, Information and Sport has also made a valuable contribution. This paper largely takes its cue from the reports — on the social situation of cultural workers, on regional cultures and regional languages, on conservation of the architectural heritage, on promotion of the cinema, etc. — already adopted or being drafted by that Committee, and from the discussions held last year following a programme statement by the President of the Commission and a public hearing for cultural workers. As a result of the discussions of 24 November 1981, the Commission was able to identify the problems of the cultural sector, learn exactly how cultural workers feel about solutions to be worked out and ascertain that the principles and practicalities of those solutions had Parliament's support. Finally, the Agreement setting up the European Foundation was signed on 29 March 1982.6 The Commission's own activity will in due course have to dovetail with the work of the Foundation, whose role and purpose is mainly cultural. The needs of cultural life are so many and so varied that there is room for both Community action and the work of the Foundation, for they will be following quite different approaches. Their respective resources are not merged, but rather complement each other. Besides eliminating any duplication the aim must be to establish fruitful collaboration. 1 Supplement 6/77 - Bull. EC. 2 OJ C 39, 12.2.1979. 3 OJ C 128, 21.5.1979. 4 Bull. EC 11-1981, point 3.5.1. 5 Bull. EC 11-1981, point 3.4.1. 6 Bull. EC 3-1982, point 1.2.1 et seq. 7 meet the Bank's criteria and rules concerning eligibility. Moreover, the appropriation entered in the Community budget will allow interest rates on such loans to be reduced. The Bank's rates are among the most advantageous for loans of this • kind, but they are still close to those on the capital markets where the Bank obtains its funds. They may be too dear for promoters of conservation projects. A restored monument does not yield the same profit, out of which the loan can be repaid, as a recently built or expanded factory. Lastly, the loans from the EIB's own resources and the interest subsidies borne by the Community budget are not the only sources of Community financing. Depending on the project, these loans and interest subsidies might also be supplemented by financial assistance from other Community Funds. A case-by-case assessment should be made to determine whether and to what extent assistance from one or other of these Funds would be possible. Economic and social viability of conservation projects 22. When considering the pros and cons of a particular project the public authorities can fairly easily estimate both the cost and the benefit in terms of the number of people employed on the site. But it is hard for them to forecast the spinoff in tourist employment and altogether impossible to gauge in advance other economic and social adventages, such as the impact on regional development and the regional environment. The Commission will set up a group of experts to work out a method to enable those responsible to carry out a cost/benefit analysis of every intended conservation project. Clearly, this will simply serve as a pointer to guide the decisions that the national, regional and local authorities will have to take. The architectural heritage and the environment 23. In conclusion, it must be remembered that certain forms of pollution and nuisance are capable of causing irreversible damage to Europe's architectural heritage. For this reason the Commission intends to ensure that the conservation aspect is given its proper place in the action programme on the environment. One of its first tasks will be to list the buildings at greatest risk and to continue studies defining criteria for establishing cause-and-effect relationships for various types of pollution and nuisance. The Commission proposal for a Council directive concerning the assessment of the environmental effects of certain public and private projects1 makes provision for all applications for planning permission to contain a description and assessment of effects on the architectural heritage. Conclusion 24. There is no pretension to exert a direct influence on culture itself or to launch a European cultural policy; what stronger Community action in the cultural sector means in effect is linking its four constituents — free trade in cultural goods, improving the living and working conditions of cultural workers, widening the audience and conserving the architectural heritage — more closely to the economic and social roles which the Treaty assigns to the Community, to the resources — mainly legislative — that it provides, and to the various Community policies (vocational training, social and regional policies). The Commission would ask Parliament and the Council to take note of its intentions with regard to stronger Community action in the cultural sector. It is convinced that Parliament and the Council will make a valuable contribution to the debate it intends to organize. It will present concrete proposals to the Council in the light of this debate. OJ C 169, 9.7.1980; OJ C 110, 1.5.1982. 