The arts blogosphere (artosphere?) has been buzzing lately with the news of the demotion of the NEA’s erstwhile Director of Communications, Yosi Sergant, in response to Glenn Beck’s paranoid delusions about two conference calls that Yosi helped to organize to get artists involved in community service. Jeff Chang says this is the new shape ofRead More
Around the horn: Laboring on Labor Day edition
WOW, that was fast. Mere days after announcing a $20 million cut in funding that impinged on previously made commitments and, in some cases, money that had already been spent, the government of British Columbia, Canada not only restored the funding that had been cut but threw another $12 million on top for good measure.Read More
Around the horn: town hall edition
Barry Hessenius is out with his second annual list of the 25 most powerful and influential leaders in the nonprofit arts sector. Bob Lynch (president of Americans for the Arts), who took the top slot last year, has to share it this time with the Curb Center’s Bill Ivey, who has increased his clout thanksRead More
Value generators II
For those of you just joining this discussion, I’ve been ruminating for the past couple of months on the nature of economic growth and its relationship to the (as it turns out, quite vague) concept we call “value.” You can read the first two essays on this topic here and here. In the first, IRead More
Around the horn: NEA edition
Fox News’s misleading attacks on the NEA, coming as they did just prior to the confirmation of a new Chairman for the organization, seem to be raising a lot of hackles in the arts world. Is the concern justified? Barry Hessenius thinks so, and warns that things might get a lot worse as conservatives gearRead More
Around the horn: hello Providence edition
I’m writing from sunny Providence, RI, where I’ll be based for the rest of the summer while I work on some projects and continue the search for a permanent landing spot. In other housekeeping news, Createquity is getting ready to move permanently to createquity.com, with a snazzy new design and blogging platform (WordPress). We’re workingRead More
Value generators
Following up on my economics and value posts from last month (here and here), I’ve been trying to do a little research on how economists presently think about the relationship between value and economic growth. It’s a difficult proposition, frankly, because the concepts involved are so slippery. Most of the normal measures of value generationRead More
Around the horn: bye bye New Haven edition
Long overdue, but Atul Gawande’s incredible article on the economics of health-care costs and the dark side of competition offers many lessons for the current debate in Congress and, indeed, for policy in general. The artists = crazy people thing just won’t go away. (Though, as Holden Caulfield might say, maybe it’s everyone else that’sRead More
More on economics and value
I’d planned to do this with my post on beating the recession, but since no one seems to be interested in that topic (who knew?), I’m instead going to post some comments from my thread from earlier this month on economics and the true meaning of “value.” In my original post, I asked: This, however,Read More
Around the horn: dog days edition
The IRS says not so fast on the L3C, stressing that it has not yet weighed in on the tax implications of the new legal form. Generation Y likes to talk a big game about change, but Rosetta Thurman says that if we really want it we’re going to have to prove it. Stephanie EvansRead More