Singer-songwriter Sting has praised the galleries and gig venues that inspired him to pursue his dream when he was growing up in north-east England.
The Wallsend-born musician has thrown his weight – and money – behind fundraising for a £10m Endowment Fund to sustain “creative futures on Tyneside” at the Baltic Centre for Contemporary Art in Gateshead.
Ahead of an intimate gig at the venue in front of fellow donors, Sting said he did not know what he wanted to be growing up, but access to the arts lit a passion inside him.
“I didn’t want to work at the shipyard, I didn’t want to work in the coalmine, I had no idea, but art gave me some sort of clue as to what I would aspire to be,” he said.
The 74-year-old told the BBC that, as a youngster, venues across Newcastle offered him access to the world of art.
“When I was 16 I used to come to the Club a’Gogo and I saw Jimi Hendrix, I saw John Mayall.”
He recalled theatres showing black and white European art movies and watching the Northern Symphonia play with Andres Segovia.
“There was this exposure to something that was outside of what was offered to me.”
Describing himself as “a curious child”, he said accessing the arts gave him the hope this might be a world he could one day be part of.
Earlier this year, Sting has made an undisclosed donation to the Baltic’s fundraising drive.
Speaking to BBC Look North, he said the Baltic building, when it was a mill, had been a fixture in his life as a child as his dad would take him to the quayside every week.
“I’d see the Baltic flour mill, never thinking for a moment it would become a world-famous, contemporary art gallery.”
He said his donation was a way to repay his community and believed “successful Geordies” had a responsibility to help.
“The Baltic attracts people who can’t afford to go to posh institutions – it’s wonderful that [it’s free] because our future artists will come from this place.”
Sting also reiterated previous criticism of government funding cuts, which he said was because the arts were “a low hanging fruit”.
He called such cuts a “short-term solution, but long-term false economy”.
“Britain punches well above its weight in story telling – the world love our stories, our songs, our plays, our art.”
He said the shop floor for that revenue was in art galleries and music venues.
“This area is a hotbed of talent and it needs to be encouraged.”
The gala also saw a performance by another Tyneside-born musician, Nadine Shah, as well an an auction featuring one of the original rivets from the Grade II* listed Tyne Bridge.
Works by Damien Hirst, Antony Gormley and Anish Kapoor went under the hammer too, along with a week’s stay for 10 people at Sting’s Italian villa, which organisers hoped would raise £95,000.
