Past, Present, and Future of the Bangkok Art & Culture Center(BACC)
“Bangkok Art & Culture Center” or “BACC” is a controversial public space under the special-purpose authority of Bangkok, the primate and capital city of Thailand. The idea for an arts center in Bangkok was first introduced in 1996, but due to the current difficult political situation and perhaps careless decision-making by Bangkok’s council, the focus shifted to street stores, local commercials, and vendors. The idea was revived by Bangkok council in 2005, marking the establishment of BACC as a hub of wisdom, knowledge, and creativity for all creative artists such as painters, musicians, poets, dancers, and other performers to showcase their skills and talents. From there, BACC can be seen partly as an arts center and gallery, and partly as a museum (Kunavichayanont, 2022). It is considered a public good in the sense that it has no rivalrousness and is non-excludable. The notion of “cultivating the mind” in this scenario is considered relevant to the development of intellectual growth. Thus, the relationship between the city council and BACC can be seen as an arm’s-length approach. BACC is organized by the non-governmental organization of the same name, which has its own operational and advisory department to operate the arts center. However, even though Bangkok council provides funding subsidies approximately 3 million AUD (Kunavichayanont, 2022) annually to support the operation, with restrictions such as prohibiting ticket sales, profit-based events, exhibitions, or festivals, it is difficult for BACC to continue to inspire future generations. Even though Bangkok council sees the romantic notion of artist genius and supports them through cultural production policies such as production subsidies and cultural policy institutions (Bell & Oakley, 2014), the lower restrictions and fully-committed supportive decision-making could perhaps benefit cultural development not only in Bangkok but also as a sense of national development. Should art be independent and inclusive? For Thai arts and culture, development is concentratedly centralized in the capital. Unlike the way Raymond Williams expected “arts and culture, as a free form of expression and idea of intellectual, moral, and aesthetic development should be inclusive,” judging from the successful results of great cities around the world, such as the emergence of African-US music genre known as hip hop in the USA in the 1970s and the emergence of punk scene and Madchester sound in Manchester, UK. Thai policymakers should aim to emphasize a new urban cultural sphere and transform the role of the city. All cities have their own uniqueness, and that distinctiveness can be represented as “centers of symbolic production and consumption.” Hence, the reevaluation of the theory of authoritative choice and structured interactions by Dennis & Maddison (2013), describing that if the government’s attention focuses on artistic and cultural development as “an authoritative framework of the government’s beliefs and intentions in the policy area” (Althaus, Bridgman & Davis, 2007), combined with fitted structured interactions, focusing on collective effort, shared goals, and division of elements, rather than assuming a single decision (Colebatch, 1998), would squeeze out the keen confidence of people to create arts.