This all started with a throwaway comment I made to Ian when I was dropping him off at the airport. Sharing an idea that you’ve been mulling over for awhile, but never said aloud and aren’t sure you’re ready to discuss, is best done when the sharee is dashing for a flight and won’t really engage. Or so I thought.

Ian said: 1) Now that’s worth discussing. 2) I’m not sure whether I agree with you. 3) Maybe you should write a blog post about it.

Ha.

So – now you know how I ended up here.

The Theory: Shhhhhhh 

Shhhhhhhh

Here’s the theory I pitched at Createquity that day: Advocates for the arts might be better off doing their work under the radar than trying so hard to get a lot of media and public attention when fighting for public funding of the arts. 

Createquity readers get regular updates on public funding of the arts. So we all know this was an especially rough year for many state arts councils.

But is this unique? Nope. We all have examples in our catalogue of “can-you-top-this” horror stories about arts advocacy experiences from over the years.

Like this.

When President Obama proposed including funding for the National Endowment for the Arts in the stimulus legislation, the media covered the topic in typical he-said-she-said style with headlines like “Stimulus funding for arts hits nerve: Some doubt it would create jobs.”

The arts are often used as a way to politicize and undermine bigger issues (like the stimulus bill), because the public tends to erupt with charges of elitism like this one:

“Why should the working class pay for the leisure of the elite when in fact one of the things the working class likes to do for leisure is go to professional wrestling? And if I suggested we should have federal funds for professional wrestling to lower the cost of the ticket, people would think I’m insane….” — Catholic League President Bill Donohue speaking of an exhibit at the Smithsonian in 2010.

Media coverage like this encourages a debate over the “facts.” Unfortunately, rebutting the doubts with our research findings means that arts supporters have to stay in our opponents’ frame.

They Aren’t Listening Anyway

A debate that lives within the position of a critic (like arts jobs aren’t really jobs or the arts should be supported by the rich) does little to shift the public landscape of a widely-shared belief, such as: the arts are a low priority for public funding.

Unfortunately, facts and research we’ve accumulated to prove the value of the arts as a public matter of concern, and then worked hard to get reporters to cover, are too often dismissed or ignored when seen through the lens of an idea that’s not new and about which people have already made up their minds.

Most people will simply ignore the rest of the story (where all our snappy facts live) once they’ve seen the headline. We all filter the barrage of information in today’s info-heavy world, paying little attention to all but those matters of deepest interest to us. A headline that presents an issue we’ve already decided for ourselves is likely to be read as: “Oh, that again. I know what I know about that. And I don’t need to know anymore.”

Worse Even: The Backfire Effect

But even worse is the possibility that a public debate makes things harder for arts advocates in the long run because, as Chris Mooney explains, “…head-on attempts to persuade can sometimes trigger a backfire effect” where people react by defending their position and holding onto their views “more tenaciously than ever.”

In other words, when we think we’re reasoning, we may instead be rationalizing. Or to use an analogy offered by University of Virginia psychologist Jonathan Haidt: We may think we’re being scientists, but we’re actually being lawyers (PDF). Our “reasoning” is a means to a predetermined end—winning our “case”—and is shot through with biases. They include “confirmation bias,” in which we give greater heed to evidence and arguments that bolster our beliefs, and “disconfirmation bias,” in which we expend disproportionate energy trying to debunk or refute views and arguments that we find uncongenial.

It’s true that in the end, Congress included some funding for the NEA in the stimulus bill. But it took a very heavy lift — well executed by Americans for the Arts — to set up hundreds of conversations between constituents with influence and members of Congress. It’s certainly sometimes possible to overcome bad press and the fear felt by elected officials that they might doom their own careers supporting an unpopular cause. But it’s seriously labor intensive and asks a lot of our supporters — not an ideal way to ensure success year after year. And it forced us to revive an old debate – possibly making things harder for arts supporters next time around.

An Alternative: Don’t Try to Change Minds, Change Perspective

One solution to this dilemma is to craft a new communications strategy —one built on a deeper understanding of the best ways to communicate with the public about the arts—that would increase a sense of shared responsibility and motivate public action in support of the arts. That’s what we’ve done at ArtsWave.