14 S. 6/82 Annexes Annex I Record cards for works of art 1. It is obviously useful to have a photograph when searching for stolen art works, but it is not enough in itself and must be supported by other means of identification. 2. The Commission will instruct a group of experts to compile the list of headings to be put on a form to be used by owners or custodians of works of art. By filling in this form for each major work that they own or have charge of, they will be able to establish the record card for that work; when combined with the photograph, it will constitute a kind of identity card. Should the work be stolen, the card can be given to the police and customs and to as many as possible of those people — museum curators, dealers, collectors — whose good faith the thieves or pedlars will try to abuse. Announcements in the trade press, or in especially serious cases in the ordinary newspapers, and on television will also be possible. 3. A general register of thefts will be compiled from all the cards on stolen works. It will be kept in one of the Member States by an office (to be specified) which will make all the necessary arrangements so that those concerned can consult it if they have doubts about the provenance of an item offered for sale to them. 4. It should be emphasized that: • the cards will not give technical details of the kind familiar to art historians, but a simple description that the layman can understand; • use of the cards will be voluntary and no charge will be made; they will not be compulsory but simply a facility offered in their own interest to owners and custodians of works of art, who will keep their cards to themselves and make them public only after there has been a theft. Annex II Improving the living and working conditions of cultural workers — Specific measures /. The first part of this annex considers in operational terms the principles set out in a number of articles of the EEC Treaty, in particular Articles 117 and 118. The second part deals with harmonization of taxation both of cultural workers and of culture. Harmonization of laws on copyright and related rights 2. The work now being done by Commission departments will result in a 'green paper' which will open a wide-ranging debate on these rights and relevant legislation. The harmonization of laws will also have to cover the work of creative craftsmen and photographers as well as droit de suite for plastic artists. Authors' and performers' rights 3. Because of its impact on employment, technological development has been seen to impoverish those who hold these rights. The general depression of their standard of living is in large part due to the anachronisms of legislation, which is trailing well behind technology. The Court of Justice has already spoken out against 'the breach made in legal systems for the protection of copyright by the increase in the use of reprography'.1 Reprography is not the only problem. There is also the problem of private recording by individuals using the latest reproduction techniques, a problem which will grow with the increase in the number of programmes offered in the home: cable networks, local television and, shortly, satellites. The measures being prepared will modernize the legislation so as to give authors and interpreters better protection against the adverse effects of technological development on their employment and their remuneration. 1 Case 90/79 Commission v France [1981] ECR 283, at p. 302. 16 S. 6/82 Good care will be taken not to overlook one particular practice which undeniably constitutes a criminal offence — pirating. The Community is duty bound to take action to counter what amounts to theft of the remuneration that authors and interpreters should get from the legitimate use of records, films and books in which they have invested their labour. It goes without saying that any such measures must surely fail if they are applied by each country on a purely national scale. Two directives are also planned. The first is specific to composers and playwrights. It takes account of what is in many respects a welcome trend in the financing of concerts and theatres. It often happens that government and local authority pay almost as much in subsidies as the public pays at the box office, and sometimes even more. The composer or the playwright suffers in that his remuneration is still calculated only on box office receipts, whereas those receipts have to meet only the portion of the expense that the grant does not cover and so do not increase very fast, certainly not as fast as the general cost of living. A new method of calculation should be applied so that the benefit of the grants is equitably shared between the three parties involved — the organizer of the concert or performance, who has very heavy expenses, the members of the audience, for whom the grant ensures reasonable prices, and