When an independent review into Creative Scotland found that artists were being choked and deflated by “endless bureaucracy” and urged the arts agency to take more risks, I was shocked.

Mainly because, finally, something has arrived striking at the heart of Scotland’s arts problem.

It’s an issue I’ve written about in this column multiple times into an endless void, and here was someone finally validating what I could see: that the Scottish arts have a complacency problem, and the top-down managerial structure of such a body only serves to make the culture surrounding us risk-averse and with lack of vision.

It results in the arts constantly coming up for their last gulps of survival, endlessly playing by the rules that such an overreach of bureaucracy establishes. How many budget cuts, funding gaps, closures, and lay-offs can it all take before the rules stop being so cared about, I wonder?

But it’s an accepted thing, and most struggle to comprehend arts and culture outside of this rigid system. The default escape for ambition is maybe having better luck down in London with your skills, talent, and perspective. It’s an attitude that infects Scotland as a whole and then finds its way into every manner of public life, and eventually in ourselves as citizens. You could call it tall poppy syndrome.

The arts have a lot more power than they realise, at least compared to other areas of society. It thrives on drive, ingenuity, thinking outside........

© Herald Scotland