Instead of reviving an old debate, we sought a new way to start the conversation – based on something we can all be for, instead of something we’re defending against an attack. And importantly, we aren’t trying to change people’s minds, but present the arts in a way that changes perspective. Therefore, we held the message accountable to factors such as whether it prompts people to focus on certain aspects of the topic (such as broad benefits) rather than others (such as personal tastes); whether a message is coherent and memorable; whether it promotes the idea of public/collective action; and so on.

After a year of investigation and interviews with hundreds of people in the our region and surrounding states, this research—conducted by the Topos Partnership for ArtsWave (happy disclosure, the writer is affiliated with both) —found that public responsibility for the arts is undermined by deeply entrenched perceptions. Members of the public typically have positive feelings toward the arts, some quite strong. But how they think about the arts is shaped by a number of common default patterns that ultimately obscure a sense of shared responsibility in this area.

For example, it is natural and common for people who are not insiders to think of the arts in terms of entertainment.  In fact, it’s how we want people to think when we are selling tickets or memberships. But, in this view, entertainment is a “luxury,” and the “market” will determine which arts offerings survive, based on people’s tastes as consumers of entertainment. Consequently, public support for the arts makes little sense, particularly when public funds are scarce.

Perceptions like these lead to conclusions that government funding, for instance, is frivolous or inappropriate. Even charitable giving can be undermined by these default perceptions. People who target arts funding, as they did in the stimulus bill, know that these dominant ways of thinking about the arts will work in their favor. Our investigation identified a different approach, one that moves people to a new, more resonant way of thinking about the arts.

What is it? The arts create ripple effects of benefits, such as vibrant, thriving neighborhoods where we all want to live and work.  This is not only compelling, but it also sets an expectation of public responsibility for the arts.

However, even though most people agree with this view already (so we don’t have to change their minds), we know that it will take time, repetition, and many partners across the nation to bring this way of thinking to the forefront of people’s minds.

Stay Off the “Front Page”

So — back to my theory about arts advocacy – until we effect that change, the better strategy, when possible, may be to keep stories about public funding for the arts off the front pages and out of the media.

To some this may seem counter-intuitive. Or at least uncomfortable. If we care about the arts, shouldn’t we be shouting about it? Getting people to pay attention to our facts and our data.

Well – it depends. Is our advocacy goal a widely seen news piece outlining all sides of the issue? Or, do we want a successful budget outcome?

I think it’s the latter. And when it can be achieved with a quiet effort, making sure to begin modeling this new way of thinking about the arts in our meetings with decision-makers, that is preferable to another big public debate. Because the big fight in the default way of viewing the arts is very losable. And in our efforts, we’re forced to expand a precious resource: the time and energy of staff and key supporters who have to work so hard to convince public officials that they won’t suffer consequences in the next election.

Moreover, every time the fight is public, we’re likely to be reinforcing the dominant ways of thinking about the arts that are getting in our way now. When attacked, we rebut with facts, and the media covers the issue as a political fight with two equal sides – both seen through a lens that sets up the arts as a low priority on the public agenda. And as we know, this can have the effect of making people defensive and hardening existing positions. Of course, it should be no surprise that even officials who are friendly to arts funding are reluctant to be in the middle of that kind of coverage.

The Ohio Success Story

This past year, I watched closely as our state arts advocates at Ohio Citizens for the Arts carefully managed what seemed to be a stealth campaign to retain funding for arts and culture through the Ohio Arts Council. Despite an initial proposed cut by the newly elected Governor, the final outcome was an increase in funding over $4 million more than the previous budget.  Each step of the process brought an increase in the proposed funding level — the House vote, the Senate vote, and the reconciled proposal sent to the Governor, resulting in $6.6 million more than the proposed executive budget. And it went forward without fanfare or comment when signed into law.

Compare this scenario with the nightmare that was Kansas.  Of course, the Governor started a fight there — and there’s some evidence that this battle to the death did bring out supporters. But it clearly brought out opponents too.

As a little test, I tried two Google searches: One for blogs mentioning ‘“Ohio Arts Council” budget’ and the other for ‘“Kansas Arts Commission” budget’. In both cases, I limited findings to the first six months in 2011. The Kansas search revealed over 1000 posts, compared to only 42 in Ohio. An even greater disparity than I had imagined.

It appears that the Ohio advocates strategically sought to keep the campaign under the radar. And it worked.

