Back in March, I participated in the latest American Assembly, which explored the co-evolution of the performing arts and higher education in the United States. The convening was based on the premise that these two cultural engines had supported and advanced each other’s work over the past fifty years, and that their future could be given more intention, more direction, and more success if we called that co-evolution forward.
The American Assembly conference model is quite intense…with 70 or so dignitaries sequestered in a mansion in upstate New York for days on end. We talked, we ate, we drank cocktails, we talked more. And we all came to realize what a complex interconnection we had come to explore.
Colleges, universities, and other institutions of higher education were the backbone of performing arts touring in the 1950s, and continue to be primary comissioners of new work. A large bulk of professional performers are trained and acculturated in higher education arts programs, many now discovering a complete disconnect between what they learned and what they need to know to succeed as engaged professionals. And both higher ed. and the professional performing arts now find themselves with serious, structural problems that actually might be addressed by a better connection.
I bring up this conference now because the Assembly recently posted its final report from this event on-line, along with two video keynotes, one by Columbia University President Lee Bollinger and the other by Nancy Cantor, president of the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign (I’d recommend Nancy’s if you only watch one).
It’s a rich and dense conversation, and clearly just the beginning.
