This past week I read Nina Simon’s new book, The Art of Relevance. I am a tremendous admirer of Simon and have many times used her transformation of the Santa Cruz Museum of Art & History from an object-oriented museum to a participatory museum as one example of how to make a permanently failing arts organization more broadly relevant. As I recently remarked in a keynote address: Since Simon became executive director of her museum, attendance has tripled, membership has increased by 50 percent, and more than 4,000 local artists and … [Read more...]
When communities become markets, citizens become consumers, and culture becomes an exploitable product
A couple weeks back I had the privilege to give a talk in Christchurch, NZ at an event called The Big Conversation—hosted by Creative New Zealand, the major arts funding body for the country. The talk, Transformation or Bust: When Hustling Ticket Sales and Contributions is Just Not Cutting It Anymore (click on the link and it will take you to a transcript) was intended to address the general conference theme, Embracing Arts / Embracing Audiences. It was assembled on top of four cornerstone ideas: Michael Sandel’s argument that we have … [Read more...]
The Value of Intrinsic Value in the Arts: A Guest Post by Carter Gillies
In recent years an artist named Carter Gillies has written to me with some regularity in response to Jumper posts. I have always valued his letters, which are invariably insightful, provocative, warm, and encouraging. Recently, Carter dropped me a line and mentioned that he had come across a Facebook post by Clay Lord soliciting a better framing of the intrinsic/instrumental distinction. Carter then shared that he had been rather astonished by the manner in which the word 'intrinsic' was being used by arts types posting comments as it was … [Read more...]
Irvine asks: Is there an issue in the arts field more urgent than engagement? My answer: Yes.
A couple weeks back the Irvine Foundation launched an online Q&A series, Are We Doing Enough?—aimed at “exploring tough questions about engagement practices and programming." I was delighted and honored to be one of a small group of “outsiders” asked to provide some reflections in response to one of the Qs. The first two issues of the series (Part 1 and Part 2) featured a group of Irvine’s current grantees, as well as Irvine arts program director Josephine Ramirez, addressing such questions as: Should artists be responsible for creating art … [Read more...]
A Q&A on the Beauty Class with Students from the SAIC
Recently, I received an email from a student at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, preparing for a seminar on Arts Organizations in Society. She asked if I would be willing to Skype into the seminar to answer a few questions about the beauty class. Since the time difference made this impossible, I suggested that she email me a few questions and I answer them on a video, which could be played during class. Here are the questions the student sent me (with the times on the video where you can find my responses). What was it like for … [Read more...]
The role of the arts in our interdependent world: hopeful signs but there’s still work to be done
While in NYC last month I attended a forum produced at the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts aimed at exploring the role of the arts in an interdependent society. The forum was held in conjunction with the 13th annual Global Interdependence Day. To be honest, when I received the invitation I had no idea such a day existed and felt a bit sheepish that I had missed the first twelve. Global Interdependence Day is an initiative arising from Benjamin Barber's Interdependence Movement. (Again, I had no idea there was such a … [Read more...]
To share or not to share: On nonprofits and the disclosure of information to the public
A couple weeks back the Chronicle of Philanthropy ran an article by Rebecca Koenig with the headline: Some Nonprofits Misuse Contracts to Hide Activities, Experts Say. The experts cited in the article include the president of CharityWatch (which provides information about the financial efficiency, accountability, governance, and fundraising of nonprofits), Senator Charles Grassley (who has long sought greater regulation and oversight of the nonprofit sector) and the president of Guidestar (which primarily collects and makes available for … [Read more...]
In defense of the quieting of the audience (and so-called passive participation)
A couple weeks back I wrote a post about the latest research report from the Irvine Foundation, in response to which several people posted smart comments. My post dealt to a large extent with Irvine's general recommendation to arts nonprofits to respond to audience demand for more active participation. Around the same time my post was published, the performing arts world (the theater world, in particular) was buzzing a bit about two audience member cell phone infractions that made the news. First, at the July 2nd performance of Hand to God in … [Read more...]
Valuable data, questionable field recommendations. (A response to Irvine’s latest report on arts participation.)
A few years ago I had a meeting with a PhD advisor in the US to talk through the proposed chapter breakdown for my dissertation. When discussing the key components of my final chapter I conveyed that it would include a major section covering policy implications and recommendations for arts organizations, artists, and funders. My advisor smiled a bit and said, “Well, let’s see if you earn that section, first.” It was a good lesson. Whenever I come across a passage in a research study that begins, “The evidence suggests that arts organizations … [Read more...]
It’s creative; but is it beautiful? (My talk at the Pave Symposium on Entrepreneurship and the Arts)
In May, I gave a talk at the Pave Biennial Symposium on Arts & Entrepreneurship at Arizona State University. The theme of this year's conference was Creativity and New Venture Creation. The videos from the conference should be posted here by early July at the latest (please check back if you are interested to see the proceedings). In the meantime, you may read a transcript of my talk (with selected slides helpfully embedded). The talk begins with a preamble on creativity and the reasons for my resistance to using that particular word in … [Read more...]
The last beauty class post
Well, 12 posts later, we’ve come to the last post in the series covering my course in aesthetics and business (aka/ approaching beauty) offered at UW-Madison, for undergraduate business majors. This post basically walks through the last two classes in which the students took stock, reflected on their journeys, and thought about where they go from here. (The photo (left) is from an article that ran in a UW-Madison magazine. Unlike my Jumper posts, it's a quick read.) As the course has come to an end, several people have asked me "What's … [Read more...]
Highlights from the beauty class visiting artists (post 2 of 2)
In my last post and this one I am sharing highlights from presentations by the several artists who joined us in the second half of the course and key ideas that resonated most for the students. The last two sessions, discussed in this post, focused primarily on the notions of taste and craft. April 14 – On tastes, on obssessions, on beauty in unusual places (Fred Stonehouse & Polly Carl) In the first half of this class we enjoyed a great lecture by the artist Fred Stonehouse, who is on faculty at UW-Madison. Fred was laid … [Read more...]
Highlights from the beauty class visiting artists (post 1of 2)
Apologies for the radio silence. The beauty course marched on but I failed to get anything written on Jumper the past few weeks as I was finishing up the term and writing talks for two symposia (a symposium on Beauty and Business that I helped put together at UW-Madison and then the fourth biennial Pave Symposium on Arts Entrepreneurship at Arizona State University). I’ll post transcripts from both conferences in conjunction with the videos from each being posted by the conference organizations (UW-Madison & ASU, … [Read more...]
Approaching Justice & Democracy (in Beauty Class)
In last week's post I wrote about a lecture by Polly Carl on the first half of Elaine Scarry's monograph on beauty, which focuses on the relationship between beauty and truth. This week’s post takes as a starting point Polly’s lecture on the second half of Scarry’s book, which focuses on the relationship between beauty and justice. From there, it explores the importance of beauty in a democratic society. How beauty presses us toward justice Polly began her lecture by explaining that there are two enduring criticisms of beauty that Scarry … [Read more...]
What beauty does. (Taking stock in WK6 of the class.)
Approaching Elaine Scarry's On Beauty and Being Just: Elaine Scarry is a major contributor to the discussion on beauty. In the sixth week, the always brilliant Polly Carl gave a lecture on Scarry’s monograph (based on a series of lectures), “On Beauty and Being Just." Scarry is a professor of aesthetics and literature and her book is an attempt to rescue beauty from its banished state in the humanities (by which Scarry means the conversation about beauty, not beautiful objects themselves). It’s difficult to summarize Elaine … [Read more...]