Culture | Money and the arts

Britain’s arts still dazzle the world

But they are being diminished by a funding crisis

Children on a school visit surround the Lely's Venus statue in the British Museum, London, UK. — Photograph: Alamy

Feb 29th 2024

It was a cruel and dramatic scene. (Cue the sombre score.) On February 15th, during the final performance of “The Handmaid’s Tale”, an opera based on Margaret Atwood’s novel at the London Coliseum theatre, singers and members of the orchestra were handed redundancy notices by the English National Opera (eno). The notices followed a deal the ENO had struck with its musicians, who had threatened to down fiddles and flutes over plans to cut work. (The ENO says staff will be rehired and offered new seven-month contracts to replace ten-month ones.)

This article appeared in the Culture section of the print edition under the headline “Death by a thousand cuts”