To be sure, I called Donna Collins – the executive director of the Ohio arts advocacy organization. And she confirmed my theory.

“We didn’t want to be in the headlines,” she said. “We didn’t want to see masses of people on the statehouse lawn with signs about funding the arts. We wanted people on message, talking with their own elected officials at home, as well as in Columbus.  Our advocates, from the smallest rural community to the large urban centers, all had compelling stories about the positive impact of the arts.”

Collins credits long-term investment in relationship building with state decision-makers and encouraging a consistent message: the value citizens place on the way arts make places great. She organized a meeting about this message for partners on the morning of a well-attended statewide Arts Advocacy Day in the capitol. There was no big public fight, no need to defend a position in the media, no risk of the opposition hardening in place – and therefore little reason for politicians to fear supporting the increase in funding for the arts.

So…this is a theory, and one deserving of more study. But until we have a new landscape of public understanding, it seems a theory worth testing again.

Posting has been light around here lately because I am in the midst of another move. I am coming to the end of my official residence in Rhode Island, where I have been plying my trade and generally causing trouble for the last year or so. I’m moving back to New York to join the rest of my Fractured Atlas colleagues in the West 35th St office, and have been subletting a place this month in Harlem/Morningside to provide a home base for apartment searching (which thankfully looks to be over) and unpacking. I really enjoyed my time in Providence – it’s a very cool small city that has a lot going on for its size and very much “gets” the value of the arts and creative industries in a way that many places don’t.

• Much has been made of the NEA’s new investment in urban revitalization, but since the agency’s budget looks like it will be the same or a little less compared to last year, this is all something of a zero-sum game. In this case, looks like Dana Gioia’s “The Big Read” program is the big loser in Rocco’s reorganization of agency priorities. (As an aside, I came across this old-ish articlecatching up with former NEA Communications Director Yosi Sergant this weekend and noticed the following observation: “in Sergant’s department of 14 people, four were dedicated to making books-on-tape.” Another legacy of Gioia’s literary-centric worldview, perhaps?)
• By the way, did you know the NEA has a YouTube channel? Here’s Design Director Jason Schupbach talking about “creative placemaking.” There’s much more here.
• Meanwhile, right wingers are hot on the trail of arts funding again, though so far it seems less organized than it was for the Sergant incident. The same “arts jobs are not real jobs” lie that we heard during the stimulus fight is once again front and center. (Michael Rushton patiently explains why it’s not true.) Senators Coburn and McCain have continued to identify arts projects supported by the federal government as “wasteful” for no other reason than that they are arts-related, offending Gary Steuer in the process. Perhaps more troubling is the newfound focus by conservatives on state and local funding for the arts, led predictably by Glenn Beck.
• Looks like Bill Gates’s and Warren Buffet’s efforts have had some impact: 10% of the world’s billionaires have now adopted the Giving Pledge to donate at least half of their wealth to charity before or at death. Notable arts supporters among the list include Gerry and Margaret Lenfest, Eli Broad, Michael Bloomberg, Paul Allen, Joan and Irwin Jacobs, Bernard and Barbro Osher, and Sanford and Joan Weill. Hopefully they’ll listen to Kathleen Enright’s advice for them.
• Grantmakers in the Arts is ramping up an interesting-looking series of guest blogs, and the latest is a grantmaker-grantee conversation between Ute Zimmerman and Theaster Gates.
• Retrospective: Michael Kaiser looks back on the Arts in Crisis tour, and Conni of Conni’s Avant-Garde Restaurant takes stock of inventory after a year of support from the Economic Revitalization for Performing Artists program.
• Delinquent nonprofit form filers are getting one last chance from the IRS to prove they still exist: file the 990-N “postcard” form online by October 15. Otherwise, it’s lights-out.
• Newsweek may be considering going nonprofit.
• Massachusetts has signed a law empowering local communities across the state to define their own cultural districts and identify incentives for their development. The Massachusetts Cultural Council will manage the program. Earlier this summer, the MCC had been in danger of getting moved under the aegis of a new quasi-public agency called the Massachusetts Marketing Partnership, but it looks like that proposal is off the table.
• So in addition to seven-figure salaries, we need to be giving top culture executives seven-figure tax-free housing as well? I want to see Dan Pallotta‘s defense of this. It’s not all fun and games, though – sometimes you get a full-fledged performance review from your colleagues in the New York Times. If you too want to be a culture executive, Laura Zabel explains how did she get that job.
• I was totally going to give Devon Smith a rest after linking to her blog a bunch of times over the last few months, but dammit, she keeps coming up with fantastic new stuff that can’t be ignored. Her “Social Media Measurement Plan” is perhaps her most ambitious post yet, chock-full of tips and tricks to track your online footprint. It’s seriously a must-read. I’m starting to think maybe we should try to keep Devon from getting a job after all because then she’ll keep giving this stuff away for free. (Just kidding, D.) Devon has a panel proposal in the mix for South by Southwest Interactive; and Fractured Atlas has two, one for Interactive and one in Film.
• By the way, you can vote for those SxSW panels, thus helping to choose the content of the event you’re going to. Ever since I wrote that article on crowdsourced philanthropy platforms, I’m always coming across new systems that I wish I could have discussed as part of it. Case in point: IDEO’s new collective design hub for the good of the world, OpenIDEO. Meanwhile, Lucy Bernholz declares “Curator” to be the philanthropy buzzword du jour.
• Iranian leader declares music incompatible with Islamic values.
• Are affluent Westerners psychologically different from the rest of the world?
• So, this is…unexpected: Paul Miller, aka DJ Spooky, “is setting up a foundation dealing with contemporary art in the South Pacific [specifically Vanuatu], he’s got 400 acres of land on the island, and will be inviting artists, writers, film makers, composers etc from all over the world to do small residencies of several weeks each. They’re going to have artist residencies starting mid next year, and the whole venue will be based on bamboo.”

