Arts & Economic Prosperity: Cliffs Notes version

I know: you’re a busy person. You don’t have a lot of time. You’d like to read my entire 7,000-word tome on Americans for the Arts’s economic impact study, but let’s face it: it’s just not gonna happen. At least not this week. Probably not next week, either. You suppose you could take it onRead More

Arts Policy Library: Arts & Economic Prosperity III

Perhaps no arts-related research study is cited as frequently in the mainstream media these days as Americans for the Arts’s gargantuan economic impact survey, Arts & Economic Prosperity III. Its key message, that the nonprofit arts sector is responsible for $166.2 billion in economic activity nationwide, has been hammered home relentlessly to policymakers, politicians, grantmakers,Read More

Around the horn: term paper edition

Have you been wondering whatever happened to the Arts Policy Library series? It hasn’t gone anywhere–it’s just been in extended hibernation in preparation for the piece that’s about to be unveiled tomorrow: a 7000-word, seminar-paper-length treatise on Americans for the Arts’s landmark economic impact study, Arts & Economic Prosperity III. Well over 60 hours ofRead More

AFTA Convention Wrap Day 4

My final day in Seattle began with a “peer group” session called Meet the NEA that was really another panel. I wasn’t able to catch the entirety of it, but the panelists did say that the agency would take a “hard look” at the policy around individual artists (it should be noted that the EndowmentRead More

AFTA Convention Wrap Day 3

Whew! Extremely full day yesterday. Started with waking up far too early to catch Peter Senge’s keynote address. Senge is the founding chair of the Society for Organizational Learning and focused his talk at the mile-high level, really probing into why the work we do is important. The speech received mixed reviews from the peopleRead More

AFTA Convention Wrap Day 2

Wow, you guys are eager beavers all of the sudden in the comments! I think I approved more this week than I did the entire summer last year. Glad to see that the content is engaging you. The first official day of the AFTA Convention was great – the discussions have mapped extraordinarily well toRead More

AFTA Convention Wrap Day 1

It’s late, so I’ll be brief. Seattle is very, very pretty. Went to the Creative Economy: By Design advance workshop today to learn about creative community building with Meri Jenkins, Tom Borrup, Craig Dreeszen, and Maren Brown. Here were the major notes and takeaways for me: Some startling statistics: in Massachusetts, attendance at arts &Read More

New Blogs!

Here are this week’s newly added blogs….enjoy! ARTSBLOGWho knew? It seems I’m a little late to the party, but apparently DC-based advocacy organization Americans for the Arts has been running this quite lively group blog with a dizzying array of volunteer contributors since 2007. With so many authors, you’d expect the quality to be aRead More

Around the horn: Bake sale edition

Last weekend, I visited NYC and checked out some new music concerts for the first time in a while. The first, on Friday night, was the first-ever New Music Bake Sale presented by Newspeak and Ensemble de Sade, a raucous affair with five hours of music, well over a hundred attendees, tables for different organizationsRead More

Victory.

It’s official. As of 10:17 pm tonight, the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act has passed both houses of Congress, and the arts are invited to the party. Quoth Americans from the Arts, by email: We can now confirm that the package DOES include $50 million in direct support for arts jobs through National Endowment forRead More