The Irish art world is supposedly going through a renaissance. Articles in The Guardian and The New York Times hail the growing influence of Irish music, novelists, film stars, and visual artists. Influential American culture magazine Vulture recently claimed that the Irish have “come to rule pop culture.”[1] . Back home, the Arts Council’s 2025 budget of €140 million is the largest ever.
Ireland’s impact on the global mainstream of contemporary popular culture is certainly testament to genuine artistic accomplishment. But this impact has been mediated through a market-driven model packaging Irishness for a global audience. While this can increase exposure, it offers little incentive for artists to explore or experiment beyond the familiar and marketable.
Artistic exploration requires funding. Artists, particularly those pushing the boundaries of convention, have always relied on a benefactor. In modern societies, the state often fills that role. In Ireland, the most significant institution in this regard is the Arts Council. Yet even with an expanded budget, demand far outpaces supply. Since 2019, applications have risen by 245 per cent. The Arts Council itself has acknowledged the need for further investment, especially in long-term infrastructure such as the proposed artist campus at Dublin Port.
This surge in applications signals a huge potential for artistic flourishing. But the failure of funding and infrastructure to keep pace risks choking that opportunity. Some artists have left Ireland and moved to Europe or other anglophone countries in search of ambitious opportunities and finance. While this has allowed for personal success, it has weakened the connection between those artists and the realities of Irish society. The art they create, while Irish in flavour, is often shaped by the concerns and tastes of other nations. Ireland’s artistic reputation, like its GDP, is to some extent inflated by foreign capital.
Non-domination and Artistic Freedom
In Republicanism: A Theory of Freedom & Government, Philip Pettit makes an important distinction between two types of liberty: non-interference and non-domination. Non-interference means that power exists but is not exercised – like a master who owns a slave but chooses not to punish them. The problem with freedom based on non-interference is clearly that the master still has the ability to interfere at any time. That is no real guarantee of freedom, just a hope and a prayer that the master remains benevolent.
In contrast, non-domination sees that power is structurally checked so that no one is subject to the will of another. The master doesn’t just choose not to punish the slave – they simply don’t have that power in the first place. Non-domination is the stronger, more resilient form of liberty that republicanism ought to strive for.
A free society, according to Pettit, is one in which people are not vulnerable to arbitrary control. Republicanism requires not just limits to interference but the elimination of the structures of domination that allow for such arbitrary interference in the first place.
However, while Pettit’s framework is useful, it doesn’t fully account for the economic realities of modern republics. Even in so-called free societies, corporations, billionaires, financial institutions exert enormous influence over our lives. A republic built on non-domination must also ensure that wealth and capital cannot be used to undermine self-rule.
This understanding of freedom brings us to an often-overlooked dimension of self-rule: artistic freedom. A republic truly committed to self-rule must provide the conditions for its citizens to think, imagine, and express themselves freely. Institutions that support art and culture are not secondary luxuries; they are fundamental to this process. A republic is sustained not just by laws and elections but by the continuous negotiation of meaning – by the ways its population questions, reinterprets, and redefines their collective identity.
Art plays a crucial role in this process because it expands the realm of what can be seen, said, and thought. Without institutions that foster independent artistic production, culture risks being shaped solely by market forces, political agendas, or the ideological priorities of the powerful. When artists are forced to please funders, survive on scraps, or tailor their work to commercial trends, public discourse narrows, and self-rule becomes an illusion rather than a reality. The freedom of artists to create without undue economic or political pressure is not a privilege, it is a measure of how genuinely a republic lives up to its commitment to self-rule free of domination.
If freedom is about more than just avoiding interference, then artistic freedom requires a space where non-domination is actively cultivated. But today many artists are forced to navigate a commercialised art world, where autonomy is only possible for the financially secure. Public institutions, museums, and arts councils have a critical role to play in countering this – ensuring that artists can contribute to society without being completely beholden to the rich and powerful.
Funding and the Arts
Artists in Ireland are struggling to survive, let alone thrive, in a system where support is limited and precarious. Though the Arts Council’s budget has grown, it still fails to meet the volume of requests. Why has this demand increased so dramatically? The answers are complex and speculative.
Life under contemporary capitalism has become increasingly difficult, and artists, like all workers, are facing higher living costs, precarious employment, and economic instability. In this context the need for external funding increases. Another possibility is that professional development programs have made artists more confident in applying for funding. Perhaps, in some ways, the public funding system may be working, empowering more artists to seek the support they need. Or, perhaps, Ireland’s demand for funding in the arts is growing not just because of increased support, but because artists are being swept up in the broader societal trend toward self-sufficiency and entrepreneurialism. Contemporary culture is full of messaging around “being your own boss” and escaping “the rat race”, and for many, the idea of being an independent artist, however precarious, may appear preferable to the security of selling their labour in a job they don’t believe in.
The promise of secure employment is increasingly elusive. The old trade-off – stable employment in exchange for long-term financial security – is no longer guaranteed. You could become a banker and still struggle to buy a home in Ireland or find yourself stuck in a cycle of short-term contracts with no real savings. If precarity is the new normal, then why not at least try to find meaningful work? For many artists, it feels more honest to embrace uncertainty, contributing to something real in the present and relying on a community for support, rather than clinging to a corporate job that increasingly offers the same instability under a different name.