10. The L3C Gains, Loses Momentum

Last year, many in the arts who found themselves frustrated with the limitations of the 501(c)(3) nonprofit business model looked to the Low-Profit Limited Liability Company, or L3C, for an answer. An L3C is basically an LLC that has pledged to pursue a social mission as its first priority, even though it still intends to make a profit. The new legal form has been hailed as a potential panacea for businesses that serve an important social function but have trouble attracting capital because they can’t generate profits at market rates, such as newspapers, small biotech firms, and even North Carolina’s furniture manufacturing industry. Spearheaded by a foundation president, Mary Elizabeth and Gordon B. Mannweiler Foundation head Robert M. Lang, the L3C scored some early victories this year as Michigan, Utah, Wyoming and the Crow Indian Nation all passed it into law within a span of two months. However, things hit a snag in August when a technocrat from the IRS told everyone to hold their horses at an accounting conference (aside: I know I shouldn’t make fun, but an accounting conference? seriously?), claiming that “no one has really signed off” on the legal form at the federal level, which sparked an angry exchange between L3C Advisors and the agency. Since then, Illinois has been added to the list of states in which L3C formation is possible (Vermont was already there in 2008), but absent a federal mandate it’s unclear how far the movement will go.

9. NEA Webcasts Cultural Workforce Forum

The National Endowment for the Arts has had a research unit for a number of years. It’s published a number of important contributions to the literature in that time, most notably its recurring series on public participation in the arts and on artists in the workforce. This year, however, instead of simply releasing its studies in print and online, the NEA went one step further: it gathered an impressive coterie of researchers and arts organization representatives to react to the study and share perspectives from similar studies with which they had involvement. The real game-changer, though, was the agency’s decision to broadcast this forum to the public via the web so that anyone could follow along and participate. (A second forum focusing on the most recent Survey of Public Participation in the Arts took place in December.) This is what field-building looks like: bringing a mishmash of parties together around a nexus of common interest so as to move forward together. Research is at its best when it’s a team sport, and I am extremely heartened to see that our Endowment understands that as well as it does.

8. Changing of the Guard at Hewlett, Irvine

The West Coast arts funding landscape changed dramatically in 2009, as California’s two largest grantmakers in the arts found themselves in the midst of leadership transitions at a time of drastic transition in the field as a whole. Things kicked off with the impending departure of the Hewlett Foundation’s Moy Eng, who came to the end of her eight-year term as Director of Hewlett’s Performing Arts Program in November. As the search for her replacement drew to a close, her successor was identified as none other than Irvine Foundation arts program director John McGuirk, who had previously worked under Moy at Hewlett earlier in the decade. This, of course, opened up a new vacancy at Irvine, which has yet to be filled to date.

