More than ever, organized events are of interest to scholars of management and economic geography. Organized events are temporary social organisations, fleeting in and out of existence, shaping the development of organisational fields. Meyer, Gaba and Colwell have coined the term ‘field configuring events’ to denote such happenings as ‘places where business cards are exchanged, networks are constructed, regulations are advanced, deals are struck, and standards are set.’In the context of the creative industry in particular, organized events have been studied as selection mechanisms and sites for the negotiation of values. Organized events play an important role in constituting creative markets as well as the creation of symbolic and cultural values in these industries. Behind the scenes, organized events are important mechanisms for structuring activities, networks, values and resource flows. Film and music festivals, for instance, are not only a source of entertainment or a source of revenue for event organizers. They also perform other functions for the film and music industries such as providing entry points for new actors or forming temporary ‘ecologies of learning’, in the words of Rülling and Strandgaard Pedersen. Trade fairs, according to Appadurai, constitute ‘tournaments of value’ similar to award ceremonies. Being present at one of the four major worldwide art fairs, for instance, means more prestige for both galleries and artists. Events thus contain and represent a given field, but in their turn also influence that field. Events such as film festivals function as ‘boundary organizations’ at the crossroads of art and commerce as they bring together artists with industry and media actors. Usually embed¬ded, sponsored and utilized by cities, they are also at the intersection of local creative clusters and global networks. In her analysis of industry fairs in the fashion industry, Skov speaks of ‘intermediary fairs’ that bring together a large set of globally dispersed actors and influence far more than just export activities. Similarly, a music festival is not only a bridge between musicians and consumers, but also connects these groups to media agents. Many actors thus hold high stakes in events that more than once function as central nodes in an industry.
Methodology
We know that events influence cultural fields, but how does this process actually function? In order to understand the way ‘field configuring events’ influence markets and are embedded within their social and spatial surroundings, I have chosen Berlin’s design market as a case study. My approach focused on the role of informal micro-events that are organized by so-called young, ‘budding’ culturepreneurs. The aim is to gain access to their place-making processes, interactions, narrations and self-descriptions that form the cornerstones of events such as openings, closings, project presentations and irregular happenings. I have selected a number of individual cases and used semi-standardized interviews to describe the development of the entrepreneurial approach in Berlin, and to reveal how young culturepreneurs define their professional practices in relation to their surroundings, both social and spatial.Looking to academic research in this field, it appears that recent socio-spatial analyses focus on such concepts as cultural codes, the meaning of space and processes of (de)evaluation. The focus of spatial analysis has shifted towards understanding the relationships between cultural codes, physical spaces, materialized spatial constructions and culturally coded identities. Following Tor Hernes we shifted from the term ‘context’ to that of ‘space’ as the central concept for understanding the logic and social embeddedness of organizations.In order to analyze the field configuring events as a way to form, influence and access markets, I used a combination of network and milieu analyses. The culturepreneurs I investigated were chosen using a specific set of criteria: work performance as a designer, operation as an independent businessperson for at least two years, and the renting of workspace in Berlin.I selected case studies by means of minimal and maximal contrast rules and also executed a number of individual case studies, aimed at uncovering larger themes on the basis of semi-standardized interviews.
Perspectives
My empirical observations demonstrate that a distinct place-making process turns the field into a potential place of social interaction. Although the spatial dimensions of an event are programmed by the organizers, the visitors start to interact with the spatial opportunities and thus create their own program.An event is an opportunity to highlight relevant actors in a certain field. It is thus, among other similar events, an important opportunity and occasion to shape the market by distinct products, practices and perspectives on what is ‘state of the art’. Field configuring events are a frame to understand the emergence of markets and their contexts within social and spatial dimensions in a setting where there is no pre-developed or externally evaluated set of production standards. Although the mood at these events is generally rather playful, informal and loose, many new culturepreneurs are seeking to distance themselves from usual entrepreneurial behaviours. Events are an occasion for culturepreneurs to position themselves as newcomers and as permanent mavericks, thereby allowing them to be considered as innovators and founders of new trends and styles. With interpretative methodologies, it was possible to show that young cultural entrepreneurs in this market attach far more importance to an informal milieu and network knowledge than to more standardized and codified forms of technical, management, business and organizational knowledge. In contrast with these more formalized modes of knowledge the ability to know how, where and when to interact with others is of the utmost importance. The network and milieu forms of knowledge have a distinct, but not essential relation to space and place. Considering creativity as a decisive source for competitive advantage, it is crucial to shift the focus to spatially relevant practices in the field of symbolic production, because symbolically designed products must be assessed, enriched and upgraded first and foremost in social spaces. The creation of new genres, formats and products is connected with inventing narratives and social practices, as well as with strategies to place these products symbolically but also spatially in urban-based social places. Before being able to talk about, let alone sell and distribute products, it is necessary to invent a narrative connected to the product and to social practices. This allows clients to later talk about a (immaterial) product to others. The encounter with an immaterial good, which is an important part of the process, has to happen on the basis of emotional experiences. While focussing on the way in which products are introduced into the markets of creative industries, it is important to take into consideration these immaterial products. Symbols, signs, sounds etcetera not only have to be communicated in social networks, but should also be selected and evaluated beforehand on the basis of their performative and atmospheric qualities. That is why products have to be placed in carefully and consciously arranged places – such as gallery openings, exhibitions, show cases, clubs or fairs, in order to allow performances to take place at all. Symbolic products thereby acquire social relevance. From this perspective, producing symbols is a social process that is stimulated, fostered, orchestrated or hampered by specific organizational as well as spatial contexts.The category of space and spacing opens up the opportunity to analyze processes of product-based symbolic upgrading as well as re-evaluation in the field of creative industries. Forming space aims to achieve a necessary degree of professional competence with which they can present their symbolic products. These spaces provide an atmosphere-based around immaterial products. Professional scenes need club events, galleries, exhibitions, flexible fairs and staged office openings, that can be understood as temporary place-makings resulting from social formation on the urban stage. Scene-related clubbing practices not only have infiltrated the formation of professional identities as well as respective entrepreneurial strategies to access markets, they have even become a constitutive prerequisite to forming an entrepreneurial identity in the first place.