Despite the clear appetite for the artistic work, the system to support it is inadequate. Artists are left scrambling for funding and constantly wary that their work might jeopardise their livelihood. True artistic freedom isn’t simply the absence of censorship – it demands conditions where artists can create without fear that speaking the wrong truth will cost them support, ensuring that culture remains a space of genuine critique rather than one shaped by economic coercion.
Without intervention, Ireland risks following the trajectory of countries like the United States, where cultural funding is almost entirely privatised. Artists rely heavily on corporate sponsorships, private foundations, and individual donors. This means that the arts are often subject to the ideological whims of the wealthy. If an artist’s work is deemed too radical, too critical, or too politically inconvenient, funding simply dries up.
Under Trump’s second term, attacks on cultural institutions have intensified. The National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) has been forced to comply with executive orders barring federal funds from supporting projects that promote diversity, equity, and inclusion or so-called “gender ideology.” These restrictions mark a renewed effort to suppress artistic expression, echoing conservative attacks in past culture wars. Artists and cultural workers are being systematically marginalised, their work censored or dismissed as “un-American.” Trump has also mandated that federal public buildings adhere to traditional and classical architectural styles, rejecting modernist designs. The American Institute of Architects has criticised this directive, expressing concern that such mandates stifle innovation and harm local communities.[2] This is all part of a broader effort to culturally reshape the US in line with Trump’s authoritarian vision.
Some in Ireland may assume that such restrictions on artistic freedom could never happen here. But, if we look at Britain, we see a dangerous shift in arts funding and cultural policy. As the arts in Britain experience a funding crisis, museums and galleries are under dire financial constraints; many have closed or are on the brink of closure. Major institutions like Goldsmiths University are slashing humanities programs and Kingston University is proposing the complete closure of its humanities department[3]. We see this turn against artistic freedom in the British state’s suppression of Kneecap’s artistic expression.
Across the board, support for the arts is shrinking, and Ireland is not immune. As the right-wing parties like Ireland First, the National Party, the Irish People and Aontú gain ground, all promoting culturally conservative agendas, it becomes increasingly clear that artistic freedom cannot be taken for granted. A republic that does not actively protect its cultural institutions risks sliding into the same situation where artists do not have the support and resources to express themselves freely, but instead must produce art for those with the deepest pockets and most political power.
What Kind of Republic?
Ireland’s history offers an example of how republicanism, if not constantly evolving, can fall short of true self-rule. The southern state emerged from a struggle for self-determination, rejecting British rule in favour of governing itself. This self-rule has been compromised over time – not by a return to monarchy, but by economic forces that have gradually eroded democratic public power.
Today, Ireland is dominated by multinational, predominantly North American, corporations like Apple and Google. An unresolved housing crisis continues to dictate the lives of countless citizens. These are modern examples of the unchecked power Pettit warns against. If Irish republicanism is to truly mean self-rule, then it must extend beyond just political institutions – it must address economic structures and cultural institutions as well.
If art is forced to serve corporate interests or political agendas, it ceases to be a space for genuine self-expression. Real artistic freedom requires more than the absence of censorship. It requires stable, public infrastructure that allows artists to create freely and critically. This is not idealism. It is a necessary condition for democratic life. Art and culture shape the public imagination. They influence what people believe is possible. If culture is dictated by the wealthiest voices, it ceases to reflect the collective. It becomes a tool of domination.
A true republic is not just about rejecting monarchs – it’s about ensuring that no one, whether a king, a CEO, or a financial institution, has unchecked power over others. Pettit’s theory of non-domination gives us a framework to understand that, but it needs to go further. A republic that allows corporate oligarchs to dictate economic policy is no freer than one ruled by a monarch. A republic that leaves artists scrambling for funding, unable to freely create and critique their society, is not fully self-ruled.
So, what does a complete republic look like? It looks like a system where institutions don’t just prevent interference but actively ensure that no force – be it political, economic, or cultural – can arbitrarily dictate the lives of others. It means stronger worker protections, real checks on the power of capital, and robust public investment in the arts. It means recognising that self-rule isn’t just about what we reject, but what we build in its place. And this includes the cultural institutions that shape collective understandings.
In Ireland, like in so many other places, the task of building the republic remains a work in progress. But if we are serious about self-rule, then we must expand our understanding of what domination really means – and commit to dismantling it, wherever it exists. We must take artistic freedom seriously. We must ask: who pays the artist? And what does that say about who truly holds power?
[1] https://www.vulture.com/article/how-the-irish-came-to-rule-pop-culture.html
[2] https://www.theartnewspaper.com/2025/01/22/architects-denounce-trump-traditional-classical-architecture-executive-order
[3] https://www.e-flux.com/notes/658933/open-letter-from-crmep-students-researchers-on-kingston-university-s-proposed-closure-of-the-department-of-humanities
Sara Muthi is a writer and the Curatorial Fellow at the Irish Museum of Modern Art. Joshua Muthi is a writer and recent graduate of History and Politics at University College Dublin.