7. GIA Opens the Gates

I hope you’ll forgive me for including something in which I directly participated, but I really do feel it’s important (and the fact that I was the one participating is not what made it important). The annual Grantmakers in the Arts Conference, the only national convening of the folks who collectively have more influence over the future of the arts in America than just about anyone else, has traditionally been a closed-door affair. While you don’t have to be a member to attend, you do have to be staff at an arts grantmaking institution unless you’ve been offered a specific invitation to speak or perform. With one exception, the conference had never had press at any of its events and even then, they only covered the full plenary sessions, not any of the individual panels. In other words, if you weren’t there, you didn’t know what was happening, and you couldn’t participate in any way. This year, under the new leadership of Janet Brown, GIA has taken steps to open things up. In addition to inviting a blogger (me) to cover the conference, including workshops and breakout sessions, for the public, the organization has started two blogs of its own (authored by Brown and deputy director Tommer Peterson) and just unveiled a new website with an eye towards dramatically increasing the possibilities for substantive interaction online. Given the oft-heard criticism of funders as being too isolated and risk-averse, I can only say that this represents a giant step in the right direction.

6. The NEA Gets Stimulated

This was a big year for the NEA, as evidenced by its inclusion on this list four times. The first big story of the year involving the Endowment was the fight to include money for it in the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, better known as President Obama’s economic stimulus package. It was initially expected that the biggest fight over the NEA would be among Democrats, as Americans for the Arts and other advocates urged the administration and Congress to include as much as $1 billion for the agency in the bill. But it wasn’t until after the stimulus package passed the House with what at the time seemed like a disappointing $50 million for the NEA that the real fireworks started. Republicans, who had voted as a unanimous bloc against the legislation despite numerous compromises on the part of Democrats in the name of bipartisanship, began decrying “waste” in the bill and using the arts to draw media attention to their cause. Senator Tom Coburn, whose daughter is an opera singer, actually succeeded in passing an amendment that would have barred any of the stimulus money from going to museums, theaters, and arts centers. Fortunately, the $50 million was restored in conference committee, and the NEA had a small but real pot of money to help the arts community weather the storm. If only that had been the end of it…

5. Grand Dreams for Federal Arts Policy Fail to Materialize

It may be unfair to give the Obama administration anything other than an “Incomplete” on this one. Nevertheless, it does seem clear that artists’ hopes for a dramatic reorganization and integration of cultural policy at the federal level, manifested most obviously in the hugely popular Quincy Jones-inspired petition to create a Cabinet-level Secretary of the Arts, are not going to be realized anytime soon. Despite running the first Presidential campaign in memory to pull together a committee to advise on arts policy, since taking office Obama has mostly kept the arts at arm’s length as he (understandably, for now) focuses on frying bigger fish. Rather than the Arts Czar many were hoping for (and some were dreading), the only real effort to reform the system to date has been the appointment of two officials in the Office of Public Engagement with seemingly limited, ill-defined roles, both of whom have been virtually invisible since the summer.

4. The Conference Call Heard ‘Round the World

It all seemed so innocent at the time. Yosi Sergant, newly installed as the head of communications for the National Endowment for the Arts after a successful stint mobilizing artists, designers and other creative types for the Obama campaign, had an idea. He wanted to build a bridge between the NEA and the President’s United We Serve initiative, involving artists across the country in local community service projects — thus increasing the profile both of service and of the arts. His hope, as he explained it to me one warm June night in Seattle, was to make the NEA look good through this association, to be able to say to Congress, “look what we can accomplish just on a volunteer basis; now see what we can do if you actually give us some money!” So he organized a conference call with some of his old friends from the campaign, with the help of colleagues from the Office of Public Engagement and the Corporation for National and Community Service, which ran the United We Serve program, to try to get the word out about his idea. And being that the call largely featured old friends, and that he’s a blustery person in general, he indulged himself in some blustery praise for the President which sounded, well, a little over the top if you didn’t share his political views. Just one problem: one of the people he’d invited was Patrick Courrielche, a marketing professional who most definitely did not share his political views…and wouldn’t you know it, the two of them also used to work together. Courrielche took it upon himself to secretly record the entire exchange and bring it to Andrew Breitbart’s ultra-conservative Big Hollywood blog. Courielche’s widely-circulated piece cleverly presented actual information only in bits and pieces, woven together throughout with a paranoid vision of how the call might, just might, have really been an attempt to coerce artists into becoming ideological slaves for the government. Though the original essay retained some degree of humanity and had the decency to frame the title with a question mark at the end, the conspiratorial frenzy of the Big Hollywood/Big Government community soon had Courrielche playing investigative reporter, “discovering”  more and more pieces of a puzzle that ultimately fit together into something not at all like what he was describing. The damage was done, however; under intense pressure from conservative media outlets, Yosi Sergant was first reassigned from his post, then resigned from government altogether. After nine months of trying, the NEA bashers on the right wing had finally drawn blood.

