The decentralization of actions, the strengthening of public cultural policies and the promotion of culture were elected as priorities of the current administration of the General Superintendence of Culture, linked to the Secretariat of Social Communication and Culture (SECC). More than managing public resources, the work was directed to provide means for artists, producers and municipal cultural managers to participate more actively in cultural policies. In this interview, the General Superintendent of Culture of the State, Luciana Casagrande Pereira, details the main actions and programs of the administration.
The State of Paraná has a program to promote and encourage culture, PROFICE. How do you evaluate the program?
PROFICE is our largest program to promote and encourage culture. It is incorporated into the state's public cultural policies, but it is still constantly evaluated and improved. In 2019, the third edition of PROFICE was launched, covering 169 projects from all macro-regions of Paraná, with more than R$32 million. Now, in 2022, PROFICE has reached its fourth edition, completely reformulated after extensive construction with civil society to ensure better distribution of tax exemption resources. R$40,9 million is earmarked for the collection of projects approved by the call for proposals. This represents an increase of almost 30% in resources compared to the last edition.
The Covid-19 pandemic has hit people who work in culture hard. How has SECC worked to alleviate this period of loss for these citizens?
Indeed, the audiences are gone, and with them the jobs and income of cultural workers. The Superintendence of Culture worked with other states and civil society to get the federal government to approve an unprecedented R$3 billion for the cultural sector. The Aldir Blanc Law was then created in honor of the great composer, one of the thousands of victims of Covid-19.
But before the resources from the Aldir Blanc Law were available, the government of Paraná launched an emergency package to mitigate the effects of the pandemic on the families of these people. The package included: the Cultura Feita em Casa (Culture Made at Home) public notice; the second edition of the Paraná Cultural Program; the Salão Paranaense (Paraná Salon) of the Paraná Museum of Contemporary Art – one of the most important and traditional visual arts awards in Brazil; and the Digital Library Award, through the Paraná Public Library. Entrepreneurs in the creative sector were also able to participate in the state government's Recupera Paraná program.
When the funds from the Aldir Blanc Law were released, we were able to launch calls for proposals and programs to qualify and assist cultural workers. Some of these were possible thanks to technical partnerships with universities and institutions. These partnerships greatly expanded the scope of our public cultural policies.
Paraná launched the largest and most comprehensive cultural qualification program in the country, the Cultural Qualification Grant, investing R$36 million. The grant, paid and operated by the State University of Ponta Grossa (UEPG), served participants from almost all municipalities in the state.
Still in the field of qualification, but now aimed at cultural entrepreneurs, Cultura Paraná, in partnership with the State University of Londrina (UEL), launched the Bolsa Cultural Paraná Criativo, which awarded 950 individual microentrepreneurs and microbusiness owners more than R$15 million.
The premise was to qualify as many people as possible to strengthen the cultural chain as a whole, since more people in more municipalities are able to participate in the calls for proposals and programs, decentralizing resources. With more people trained, we are already seeing the result in greater cultural production reaching the population.
During these two years of the pandemic, the Superintendence of Culture has looked at segments that were not previously covered. Just to give an example: R$2,8 million was allocated to Traditional Knowledge and Practices; R$8 million was allocated to the Lifetime Achievement Award; R$5,3 million was allocated to the Memorial of Experiences; R$1,92 million was allocated to the Urban Art: Graffiti, Education and Art – Colorful Schools of Paraná; and R$5,3 million was allocated to the unprecedented Cultural Technicians Award.
What was it like managing culture remotely, with the huge challenge of getting resources to those who needed them?
In 2020 alone, at the height of the pandemic, the State Council for Culture, responsible for deliberating with the Superintendence on emergency cultural policies or not, met virtually 36 times. The SECC also created and solidified a biweekly communication mechanism with municipal cultural managers through the Dialogue Cycle with Municipalities for the constant exchange of experiences. Through the cycle, we presented, listened to, and discussed the main challenges facing culture in our state, also at the municipal level. This made a huge difference in facing this atypical period.
We can also include in our approach the creation of the Paraná Cultura streaming platform. This portal hosts and makes available for free more than one thousand and six hundred productions created during the pandemic by both people benefiting from the public notices and our cultural institutions such as the Centro Cultural Teatro Guaíra and the Paraná Public Library.
Between 2020 and 2021, more than 1.300 public culture managers were trained in free courses in the distance learning system in the areas of Development of Cultural Projects, History of Art, Public Policies, Photography and Cinema.
This year, all municipalities in Paraná will be able to implement their own Municipal Culture System through a training and advisory program offered to municipal culture managers and directors. Cultural agents will receive this training at UEPG and will travel to all regions of the state to share this knowledge, which will strengthen the management mechanisms of the municipalities.
How is the recovery of Culture going after the pandemic?
In-person cultural decentralization initiatives have resumed with full force. For the first time, the Oscar Niemeyer Museum has extended its collection to other cities, such as Cascavel, which received an advanced museum platform with part of the collection of works from the “Africa” exhibition. The MON has also held numerous traveling exhibitions throughout the state.
The Teatro Guaíra Para Todos program, from the Centro Cultural Teatro Guaíra, has brought free performances by the Balé Guaíra and the Paraná Symphony Orchestra to all macro-regions of the state, with emphasis on the resounding success of the Clássicos Sertanejos in May and June 2022. There were around 12 thousand spectators in five cities in Paraná.
Another highlight of the post-pandemic decentralization is the second edition of Cinema na Praça, which, through a partnership with the private sector and municipalities, brings free film sessions to thirty cities in the interior of the state. Approximately R$1,6 million was invested in the two editions.
With funding from the state government and private initiative, the Children in the Theater program will bring classics of children's literature to more than one hundred thousand students in the state public school system throughout Paraná. A total of R$1,5 million is being invested in this first edition.
In parallel with all these actions aimed at the public, the Cultural Employment Agency (ATC), the first and only in the country, has been very successful in connecting job seekers with companies in the cultural and creative economy segments. The ATC is already an important employment tool for the creative economy with an effectiveness rate of 95%.
