Sculpture Park proves value of our cultural sector – The Yorkshire Post says

Operations worker Andrew McCallum cleans Damian Hirst's unicorn Myth as work continues behind the scenes during the lockdown period at the Yorkshire Sculpture Park. Picture: Tony JohnsonOperations worker Andrew McCallum cleans Damian Hirst's unicorn Myth as work continues behind the scenes during the lockdown period at the Yorkshire Sculpture Park. Picture: Tony Johnson
Operations worker Andrew McCallum cleans Damian Hirst's unicorn Myth as work continues behind the scenes during the lockdown period at the Yorkshire Sculpture Park. Picture: Tony Johnson | 'JPIMedia Resell'
THE first signs that life at the Yorkshire Sculpture Park is returning to something approaching normal are welcome indeed, for if ever an attraction was designed for social distancing, this is it.

The exhibits dotted across its 500 glorious acres are well enough spaced to organise a game of cricket in between.

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It is without doubt a world-class exhibition space, and indeed it was one of the institutions behind the global Yorkshire Sculpture Festival last year – but the absence of visitors these last few months, at the very height of its season, has cruelly exposed the fragility of the infrastructure within the arts and creative sector.

Just a year after opening its stunning new visitor centre and restaurant, it finds itself having to make emergency applications for funds to the Arts Council. Needless to say, it will not be alone in so doing.

Yet quarantine has proved the importance of art and the outdoors to our national wellbeing. We need them more than ever – especially when they are as one.

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Editor’s note: first and foremost - and rarely have I written down these words with more sincerity - I hope this finds you well.

Almost certainly you are here because you value the quality and the integrity of the journalism produced by The Yorkshire Post’s journalists - almost all of which live alongside you in Yorkshire, spending the wages they earn with Yorkshire businesses - who last year took this title to the industry watchdog’s Most Trusted Newspaper in Britain accolade.

And that is why I must make an urgent request of you: as advertising revenue declines, your support becomes evermore crucial to the maintenance of the journalistic standards expected of The Yorkshire Post. If you can, safely, please buy a paper or take up a subscription. We want to continue to make you proud of Yorkshire’s National Newspaper but we are going to need your help.

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Postal subscription copies can be ordered by calling 0330 4030066 or by emailing [email protected]. Vouchers, to be exchanged at retail sales outlets - our newsagents need you, too - can be subscribed to by contacting subscriptions on 0330 1235950 or by visiting www.localsubsplus.co.uk where you should select The Yorkshire Post from the list of titles available.

If you want to help right now, download our tablet app from the App / Play Stores. Every contribution you make helps to provide this county with the best regional journalism in the country.

Sincerely. Thank you.

James Mitchinson

Editor

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