3. State Arts Agencies Decimated

The numbers say it all: New Hampshire, down 32%. Ohio, down 47%. Illinois, down 51%. Arizona, down 54%. Florida, down 94% in three years. It was a terrible year for state arts agencies as the sluggish economy opened up yawning holes in many states’ financial registers. South Dakota, Pennsylvania, Connecticut, and Michigan all faced the serious prospect of closure of their state agencies and in some cases the loss of all state funds for the arts. (With the exception of Michigan, the former prospect was averted.) Hawaii’s briefly lost its executive director position; New Jersey’s governor actually ignored a law in order to cut his agency’s budget to the bone. The lone bright spot was Minnesota, where a new Constitutional amendment is expected to triple the total available for the arts in that state. Many state arts agencies had just recently returned to funding levels, in non-inflation-adjusted terms, seen prior to the last recession; it will take them a long, long time to recover from this one.

2. Rocco

For most of the first half of the year, the hottest arts policy question on everyone’s minds was the identity of the next Chairman of the National Endowment for the Arts. The LA Times ran a memorable feature in which thirty artists and celebrities were asked what they would do if they found themselves in the position. Many names were thrown around, including those of Michael Dorf, Claudine Brown, Caroline Kennedy, and Bob Lynch. Even so, Rocco Landesman’s nomination seemed to take everyone by surprise. The brash director of Jujamcyn Theaters was known for running his mouth, and sure enough he got himself into trouble almost from the moment he entered the spotlight by insulting Peoria’s theatrical community in an interview with the New York Times. (Rocco and Peoria have since become “best friends” after he kicked off his Art Works tour in that city.) Loose lips aside, though, many in the field are eager to see what comes of the Landesman chairmanship; he’s signaled an admirable understanding of and enthusiasm for the economic dimension of what the arts do, and the efforts to open up the NEA’s research to public comment have his stamp all over it. The NEA even has a new blog, Art Works, which opened with two posts from the Chairman himself. If nothing else, Landesman will keep things interesting over the next three years, and early signs suggest that his leadership may well take the agency in promising new directions.

1. The Great Recession

Rarely has a single event had so dominating an effect on the arts community as the stock market crash of September-October 2008 has had on the field this year. The Great Recession thoroughly reshaped the landscape in 2009 and served as the lens through which every decision was made and every strategy was considered. In addition to its impact on state arts agencies mentioned above, its influence was felt among the ranks of private foundations, where the Hewlett Foundation cut grantmaking by 40%, the Ford and Robert Wood Johnson Foundations offered buyouts to huge proportions of their staffs, and the Wallace Foundation let go of longtime program officers; among cultural institutions, a number of which (such as the Baltimore Opera and Los Angeles’s Museum of Contemporary Art) either closed for good or required extraordinary rescue; and among artists themselves, who despite occasionally finding creative inspiration in poverty nevertheless suffered through fewer work opportunities. Unfortunately, there isn’t much talk anymore of a swift recovery; indeed, some observers actually think 2010 will be even worse. That doesn’t mean we’re powerless, though: there are things we can all do to beat this recession together.