the composer or playwright, who is otherwise unfairly robbed of a share of the actual receipts. The second is more general in scope. It will replace by a single copyright period followed by a period of collective authors' rightsl the five different copyright periods still operating in our 10 countries, which raise barriers to trade and distort competition. If nothing is tried before the accession of Spain the Community will eventually have six copyright periods ranging from 50 to 80 years. Protecting the work of creative craftsmen and photographers 4. The importance of this protection is commensurate with the cultural and social role of creative craftsmanship and the wide use to which photographers' work is put. Droite de suite for plastic artists 5. In its 1977 communication on Community action in the cultural sector the Commission annonced its intention of arranging for the introduction of 'resale rights' (droit de suite (Sheet 2)) in those countries which have not yet done so. The Commission is still convinced that something must be done to remove the inequality between the plastic artists in those countries and their counterparts in countries where the droit de suite assures them and their heirs of a share in the proceeds from successive sales. Studies 6. Until the Commission made a start on its studies on the economic, social, legal and taxation aspects of the world of literature, fine arts, music and the stage, little work had been done in this field in the Member States and none at all by the Community. These aspects with the laws that govern them and the prevailing practices were a kind of uncharted territory. The studies that have been made have established the contours of the cultural sector. They provide a firm basis for Community action. They also elucidate the various measures to be taken by the ministers with responsibility for culture and by the various circles actively concerned; in both cases extensive use has been made of the studies. This exploration is, of course, by no means complete; further studies still need to be made. 7. Wishing to have statistics to back up the studies for the sake of complete and reliable information, Parliament called for straight application of the second paragraph of Article 122 of the EEC Treaty, and invited the Commission to instruct the Statistical Office to gather and update statistics on the levels of employment (which really means unemployment), remuneration and social benefits among cultural workers. An outside institute has already been asked to devise a method of collating and processing the statistics. This work will soon be finished. The Office will then continue by means of successive studies to improve the information on one or other of the main features of the social situation of the cultural sector. The studies will be published as and when they are completed. 1 The principle and the benefits of collective authors' rights (the public domain associated with the distribution of proceeds from royalties) are explained on Sheet 1 attached to this paper. S. 6/82 17 Employment 8. By means of an amendment in the 1982 budget Parliament inserted an article headed 'Promotion of the cultural sector', which it justified as follows: The purpose of this article is to contribute towards the financing of a variety of projects and pilot schemes aimed at offering the public a wider variety of forms of cultural expression, thereby reducing the level of unemployment among cultural workers.' The appropriation under the new article will first be used for experiments to promote the cinema, the theatre and poetry, as well as the plastic arts in the form of the travelling exhibition of 'A hundred and fifty young Community painters' (Sheet 3). Job creation in the cultural sector is in line with the trend towards developing the tertiary sector. Moreover, the cost of the investment needed to create cultural employment is trivial when compared with the scale of industrial investments. Live performances could give employment, not only to performers, but also to a considerable number of administrators and technicians for lighting, sound, stage management and scenery design, costumes, the making of musical instruments, etc. Initial and advanced training 9. Since unemployment is at one of its peaks in the cultural sector, there are many more reasonably suitable applicants for one and the same job than in any other sector. Competition is such that more than anywhere else employment hangs upon qualifications. On an extremely tight labour market the chances of getting a job are not increased by, but indeed depend on, qualifications. Qualifications are obviously an individual solution to the employment problem. They are valid only in so far as they are part of the overall solution that national and local authorities can find, notably through cultural investments and the resultant wider audience. In the matter of qualifications the cultural sector is no exception: cultural workers, like all other workers, get their