How art can soften an introduction to business with beautiful things

Declan Moylan and Paul Convery, of the law firm Mason Hayes & Curran, leave the office with a mission on Thursday evenings, when Dublin’s art galleries open their latest exhibitions. They try to resist the complimentary wine on offer, lest their judgment be clouded. “That happened once,” said Moylan, “we’re older and wiser now; more prudent.” After more than 20 years of art buying, the company has incorporated the wisdom acquired into a formal company policy.

“It’s a mature policy at this stage,” said Moylan, “it’s not just something that took our fancy one day.” It includes an annual spend, but also a commitment to contemporary art – all of their art works are from living artists – and a sole focus on the visual arts, which includes a selling exhibition at Christmas.

“The more you focus on one art form, the more you achieve,” said Moylan.

The collection now stands at about 100 pieces on display, including commissioned work such as a Corban Walker sculpture in the Barrow Street building’s atrium and work by artists such as Bridget Riley, Garrett Cormican, Stephen McKenna, Simon English, Eithne Jordan and John Boyd.

The most recent acquisition is by John Cronin, from the Green on Red Gallery on Lombard Street. Gallery owner Jerome Ó Drisceoil said, “It’s great there are people like Declan. It usually comes down to one passionate person in the company. It’s obviously very helpful to us.”

At a time when State subsidy for the arts in Ireland has been cut for a sixth successive year, down 34 per cent from €85m in 2008 to €56m for 2014, artists need and are increasingly seeking corporate support. Likewise, businesses engaged with the arts and entertainment have been successful in building big brands such as Bord Gáis Energy Theatre and smaller sponsorships such as between the Gaze Film Festival and Accenture; the Ballymaloe International Poetry Prize; Matheson and the National Gallery of Ireland's Family & Children Programme; The Dublin Lectures at The Little Museum of Dublin, part supported by Davy and Carmen Wines.

High-profile schemes for individual artists or organisations have included Diageo's Arthur Guinness Fund and Sky Arts Ignition. Bank of America Merrill Lynch's art and culture programme is involved in a number of projects including the restoration of well known paintings such as The Marriage of Strongbow and Aoife by Daniel Maclise.

There also exists smaller-scale partnerships such as the Google Mentoring Scheme, in tandem with Arts Audiences, which pairs an arts organisation with an arts-interested mentor from Google’s staff. The results have been significant for the participating companies’ digital marketing, with a direct impact on ticket sales.

Emily O’Dwyer from Glór in Ennis, Co Clare, was selected for the scheme last year. “It took away the mystique and fear of using Google AdWords for example,” said O’Dwyer, who had a target increase in online sales of 10 per cent. By the end of the mentoring they had increased by 112 per cent.“We are also a registered charity, so we get a Google grant of $3,000 (€2.2k) AdWords a day.”

Arts organisations can also come under the non-profit sector. IPB Insurance has recently launched its Youth and Community Fund of €1m, with some going to arts and cultural projects at local level. It’s not something that’s been widely promoted and the company see it as part of their wider social engagement. IPB’s chief executive Ronan Foley said, “Corporate social engagement is not a high-brow concept or a box-ticking exercise, we have an absolute conviction from board level to frontline staff that there is a better way to do business.”

Coca-Cola has a similar Thank You Fund, launched in 2011, to mark the company’s 125th anniversary. Over the past two years €250,000 has been donated to not-for-profit, voluntary and charitable organisations. In 2012 the overall winner was the Irish Olympic Handball Association but CoisCéim Dance Theatre were also successful in receiving €10,000 towards the Beat Project.

Philippa Donnellan is director of CoisCéim Broadreach and choreographed the Beat Project. “There was infrastructural support from CoisCéim too, so it wasn’t entirely funded by Coca Cola, but it wouldn’t have got off the ground without them.” However, one of the difficulties Donnellan sees in such funding opportunities is the draw of the new for business sponsorship, instead of sustainable partnerships that allow for long-term development.

“It’s quite hard to build a sustainable programme or to fund something already in existence. That edge on corporate funding which often sponsors the catchy and the new has its problems.

“We are absolutely looking for these funding opportunities, it’s essential, and I think it’s a good thing to be linking with businesses. That is hard to do, it’s hugely time consuming to build those relationships, but to build anything needs three to five years”.

Andrew Hetherington, project director at Business to Arts, the primary organisation supporting and instigating creative partnership between business and arts in Ireland, said “a lot of our time is spent making people aware of how the other’s processes work”.

In an international context, it is difficult to compare accurately business investment in the arts in Ireland to that in the UK and the US, due in part to inconsistent research methods, but it is evident we haven’t reached the same levels of private investment and corporate funding here.

“There is a lot more that can be done. Our organisation is there to advocate the opportunities that exist. There are high levels of sponsorship with arts organisations in the UK and art commissions of many million spent on public art. We haven’t got to that stage in Ireland yet, but the opportunity is there,” said Hetherington.

Declan Moylan pauses to consider the impact their art collection has at Mason Hayes & Curran.

“It provides a talking point to clients and visitors. Art provides a beautiful atmosphere and occasional controversy.

Not everything is joyfully accepted, but it’s good to hear those arguments in the lift. A building can be very sterile, when it’s full of beautiful things by talented people it socialises the place. It is a softened introduction to business”.