Honorable mention:

• White House Social Innovation Fund
• Michael Kaiser’s Arts in Crisis program
• The Rise of the Twitterverse

And as a bonus, here are my picks for the top five new (in 2009) arts blogs:

5. <100K Project (Scott Walters)
4. Better Together (Janet Brown)
3. Unquiet Thoughts (Alex Ross)
2. Real Clear Arts (Judith H. Dobrzynski)
1. Arts, Culture and Creative Economy (Gary Steuer)

• The Hewlett Foundation has finally released phase two of its Youth in the Arts report, conducted by Barry Hessenius. This edition used focus groups of young arts professionals to explore the implications of generational change in arts adminstration. Many of the themes resonate with my Ten Strategies for Engaging Generation Y in the Nonprofit Workplace. The full report is available here. I read it as a very powerful indictment of the status quo and I hope it helps change some common attitudes and practices regarding entry-level employees.
• Via the Artful Manager, a report on the National Performing Arts Convention from last June.
• The Wall Street Journal has a very interesting article from a week and a half ago on how Cleveland is openly embracing the idea of supporting artists as a strategy for local economic development. It makes sense; artists (especially visual artists) do well in converted industrial spaces, and the Rust Belt certainly has plenty of those. In response to the article, Kwende Kefentse from the Creative Class Exchange asks,
  

  So are the artists we refer to in the gentrification and renewal discourse really more of an economic model – liberal people with fixer-upper money, within a limited margin? Why doesn’t it seem that local street artists who are embedded in the community, often telling the story of the community, don’t have the same renewal/gentrifying value as the sculptor or the graphic designer who move in? And how can we create that value?

  I wonder if what’s really going on here is that the economic value actually comes from the “fixer-upper” part – and that artists are valuable to communities precisely because so many of them are willing to essentially donate their time and funds doing just that in exchange for the opportunity to take advantage of the fruits of their labors. I’ve suggested before that arts-led economic development tends to be more successful when storefront spaces are involved, not just the presence of artists in a neighborhood. I don’t mean to suggest that that’s the entirety of the economic value that artists provide, but it certainly seems like both (a) a big part of the story and (b) a necessary first step in order to make further value creation possible in depressed neighborhoods. Leonard Jacobs has some additional thoughts.

• While we’re on the creative economy kick, Louisiana [edit: Lieutenant] governor Mitch Landrieu is apparently a believer…
• …and Jeff Chang, author of Can’t Stop Won’t Stop, writes about a “creativity stimulus” in The Nation.
• More hard times for arts journalists: the ASCAP Deems Taylor Awards were abruptly suspended last week. I don’t know how much these were costing ASCAP, but to the extent that quality journalism helps to promote the music that the organization represents, the decision seems a bit short-sighted to me.
• Americans for the Arts’s Adam Thurman has a hilarious cautionary tale for people thinking about starting their own arts organization that might hit a bit close to home.
• MaryAnn Devine tells arts organizations not to be afraid of competition, and also highlights this very witty marketing blog.
• A new $250,000 visual art prize, which will be the largest such prize in the world, will select the winner via popular vote. I’m kind of intrigued and horrified at the same time. As much as I am not a fan of gigantic prizes to individuals, at least this one is leveraged in service of a cool event that looks like it will bring a lot of people to Grand Rapids, MI and raise interest in contemporary art. So good luck to them.
• Speaking of new grants, the Ford Foundation has spun off the first foundation specifically for Native American artists.
• And remember how there was that whole kerfuffle last summer when Leona Helmsley directed that all of her foundation’s assets should (literally) go to the dogs? Well, the first round’s grants are out, and aside from $1 million in “canine grants,” they look pretty normal.
• Not all organizations are taking this recession sitting down: the Wall Street Journal has a round-up of some creative responses.
• You must, must view this amazing presentation from Swedish researcher Hans Rosling, developer of Gapminder, from the TED Conference. Arts freaks will especially appreciate how he values culture vis-a-vis other human development goals.

The original.

