Monday 13 March 2023

Write the fine print.

This was going to be a post about the complications that may arise from the creation of a foundation, or stichting in Dutch, by artists or art organisations.
However, upon reading the legal text, it quickly became clear that the law actually provides quite a lot of freedom in how the statutes of such a stichting should be formalised.

Yet in my experience, art organisations quite often get in trouble down the line as the organisation changes in ways that were mandated by their own statutes. This happens even if they could theoretically have written almost anything they wanted in the statutes.
So instead of a cautionary tale about the intricacies of law, it will be a plea to please consider your statutes carefully and make sure they provide guidance and protection for the artistic and non-artistic integrity of your organisation as well as a continual focus on its core values. Because right now, a lot of you are simple copy-pasting some vague and generalised words that are considered good governance or common practice and in just as many cases those principles don't apply to what you do.