Historical Formation and Development of Cultural Centres in Latvia

Abstract

Cultural centres are multifunctional cultural institutions that provide access to culture throughout Latvia, from smaller local municipalities to larger cities. Cultural centres act as interdisciplinary institutions that provide a wide variety of cultural services and partake in the realisation of all national cultural policy priorities. Throughout Latvia, there are more than five hundred municipal cultural centres. Some attempts have been made to set up non-governmental and private cultural centres, but there is a lack of comprehensive data on these initiatives. The research framework includes author’s analysis of the historical formation and development of Latvian cultural centres from the 18th century to the present day. The aim of the study is to identify and compare the main functions of cultural centres in each period of their historical development in order to explore the genesis of the modern cultural centre and the validity of the historical classification of cultural centres in cultural policy planning documents. The outcome of the work will lead to a proposal for a new periodisation that can be used in future research on the development of cultural centres as well as in policy planning.