Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thanks to the clerk for accommodating us.
My name is Dominic Lloyd, and I have been managing arts funding programs with the Winnipeg Arts Council for eight years now, prior to which I worked in the Canadian music industry for almost a dozen years.
The importance of the arts to our quality of life, to the cultural, social, and economic well-being of Canada, cannot be overstated. However, even more important is the value of art itself. The creative ingenuity of people for its own purpose. Experiencing the arts provides us the capacity to perceive, to feel, to interpret the world, and to build empathy.
What is less often stated but should always be at the forefront of our discussions is the recognition of the individual artist as the primary source of creative activity in all artistic disciplines. Without artists, quite simply, there's no art. This is what drives the Winnipeg Arts Council, and we ask today that you too keep this in mind as you cross the country and develop legislation that will have a great impact on the entire Canadian cultural ecology.
Innovation is a word that's bandied about all the time as though it were a new concept, but by definition, artists are innovators. They've always been the ones looking for new ways to express our goals as a society and to interpret the world. It follows that where conversations around ownership and financial rights of creative material occur, they must involve artists, first and foremost, and their interests must remain paramount in your deliberations.
Here in Winnipeg, we know that the arts are a significant contributor to the economy. Independent research from PRA in 2014 showed that the arts employ over 26,000 people in our city, and contribute over a billion dollars to our GDP. It sound impressive until one considers Hill Strategies' research from the same year, which showed that artists in Canada are earning, on average, $33,000 a year, which is high when you consider the income of artists in the visual arts, music, and dance.
We know that artists in Canada do what they do with very little money, but the work they do is essential to building our community, our identity, and our economy, and their interests above all must be included in your discussion.