STREET ARTISTS IN EUROPE - Fondazione Fitzcarraldo

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Street Artists in Europe
The fact that safety rules vary a lot from country to country can cause problems to companies
when travelling and performing abroad, as well as to directors when choosing performances to
include in the programme of their festivals.
The safety rules more frequently named by the professionals concern the separation between
audience and performers, the presence of security people among the audience, and restrictions to
fire shows.
Sometimes the space where the performance takes place must be physically separated from the
space where the audience stands (this happens in Portugal, for example). This influences deeply
the “magic” of the show, because it makes much harder for the audience to feel as a part of the
show which is going (perceived therefore like a show, and not like a magic, parallel reality).
The same effect is given by the presence of security people (policemen etc.) among the
audience, a rule adopted by some countries such as Ireland.
Fire shows are submitted to very strict rules in some countries (as Italy and Holland) while are a
core element in many Spanish performances. This means that festival directors cannot invite
important foreign companies whose speciality concerns just fire shows.
According to many operators, self-regulation by festivals and companies, successfully applied in
some countries, and security commissions made up of professionals of the field, would be the
solution to this problem.
1.2.2. Conditions of employment for performers
The uncertainty in the form of engagement and in the contractual issues leads to a lack of social
and personal guarantees for performers 374 (artists often have no choice but “cultural selfemployment”,
as an interviewee said), as well as it happens for other social categories. Clearly,
for those having another work and dedicating themselves to street arts only in their free time,
there are other sources of social guarantees and assistance.
The difficulties related to social security are closely linked to the employment status of the
workers, who can even belong to different employment status at the same time. Also, working
on different live performance projects across the border does not automatically mean keeping
one’s original employment status. It is important to remember that in this artistic field
professional opportunities with very different employment models “suddenly appear or
disappear in a more unforeseeable way than in any other sector of the economy. There is no
established model or practice or any rule which mobile live performance workers in the EU
would systematically follow for their careers which can turn in completely unpredictable
ways” 375 . Mobility makes it all more complicated from the point of view of social security.
Unemployment benefits and health insurance too are regulated on a national basis: therefore, in
countries in which there is not this kind of guarantee for artists, if a performer has an accident or
• making sure that practitioners are highly trained (another reason why professional training and
development is so necessary in Scotland); and
• it must become involved in the setting and regulating of these standards.
In the UK, the street arts/circus sector has already become aware of the need to do this rather than passively
wait for standards to be decided by outside agencies with poor understanding of the way the industry works”.
374
Different kinds of contracts and forms of employment are listed in “Tax and social security”, by Judith Steines,
March 2004.
375
From "Study on impediments to mobility…", January, 2007.
PE 375.307