This Friday, I’m excited to be moderating and presenting at a panel at the Net Impact North America Conference at Cornell University’s Johnson School. (For those of you who have been following Createquity since the spring, this is the result of the Creative Economy proposal I submitted back in April.) If you happen to be attending, please say hi!
I’m also on the ballot for this year’s elections to the Americans for the Arts Emerging Leaders Council. If you’re a member of AFTA, you can vote for up to six candidates for the Council here.
- Detroit is shaping itself into a strong candidate for the “Making Lemons into Lemonade” award. The financially ravaged city has emptied out so much that urban planners see it as an unprecedented playground for new ideas. On the occasion of the Independent Sector Conference’s visit to the city, there have been a few stories this week on the urban farming movement now taking hold there. Curiously, it’s a case where the “incapacity of the government is actually an advantage” when it comes to trying to do new things, since it is as powerless to get in the way of a positive grassroots movement as it is decay and crime. Meanwhile, the Knight Foundation just committed to dumping $5 million into the city, with the core investment aimed at “transform[ing] the city’s newly-designated Creative Corridor into an economic engine and national destination.”
- Rocco visited Peoria last week, and Judith H. Dobrzynski and Bloomberg have the details.
- The President has announced new members of an arts and humanities advisory committee; the names are heavy on big-name stars such as Sarah Jessica Parker and Yo-Yo Ma. By all accounts, though, the committee’s function will be largely ceremonial rather than substantive.
- Rupert Murdoch wants to erode the arms-length relationship between the arts and government in the UK? Hmmm…you don’t say.
- The Canadian Liberal Party’s Cultural Heritage Critic (a critic officially employed by a political party? who knew they had such things up there?) announces that its candidate, Michael Ignatieff, wants to double the budget of the Canada Council for the Arts from $180 million to $360 million. Speaking of Canada, the Clyde Fitch Report has a very long and interesting interview with a British Columbian artist named David McIntosh, who explains the Canadian arts funding system in layman’s terms. I think we could stand to have a lot more in the way of non-US perspectives as part of the national cultural policy discussion.
- One more Canada note for you all: a Vancouver couple is pioneering “guerrilla giving“–leaving $20 bills and the like in random places for people to find it, serendipitously–and blogging about it. Totally non-strategic and totally awesome. I wonder how they would answer this question?
- What is up with arts education, Janet? The Ford Foundation is committing $100 million over seven years to public education in the United States. And higher education leaders are starting to question how long the institution of college can continue in its current form.
- Apparently 8 out of the top 15 most stressful jobs, according to CNN, are in the nonprofit sector. Coincidence?
- Friends doing well dept.: Music as Weapon?’s David T. Little, composer extraordinaire, has won the Dilettante Music Digital Composer-in-Residency. I knew him when…
- A former classmate of mine in business school has put together a list of the top LORT theaters on Twitter. Stat geek heaven. Chris Ashworth has more.
- The National Arts Marketing Project Conference was in Providence last week, and I was fortunate to meet some of the attendees even though I wasn’t able to be a part of the event officially. Corwin Christie of the excellent Technology in the Arts blog has a wrap-up here, though. Also, Fractured Atlas’s Adam Natale pushes back against arts marketer stereotyping.
- smArts & Culture shares with us the results of a new report on the habits of cultural consumers.
- Speaking of conferences, the always entertaining Kwende Kefentse reports from the Creative Places + Spaces gathering in Toronto.
- I continue to find this diversity vs. authenticity discussion that was instigated by Michael Kaiser completely fascinating. Here’s Arlene Goldbard’s reaction, and an unrelated (but very relevant) piece from New Voices in Philanthropy’s Trista Harris.
- When even the Wall Street Journal runs an article with the headline “Crisis Compels Economists to Reach for New Paradigm,” you know something’s afoot. Barry Ritholtz nails the fundamental problem with econ, though: the entire field is based on assumptions about how things should work, rather than observations about how they do work. But then, believing in the morality of selfishness is awfully convenient for a lot of folks.
- Ever wonder what makes those 10-million-times-viewed YouTube videos take off? So do the world’s biggest marketing teams.
- Best. Commercial. Ever.
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2 Comments
Just little Canadian fact check – the “critic” refers to the politicians job of criticizing the government – not art work (so there is an environment critic.) but still, hadn’t heard that announcement up here, so thanks.
Thanks for the clarification! You learn something new every day, I guess.