Engaged with the Arts: Writings from the Frontline

John Tusa, celebrated broadcaster and journalist, and Managing Director of London's Barbican Centre for the arts, has written this selection of passionately argued, candid and challenging essays on the state of the arts in Britain today.  He seeks out the ways in which the arts - from film through theatre to music and opera - can be made to blossom in this cultural and political climate, with cuts in arts funding ever threatened.  His subjects are the fundamentals of government arts decision-making, the art of living without objectives, whether leadership in the arts is a mystery or good sense.  He tells the true story of arts philanthropy and offers more personal pieces, for example on the great power of music. His own philosophy, which informs his successful management of the Barbican, is refreshing, eschewing contemporary obsession with 'objectives' and giving us a rare view of how a large multi-arts behemoth actually works;  and he of course looks to the future with prescience.  Most of all his is a call for us urgently to think about why art matters so crucially for us all.