• What is the deal with Shepard Fairey and the Boston Police? Anyone from the visual arts want to weigh in on whether the Obama “Hope” poster artist is getting his due or just getting harrassed? In related news, the AP goes after Fairey for copyright infringement for that poster and writes a “totally” “bias-free” AP article about its own action.
• In tough times, it’s nice to have public officials who see the arts as part of the solution, not part of the problem.
• Arts bloggers are starting to discover the Low-Profit Limited Liability Company, or L3C, after the Nonprofit Law Blog posted a very helpful roundup of internet coverage of the nascent legal form. We had Robert Lang, the L3C’s originator, here at the Yale SOM Philanthropy Conference in December. You can read about that panel here.
• Secretary of the Arts? Not so much, but there is a new arts staffer in the (White) house. Kareem Dale is a lawyer and former board chair of Black Ensemble Theater in Chicago. Notably, his position is within the Office of Public Liaison and Intergovernmental Affairs, which was an explicit recommendation made by Jonathan Sheffer when he spoke at the National Arts Policy Roundtable I attended in November. Apparently someone listened.
• And you thought the $50 million for the NEA was the only way to get arts funding from the feds through the stimulus package? The National Assembly of State Arts Agencies says hi.
• Whoa – the Annenberg Foundation might move to LA? This is not good news for Philly arts organizations.
• Andy Horwitz spills some of the beans on his prescription for new models of cultural production. I am struck by how many of what I thought were my own crazy ideas about the arts (in this case, a shift away from gargantuan institutions toward a more decentralized neighborhood/community model, the idea of the arts as R&D for society, the integration of “wisdom of crowds” thinking into the system) are reflected here, and in the writing of other people around the web. It tells me that a lot of the stuff I’ve been pushing for is perhaps not as radical as I thought, but rather just common sense.
• Nice writeup on the Chronicle of Philanthropy about the Pew Charitable Trusts’ Cultural Data Project.
• Musical talent is not all innate, according to this new study of kids taking keyboard lessons. Their brains grew larger in the areas relating to hearing and dexterity than a control group of students who did not participate in the lessons. The areas relating to arithmetic, on the other hand, did not appear to be affected by the training.

We can now confirm that the package DOES include $50 million in direct support for arts jobs through National Endowment for the Arts grants. We are also happy to report that the exclusionary Coburn Amendment language banning certain arts groups from receiving any other economic recovery funds has also been successfully removed.

Well done, everyone. According to the AftA email, 85,000 letters were sent to Congress on this issue, and thousands of calls were made. The email also singles out two members of the committee charged with reconciling the House and Senate versions of the bill for “carr[ying] our voices into the conference negotiation room”: Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) and Appropriations Chair Dave Obey (D-WI). If you live in either of their districts, please send them a thank you note.

UPDATE: This is especially important because many state arts councils are in serious trouble, and officials in Michigan, South Dakota, and Washington are proposing to eliminate state arts funding entirely. The $20 million in this package earmarked for the states will be a significant help in this regard.

If anyone’s wondering why I’ve been following this story so closely this week and last, it’s not just because I think it will make a difference for arts organizations (it will definitely help some of them, though many others will continue to suffer). It’s also an exercise in reading the tea leaves on how much our Congressional leadership believes in our cause. If it actually makes it into the final bill in spite of the controversy that the right threw at it and even after Coburn’s amendment (which apparently has been “watered down” to allow for arts funding) passed 73-24, that is a very promising sign indeed.

Other recent stimulus-related coverage for your entertainment:

• The Center for American Progress gets into the act with a strident rebuttal of recent quotes from conservatives on the stimulus.
• Umm, yeah, so it turns out that Tom Coburn’s daughter is a professional opera singer, and Father Dearest himself is apparently a frequent patron. (Coincidence, perhaps, that opera companies are spared the wrath of the Coburn amendment?)
• The LA Times‘s Culture Monster blog has been all over this story, and features two articles of particular note: a provocative argument to redirect funding for continued production of the F-22 fighter jet to the arts (though some of the author’s facts seem a little shaky), and speculation that the arts funding argument suffers from the public profile of well-compensated stars of the field (who, of course, represent a tiny minority of artists).
• Soho the Dog on why the Coburn amendment represents a fundamental misunderstanding of economics. (As an economist I spoke to this week told me, “it’s just stupid.”) And again today on thinking big for arts funding.

Rep. Henry A. Waxman (D-CA-30)
Rep. Jerry Lewis (R-CA-41)
Sen. Daniel Inouye (D-HI)
Sen. Charles Grassley (R-IA)
Rep. Dave Camp (R-MI-04)
Sen. Thad Cochran (R-MS)
Sen. Max Baucus (D-MT)
Sen. Harry Reid (D-NV)
Rep. Charles B. Rangel (D-NY-15)
Rep. David R. Obey (D-WI-07)

Find out how to contact elected officials here.