Research
Prof. Dr. Volker Kirchberg
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The importance of art and culture for urban development
2004-2011
At the center of this research project is the question of the contemporary importance of art and culture for urban development. And vice versa the question of the contemporary importance of the impact of urban development for the culture of a city is also pursued. The project has an interdisciplinary approach making use of urban sociology, urban geography and urban planning concerning the effect of culture in urban spaces. The theoretical basis involves the politically and economically controlled growth of cities (“Growth Machine” from Logan and Molotch), of creativity in the city (Florida, Landry etc.), governmentality (Foucault) and governance (Benz, Lange etc.) other urban planning theories (Fainstein etc.) and current cultural science discussions of space and city (the “spatial turn”). Considering the newness of this interdisciplinary research field, extensive empirical survey material was used inductively to gain qualitative knowledge.
The empirical base of the study was a comparison of two “second cities” (Hodos 2007). This comparison has a spatial dimension: Baltimore (USA) and Hamburg (Germany) were contrasted. It also has a temporal dimension: the change in the importance of culture for urban development in Baltimore was compared between 1989-90 and 2004-05. In the years 1989-90, 2004-05 (in Baltimore) and 2005-06 (in Hamburg), guided interviews were conducted with urban actors in the cultural sector: with directors of museums, theatres, orchestras, urban sector culture and art film theatres with the heads of regional and urban culture administrations and urban planners or project developers, who see cultural projects as part of urban development, e.g. neighborhood managers and members of the urban economic development. The Baltimore study of 2004-05 reproduces a study from the year 1989-90 (Kirchberg 1992).
An initial finding of the study shows that in comparison (the expert interviews were conducted 15 years apart) in Baltimore there was a noticeable change in the legitimation of art and culture for urban development and urban policy. At the end of the 1980s the direct impact of urban economic policy on culture was seen as crucial (keyword: “one-way profitability”), while in the first half of the ‘00s there was found to be an indirectly positive effect of artistic creativity on the post-industrial economic strength and the image of a (globally active) city (keyword: “creative city”). In addition in comparison the use of the arts and culture in urban development and urban policy on the part of urban planning authorities in Hamburg is found to be considerably more extensive, detailed and image-oriented than in Baltimore, which due to its much more complicated financial situation, but also due to a traditional orientation to grassroots democracy, gives more space to, or even promotes, citizen initiatives. Today in the two “second cities”, art and culture are not evaluated differently, but their instrumentalization is clearly different in both cities. This is illustrated by specific cultural spaces in the cities, the causes, developments and perspectives of which are evaluated and then analyzed, for each city, according to their differing socio-economic, political and cultural contexts.
The end of the project is planned for 2011 with the publication of a monograph. Research and teaching should complement each other and so I have taught a number of seminars on this topic: Towards the organization of culture in the city – Hamburg as a case study I, Towards the organization of culture in the city – Hamburg as a case study II, Creative city: towards the use of culture in the city, Culture and urban planning: theoretical foundations and practical examples
Urban impulses for creativity in '2-3 Strassen' (2-3 streets)?
2010—2011
The purpose of this project is to describe and analyze the multiple relations between creativity and urban development in three urban working-class neighborhoods in the Ruhr region as a part of the well-known German artist Jochen Gerz's art project '2-3 Strassen' (2-3 streets). These streets are located in the three cities Dortmund, Duisburg and Mülheim. Multiple and diverse social research methods (like expert surveys and interviews but also qualitative contents analysis plus photo elicitation) are applied for reviewing how 'artistic creativity' is developed and implemented by everyday local residents ('old' and 'new tenants') for changing these streets. It is thus assumed that this residents' creativity changes (improves?) their urban environment (physically and mentally); however, this has to be proven. The art project "2-3 Straßen. Eine Ausstellung in Städten des Ruhrgebiets“ takes place for the whole year 2010 and is realized by the NRW KULTURsekretariat as part of the activities within the framework of the European cultural capital RUHR.2010 (for more information on the artistic project see http://www.en.2-3strassen.eu).
Project leader: Prof. Dr. Volker Kirchberg, Leuphana University Lüneburg.
Team: Dr. Christoph Behnke, Annette Grigoleit, Anna Körs, Mark Nerlich.
eMotion – the psychogeographic museum: mapping museum experience
2008—2010
eMotion – an innovative field research experiment – investigates the experience of visitors with an exhibition of modern art (Kunstmuseum St. Gallen, Switzerland, summer 2009). The focus of the study is the psychogeographic effect of the museum and its objects on the experiences of the art recipients. Museum visitors taking part in the project receive an insight into their own perception of art and their physiological reactions during their visit to the museum. The accompanying social science research by Prof. Dr. Volker Kirchberg and Dr. Stéphanie Wintzerith records and analyses the important socio-economic and demographic as well as biographic individual characteristics that profoundly determine – according to international museum visitor studies – the exhibition experience and were crucial as context factors in the physiological-psychological survey in this interdisciplinary study.