qualifications through training and retraining. Training 10. Community scholarships or grants have been instituted. They are awarded to young people who have chosen to follow one or other of the artistic occupations or crafts involved in the conservation of the architectural heritage and to a number of young people who intend to become stringed-instrument makers, instrumentalists, dancers, choreographers or composers, to name but a few. 11. Two training problems call for urgent solution. • The concern for viability sometimes prompts organizers of fee-paying training courses in stage work to accept and keep students whom they know for a fact are not gifted enough to have fair chance of finding work later. Poor training standards not infrequently compromise the future employment of apparently promising students. Legislative measures should be taken which spell out the moral and educational standards to be required of organizers and teachers giving feepaying courses. • Of all cultural workers it is dancers, male and female, who have the shortest careers. The problem of retraining them therefore arises much earlier. In some cases the answer could well be to make them ballet-masters or mistresses, assisting the choreographer in directing rehearsals. But nowhere in the Community (or, for that matter, in other countries) does any such specialized course exist. Ten Community grants a year should be awarded to a dancing school which starts a course for ballet-masters or mistresses. Advanced training 12. For advanced training Community action in the cultural sector makes use of either personal contacts (Sheet 4) or multinational activity: • at the end of their training young cultural workers may go on courses in a Community country other than their own, organized on the basis of Article 50 of the EEC Treaty; • experienced cultural workers from several Community countries put on various cultural events, to which the Community makes a financial contribution. 18 S. 6/82 The combination of at least two national practices in mounting these productions adds a new dimension to cultural exchanges. They no longer achieve only half their purpose in gratifying the audience. The performers gain from them too. Their skills are raised to the highest pitch by the valuable experience of working together. The best-known example is the Community Youth Orchestra. It provides full training and practice in ensemble playing and figures prominently on the labour market for young musicians, many of whom owe their subsequent engagement by one or other of our major symphony or opera orchestras to it. Another project sponsored by the Commission is that of the 'European Rooms' organized by the Norwich Castle Museum (the preparation of which involved the creation of a veritable network of museum curators throughout the Community). Luxembourg has the Wiltz European Festival, which owes its success to the efforts of German, French, Italian and Luxembourg actors, singers and musicians, who will be joined next year by a troupe of Dutch dancers. Collective bargaining between employers and workers 13. Collective negotiations should first endeavour to put an end to a practice still all too frequently found. Certain contractual clauses rob the economically weaker party — the author, translator, actor or musician — of one or other safeguard that the law is meant to give him. If employers and employees in the cultural sector were able to agree on arrangements concerning translators, the Commission would make strict compliance with those arrangements a condition for granting financial assistance to publishers as part of the standing operation 'Aid for literary translation'. Harmonization of taxation 14. In harmonization directives designed first and foremost to establish and operate the common market, due consideration should be given to other exigencies, including those relevant to the production and supply of cultural goods and services. A closer study should be made of the position of cultural goods and services in the establishment and operation of the common market, in order to define more precisely the quite substantial role that they play in it. Harmonization of taxation could have three targets: a tax system kinder to cultural foundations and patronage; the spreading of cultural workers' incomes over several tax years; lower VAT rates on cultural goods and services. A tax system kinder to cultural foundations and patronage 15. Since the scope for cultural foundations and patronage hinges closely on their tax position, the employment of cultural workers likewise depends on it. A Council recommendation to the Member States could be considered. Spreading cultural workers' incomes over several tax years 16. In some Community countries cultural workers are allowed to spread the taxable income from an exceptionally good year over several tax years. This system could well be applied throughout the Community. It does not constitute a privilege, but simply reflects the specific situation of