Escaping a rock and a hard place: the documentary sector between art and business

Due to its specific character, as both an audiovisual media product and an art form, documentary finds itself stuck between artistic aspirations and commercial constraints. Documentary professionals in Europe are particularly concerned with the future of documentary as a space for public debate, as public material and immaterial support is decreasing. In addition, new technologies, such as new digital distribution platforms, disperse audiences. While they increase creative opportunity as well as interest in documentary (Austin, 2007) they have not yet resulted in robust alternative revenue sources. This precarious position complicates the formulation of a clear policy for the sector.

In 2017, the European Documentary Network (EDN, www.edn.dk) initiated the Media and Society project in an effort to develop policy recommendations to strengthen the documentary sector in Europe. Part of this initiative was a stakeholder consultation with professionals in the documentary sector. Filmmakers, producers, commissioning editors, policymakers and other documentary professionals were invited to share their experiences and opinions. We took part in this project by (1) developing a survey (N=211), by (2) guiding EDN in conducting focus group interviews (N=7), and (3) by analysing the results. The main question that accompanied this research was: how do stakeholders situate the European documentary sector within the wider context of arts, culture and media industries? Due to the limited study of documentary within Cultural/Creative Industries research, and because of the project parameters, we opted for a bottom-up approach, akin to grounded theory. This lead to a survey with multiple quantitative questions about financing, production and distribution practices. The focus group was guided by perceived challenges, opportunities and policy priorities for documentary.

It is evident from the data obtained that the documentary sector is a fragmented and economically fragile sector, characterised by a multitasking culture (Bilton, 2007), a flexible labour market (Blair, 2001, 2003; Steine and Schneider, 2013), small incomes and turnover, and a dependency on public funding (Sørensen, 2012; Zoellner, 2009). The results further suggest that documentary suffers from its ambiguous character as both part of entertainment and television, and fine arts (Chartrand, 2001, 2016).

On the one hand, respondents see documentary as a form for diverse cultural expressions with a clear societal role (Choi, 2018), that requires government protection. Filmmakers typically combine their art with other (documentary-related) jobs (Bilton, 2007). This might account for an observed lack of networks, collaboration and knowledge exchange. On the other hand, respondents see documentary as a medium capable of attracting larger audiences, potentially profitable through digital/online exploitation (Sørensen, 2014) - especially when focusing on new digital and/or interactive forms and formats. However, knowledge about proper innovative forms still needs to be developed (Ibrus and Ojamaa, 2014). The responses echo the lack of a coherent business model (Baumann and Hasenpusch, 2016) and linear television’s continued relevance (Doyle, 2016).