Public Art and the Challenge of Evaluation

The impact of public art seems harder to measure than almost anything else imaginable. Some have tried anyway. Here’s what they came up with.

Around the horn: 2012 edition

Happy New Year, everybody! ART AND THE GOVERNMENT Congress has agreed to put aside consideration of the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) through the end of the year, but the bill isn’t necessarily dead. Arts and technology commentators have begun to be more vocal in their criticism of the bill, which would, among other things, sanction pre-emptive takedown requestsRead More

Createquity in Quotes: 2011

Of course, not all commentators will make equally valuable contributions to the discussion. Just like art, providing critical analysis and consistently thoughtful, informed, and credible feedback requires considerable skill and practice. In short, we want to be able to open up the process to anyone without having to open it to everyone. What qualities would we desire inRead More

Around the horn: Newt edition

ART AND THE GOVERNMENT – DOMESTIC Sadly, this is what passes for a victory in arts funding these days: the NEA survived the 2012 budget appropriations process with only a 6% cut from last year. This represents full funding of President Obama’s request; yes, that’s right folks, our fearless leader demonstrated his steadfast support ofRead More

Around the horn: Blago edition

ART AND THE GOVERNMENT – DOMESTIC Americans for the Arts’s Narric Rome provides a vital update on the reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA, also known as No Child Left Behind), and what it all means for arts education, as it makes its way through the Congressional committee process. Proposed copyright legislation called theRead More

Around the horn: Siri edition

MUSICAL CHAIRS Lots of movement these past couple of weeks! Shannon Daut, formerly Deputy Director of Western State Arts Federation in Denver, CO, will be the new leader of the Alaska State Council on the Arts. Vincent Stehle has been announced as the new director of Grantmakers in Film + Electronic Media. Fidelma McGinn, Executive Director of Artist Trust, isRead More

Around the horn: European debt edition

ART AND THE GOVERNMENT: DOMESTIC AFTA’s Narric Rome shares the latest on how arts education has fared in the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (aka No Child Left Behind) reauthorization, which Jennifer Kessler reported on earlier this year. Mostly good news, from what it sounds like. Looks like net neutrality advocates dodged a bullet when the Senate rejected anRead More

Dispatch from the Bay Area, Part II: Beyond Dynamic Adaptability

On October 24, I was invited to be one of three official bloggers for the one-day Beyond Dynamic Adaptability conference in San Francisco, along with Clay Lord and Adam Fong, whose contributions you can read at the links above. (Disclosure: that means I was paid to write this post, but no one associated with theRead More

Around the horn: Hallsnoween edition

MUSICAL CHAIRS Judilee Reed, formerly the executive director of Leveraging Investments in Creativity, joins the Surdna Foundation as director of its Thriving Cultures program. With Reed’s departure, LINC – which was designed from its inception in 2003 as a ten-year program – begins the process of counting down the clock. I suspect it’s no accident that the funder collaborative thatRead More

Uncomfortable Thoughts: Is Shouting About Arts Funding Bad for the Arts?

(I’ve had the pleasure of working with Margy Waller for almost a year now helping her organization, ArtsWave, with its Measuring the Impact Initiative. Margy focuses on strategic communications and creative connections to promote broad support of the arts at ArtsWave and Topos Partnership. Previously she was Visiting Fellow at the Brookings Institution, with a joint appointment in theRead More