The data recording was, in accordance with the interdisciplinary approach of the study – also multi-methodological. Visitors were fitted with sensor gloves for the duration of their visit that recorded the exact position of the visitor, his heart rate and the skin conductivity response and transmitted this data to a server. Immediately after his visit the visitor was confronted with a graphic depiction of his visit to the exhibition (‘tracking’ shown on a computer terminal with multicolor printout) and his emotional and cognitive reactions (variations in heart rate and skin conductivity). The visitor was also questioned as to his mental, physical and temporal reactions to the 53 exhibition pieces. This involved using at a number of phases (at the entrance, at the exit and a number of weeks later) a standardized questionnaire, with individual statistics and evaluations on the exhibition, on individual pieces as well as on the “learning curve” (i.e. the experiences before and after the visit) and on memory of the visit (in an online post-questionnaire a number of weeks later). Within this research team, the construction, operationalization, recording and analysis of the social science data – from the entrance, exit and post experience questionnaire – was the task of Prof. Kirchberg and Dr. Winterith. The results of the study will be presented in summer 2010. (see www.mapping-museum-experience.com/).
The study received major funding from the Swiss National Science Foundation.
Research and teaching should be complementary. In summer 2009 in Lüneburg a seminar on the topic was held: Exhibition experience and exhibition behavior – the theoretical and empirical study of an art exhibition visit.
A Survey of Surveys - An international comparative meta-study of representative population analyses on cultural consumption
2009-2010
This research project, which was given start-up financing by the Leuphana University, uses a culture and art sociology perspective to systematically (theory-driven), representatively (country-wide) and statistically (quantitatively) study the causes of non-consumption of institutionalized high culture (i.e. museums, theatre, classical concerts) in Germany. It is the first empirical study (in Germany) of the (non) consumption of high culture, which also has central theoretical importance. Furthermore analyses of high culture (non) consumption are also subjected to a temporal comparison (using data from 1995 in Germany) and in national comparison (to international studies). This involves studying especially non-social structural explanations of high culture (non) consumption, such as the individualization thesis (Beck), the omnivore thesis (Peterson) the thesis of change in the experience society (Schulze) and the thesis of a growing gap between the supply and demand of high culture.
Central to the (first) phase of the research project is carrying out as complete a review as possible of theories and international empirical studies of (non) consumption of high culture, setting up a database with international statistics for an initial comparative analysis of the hypotheses mentioned above and the formulation of empirically testable hypotheses and a discussion of operationalization concepts with research partners in Germany and (possibly) abroad. A follow-up proposal will finance a representative survey in Germany of high culture (non) visits, with special consideration given to regional conditions (country-city differences; East-West differences, immigration background for city populations).
The projects will be completed together with Robin Kuchar, M.A., who in collaboration with Sacha Kagan, M.A. in the summer semester 2010 will offer a seminar on audience research in the field of culture.
Social network analysis of art and culture in the Lüneburg region
2008 - ...
As part of the teaching and research on the organization of culture in the Sociology of the Arts unit of the ICRA (i.e. “Institute of Cultural Theory, Research, and the Arts”), alongside the theory of sociological neo-institutionalism (see my inaugural lecture “Why are cultural institutions pointless? Comments from the new institutionalism”) in recent years social network analysis has become another important theoretical and practical pillar of cultural organization research. Working together with interested students in project seminars is crucial to the success of the project. Since 2008 cultural institutions the networks have been studied in fine arts, literature, music and cultural policy, cultural administration and non-governmental culture promotion in the Lüneburg region. These network structures are a good indication of the level of awareness the management of these institutions (in cultural fields and in geographical/political spaces) have of the importance of the social embedding of these organizations. They also are the basis of an organizational analysis of cooperation and dependence, which as multi-dimensional causal and power factors are elementary in determining the strength or weakness of a cultural venue. The data of the survey were classified, visualized and evaluated with the help of the qualitative content analysis program Atlas.ti and the quantitative network analysis program PAJEK. An initial goal of this study (alongside students learning empirical skills) is the clarification of network strengths (e.g. bridge persons) and weaknesses (e.g. structural holes). The results are to be discussed in future with representatives of cultural venues in the region, giving suggestions for improved networking. In a later phase as part of an interdisciplinary research project, which itself is part of the innovation incubator (receiving EFRE funding), a comprehensive analysis will be carried out of the networking of culture (music, fine arts, literature, museums and heritage) in the convergence area (from the cities of Stade to Lüchow-Dannenberg) in order to strengthen the cultural sector of the region economically through improvements in networking in the cultural sector.
Entrepreneurial cultural promotion in times of economic crisis
2004 - 2010
This research project investigates the hypothesis that entrepreneurial cultural promotion (sponsoring, corporate endowments and philanthropic gifts) has undergone fundamental changes since the economic upheaval at the beginning of 2000. The numerous economic crises of this decade, caused by speculations (“bubbles”) in the New Economy, in the real estate and in the finance markets are contra-productive for securing the long-term promotion of culture by post-fordist companies and industries.
Between 1980 and the end of the 1990s the structure and extent of entrepreneurial cultural promotion was analyzed, particularly in American social science studies. More recently empirical interest in this topic has however declined. As a result the importance of the New Economy (that is, post-fordist economic industries) for entrepreneurial cultural promotion is now in general unclear, as are its economic, social and cultural effects on society. Especially in connection with the current discussion of the importance of “creative industries” it is important to pursue these research questions again. The data basis for investigating this thesis is secondary data of the Foundation Center in New York (from 1998 to present) on the entrepreneurial cultural promotion in the metro region of New York.