cultural workers. The great majority of taxpayers enjoy a broadly stable income from year to year, the only variations resulting from the declining value of money and the normal advance of their careers if they are employees or of their business if they are not. In contrast, cultural workers are rewarded at highly irregular intervals. Their works provide an income only after a long period of gestation, during which they are reduced to living on the proceeds from previous work. Or an actor may get one season's work in between a whole series of seasons when, through no fault of his own but simply because the parts are not available, he finds himself virtually out of a job. Through the effect of the tax brackets a painter may fall into a high bracket for the year of an exhibition which enables him to sell pictures, and he then has a heavy, indeed excessive, tax bill. The same thing happens to an actor in a year full of engagements. Lower VAT rates on cultural goods and services 17. Compounding the difficulties of marketing, high VAT rates restrict openings and consequently employment for cultural workers. S. 6/82 19 Yet harmonization of VAT on all goods and services generally still covers only the basis of assessment. So we have to wait for the second stage before cultural goods and services can be subject to harmonized rates which allow for the needs of cultural workers, what cultural ventures can contribute and the exigencies of the dissemination of culture. 20 S. 6/82 Sheet 1 Collective authors' rights 1. The public domain associated with the distribution of proceeds from royalties extends the author's right (first for himself and later for his heirs) by collective authors' rights - for all living authors. In the Community this system exists only in Italy and, in a slightly different form, in France. 2. Clearly, an author must be paid for his work throughout his life. Likewise, this remuneration should normally go to his heirs during the 50 years after his death. What is wrong, however, is that the only effect of there being no charge thereafter is to boost the disseminator's (publisher's) profit. As this never results in a lowering of prices, readers and audiences get no benefit from the free public domain. It has no positive effect on the dissemination of culture. 3. General application of collective authors' rights would offer substantial advantages. The sums collected would swell the social and cultural funds set up by most authors' associations. The needs of social funds are far from being satisfied. The lack of resources is preventing the cultural funds from playing their role in promoting works. This means that it is the public authorities which, under their own cultural policies, bear almost the entire cost. If the authors could themselves bear a significant proportion of the burden they would have a fair share of the responsibility of promotion and would thus gain the more definite independence which the democratic countries in which we live cannot grudge them. 4. Initially, collective authors' rights will probably have to be confined to works which appear after the introduction of those rights and be applied for a specific period of, say, 20 years. But if the intention is to secure resources for really effective action, then these rights must eventually cover all works and remain in effect for as long as there are disseminators to exploit any one of them. The final objective is unlimited collective rights. Sheet 2 Droit de suite in the plastic arts 1. This consists of payment to the artist or his heirs of a percentage of the price obtained on successive sales of the work following the initial cession. In this way the artist obtains a financial share in the success obtained by his works throughout their life, and not just when they first appear. For creative artists in the plastic arts the time-limit applying to the droit de suite is of great importance, since it is very rare for their talent to be appreciated immediately: this generally demands a considerable lapse of time. In the absence of a droit de suite any appreciation in value brings no return to the creator or his heirs; however great the profits on each resale (a picture, for example, is often resold several times), they go exclusively to the successive owners and dealers. 2. Although the Member States are all signatories to the Berne Convention on the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works of 9 December 1886, into which the droit de suite was introduced by the revision of 26 June 1948, such rights exist dejure and de facto in only six of them: Belgium, Denmark, France, Italy, Luxembourg and the Federal Republic of Germany. General application of the droit de suite would not only eliminate the socially unacceptable inequality between artists in the various countries of the Community but also a situation which, in so far as it distorts competition on the art market, is inadmissible as regards the functioning of the common market. Since major sales (high value) tend to be held in countries where costs are lower, those countries where there is no droit de suite benefit from a distortion of competition within the meaning of Article 101 of the EEC Treaty. 