It’s student application review time in the graduate degree program I direct, so my posts will be patchy, at best, this week. I hope you all bear with me.
In the meantime, I have at least enough time to gather a ‘make your own weblog entry’ kit…sort of ‘The Artful Manager: Home Game’. Just take a peek at the following three articles to spot the trend, catch the connections, or generate some sarcastic or glib commentary. You all must have something to say about the role of the critic in the arts ecosystem, and the explosion of options that face our audiences. Here’s your chance. If you send along something short and snappy, I’ll likely excerpt it in a future posting. If not, I’ll be back to business as usual soon.
Article One: Poison Pen?
Ed Siegel explores his role as a theater critic in The Boston Globe. One quote ripe with potential:
Like it or not, and most critics don’t, people turn to theater critics more for consumer advice than for wit, wisdom, perspective, or any of the other lofty reasons that are taught in Criticism 101. As time and money become more scrunched, readers are less interested in how Samuel Beckett may have influenced David Mamet or whether August Wilson ever read Eugene O’Neill than whether they should shell out up to a hundred bucks for a theater ticket.
Article Two: Invasion of the Web Film Critics
Wired offers a perspective on film critics on the web, and the frustrating gap in their recognition: more and more readers, still no respect from the Hollywood publicity machine.
Article Three: Select All: Can you have too many choices?
Christopher Caldwell reviews the new book The Paradox of Choice: Why More Is Less by Barry Schwartz. Both authors suggest that too many choices actually make us less happy over time.
Throw into the mix the quantity and variety of entertainment and leisure time activities in your local Sunday paper (not just arts, but movies, restaurants, family fun, recreation, home project guides, and on and on), and see what big ideas emerge.
Get your pens and keyboards ready….go.