3. The Intergovernmental Conference on Cultural Policies in Europe organized by Unesco in Helsinki in 1972 recommended that member countries should recognize the copyright of the artists concerned on all public sales of their works. The droit de suite comes up again in the Recommendation on the Condition of the Artist, adopted by Unesco in 1980. Sheet 3 The exhibition of 150 young Community painters 7. In 1983 and 1984 a travelling exhibition will tour nine capitals and, for Germany, the city of Cologne. It will display two canvasses by each of 150 painters. 2. 'Young painter' means someone who has not achieved fame but whose talent is recognized by his peers, the critics and the enlightened public. 3. These are precisely the painters who • can offer the public the most striking view of painters in the Community today, and who • need to have their work exhibited more widely in order to make a decisive stride in their careers. The Commission has already been concerned with their situation. In the middle of 1981, after a survey and preparation which took almost two years, it published the Handbook for Plastic Artists. Its purpose is to familiarize painters, as well as engravers and sculptors, with facilities to help them in their own countries and in other Community countries in which they wish to work. These include scholarships, prizes, help with their first exhibition, grants for purchasing equipment and studio space. It had been found that, knowing little of these facilities, artists were not making much use of them. So the Handbook served a purpose — and a social one. 3. The selection of painters to be hung in the exhibition will not be on a competitive basis between the Member States. They will be selected in each country by a national committee. 4. The originality of this exhibition is worthy of note. The Council of Europe, for example, from time to time sponsors widely admired exhibitions of outstanding treasures. Would the Commission, in turn, try to vie with it in terms of the prestige and market value of the works exhibited? It decided to aim for something completely different. The exhibition of 150 young Community painters will not be a glamorous collection of renowned pictures. Its great fascination is that it will display the work of artists who will the tomorrow's masters — those who will be painting for the 21st century. European Communities-Commission Stronger Community action in the cultural sector Supplement 6/82 - Bull. EC Luxembourg: Office for Official Publications of the European Communities 1983-28 pp.-17.6x25.0 cm DA, DE,GR, EN, FR, IT, NL ISBN 92-825-3529-0 Catalogue number: CB-NF-82-006-EN-C Price (excluding VAT) in Luxembourg: ECU 2 BFR90 IRL1.40 UKL1.20 USD 2 The Community must bear the same economic and social responsibilities towards the cultural sector that it bears towards other sectors under the Treaties. Stronger Community action in the cultural sector as proposed by the Commission will be organized along the following four lines: freedom of trade in cultural goods, improving the living and working conditions of cultural workers, enlarging the audience, and conservation of the architectural heritage. Salg og abonnement • Verkauf und Abonnement • llujArjoeit. 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International bookstore 4 Nikis Street Athens (126) Tel. 322 63 23 Telex 219410 ELEF Sub-agent for Northern Greece: Molho's Bookstore The Business Bookshop 10 Tsimiski Street Thessaloniki Tel. 275 271 Telex 4,12885 LIMO FRANCE Service de vente en France des publications des Communautes europeennes Journal officiel 26, rue Desaix 75732 Paris Cedex 15 Tel. (1) 578 61 39 GRAND-DUCHE DE LUXEMBOURG Office des publications officielles des Communautes europeennes 5, Rue du Commerce L-2985 Luxembourg Tel. 49 00 81 Telex PUBLOF - Lu 1322 CCP 19 190-81 CC bancaire BIL 8-109/6003/300 NEDERLAND Staatsdrukkerijen uitgeverijbedrijf Christoffel Plantijnstraat Postbus 20014 2500 EA 's-Gravenhage Tel. (070) 78 99 1 1 UNITED KINGDOM H.M. Stationery Office P 0 Box 569 London SE1 9NH Tel. (01) 928 69 77 ext 365 National Giro Account 582-1002 Sub-Agent: Alan Armstrong & Associates Sussex Place, Regent's Park London NW1 4SA Tel. (01) 723 39 02 Librairie C.E. Fritzes Regeringsgatan 12 Box 16356 103 27 Stockholm Tel. 08-23 89 00 UNITED STATES OF AMERICA European Community Information Service 2100 M Street, N.W. Suite 707 Washington, D.C. 20 037 Tel. (202) 862 95 00 CANADA Renouf Publishing Co.. Ltd. 2182 St. Catherine Street West Montreal Quebec H3H 1 M7 Tel. (514) 937 3519 JAPAN Kinokuniya Company Ltd. 17-7 Shinjuku 3-Chome Shiniuku-ku Tokyo 160-91 Tel. (03) 354 0131 Price (excluding VAT) in Luxembourg ECU2 BFR90 IRL1.40 UKL1.20 USD 2 ^ OFFICE FOR OFFICIAL PUBLICATIONS OFTHE EUROPEAN COMMUNITIES L-2985 Luxembourg ISBN lE-flES-BSEI-D