ARTSblog

Ah, conventions. You know the drill. You arrive, check in to your hotel, head to the opening reception, and stand around sipping bad chardonnay and wait desperately for someone to come talk to you. Maybe you’re lucky; you came with a friend or professional acquaintance from your city, so you stand with that person as you nibble dubious shrimp cocktail. But everyone else just looks like they somehow belong; you can just tell they’ve been coming to the conference for a decade or more and are meeting old friends. And so, after another woeful canape, you head back to your hotel room for some shut-eye before the sessions begin. You’re just hopeful that you’ll glean something from the next three days of drudgery; something that you can add to your resume under the “Professional Development” category. But let’s be honest–aren’t there a million other things you could be doing right now.

That is not at all what Americans for the Arts does at their Annual Convention. As an attendee of many national conventions, I was, quite frankly, blown away by my first Americans for the Arts convention. Read the rest of this entry »

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Happy New Year!

The start of a new year is a time not only of celebration, but also reflection. This year, Americans for the Arts is celebrating its 50th Anniversary, so we’re spending a lot of time thinking about how the arts in America have been shaped during the last half century, as well as how the arts have shaped ourselves.

We invite you to celebrate with us by sharing a formative or inspirational arts moment from your own life.

Together, we can create a powerful reminder that, no matter what the future holds, the arts are an essential part of all our lives and deserving of our collective hard work and investment.

We wish you the very best in 2010!

Robert L. Lynch, President and CEO, Americans for the Arts
I work to advance the arts in people’s lives because I know that it makes their lives and the life of our towns and nation better. I know that, because a teacher in the eighth grade gave me the gift of believing that I could make poetry, because my parents gave me the gift of music making which still sustains me every day, and a single moment in a movie taught me that I was a part of a universe and not its center. I thank all the people who pass these gifts on to others.

Steve Spiess, Executive Director, Cravath, Swaine & Moore LLP
Chairman of the Americans for the Arts Board of Directors
It seems like the arts have always been a part of my life. Since childhood, I have been blessed with wonderful memories of music and theatre and dance and the visual arts. And I have been able to travel to other parts of the world to experience many different cultures. But, my most memorable arts experience is one of my most recent, and is easy to name. It is seeing the joy in my 17-month old son Joshua’s eyes as he dances to, and sings along with, the music that we have played for him since before he was born. Or the way that he runs to show me the crayon masterpiece that he created while I was at work. These special moments make everything right in my world, give me hope that he will be a bright light in his future world and demonstrate the power of the arts to make our lives whole.

Read the rest of this entry »

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Yesterday, Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) President & CEO Paula Kerger told a Los Angeles audience that following years of decline, arts and culture will once again have a home on PBS stations throughout the country.

The new endeavors for PBS include an online arts portal (starting in April) and a plan to devote one night of programming each week to the arts (starting in the fall or winter). The network is also looking to serve communities that have lost arts educators, by providing new arts inclusion material on the PBS Teachers website.

“To be candid, over the last years, we haven’t done as good a job (with cultural programming) as we could,” Kerger said. “I think we can do more. We’re looking to increase the investment we’re making in the arts. The budget (for such programs) has been flat or slightly down. I want to ramp it up.” Read the rest of this entry »

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I was a Jacques Cousteau fanatic starting in my preschool years. I flummoxed my family early on as a precocious three-year old, running around demanding “Jockootoe! Jockootoe!” until someone turned on the TV. When he appeared, I was transfixed.

Since then and until the show went off the air, when The Undersea World of Jacques Cousteau was on, I was lost in the wonders of the ocean, its mysteries and dangers, and general awesomeness. It was cool—and it stoked an already healthy imagination in a little girl growing up in rural Mountaintop, PA.

I was recently fortunate to have the opportunity to reconnect with my inner science/nature geek by communing with 80 professional artists and scientists, along with arts, university, and nonprofit administrators on a surprisingly snowy weekend in December at the first U.S. convening of the British organization TippingPoint. Read the rest of this entry »

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Hope is a pathway.  One such path is made possible through the arts. I feel pretty lucky in that I’ve pretty much seen myself as hopeful in my life.  I’ve also had a life filled with arts, as well as a family for whom arts remains central.  I am often reminded that this is not the experience of many of the students I teach.

The semester just ended and my college students handed in their final projects and write-ups.  I teach a class called “Learning Through the Arts” at California State University San Marcos, in southern California.  The final for this class, rather than a test or research paper,  is a 3D sculpture that the students create to demonstrate an understanding of how they view the role of arts in education.

The students in this class are preparing to become elementary school teachers.  Most students who attend my university commute, many live at home, and the majority work to put themselves through college.  We are located in northern San Diego County where nearly every public school qualifies as having 35% or more students on free or reduced school lunch.  Many of the students who come to the university campus grew up in Spanish speaking or bilingual homes, and as an institution we have the distinction of being named a “Hispanic-Serving” institution.  There are also quite a number of Asian-Pacific students, thus bottom line, a truly wonderful mix of students on campus.

Read the rest of this entry »

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written by Ron Evans

At the recent NAMP Conference in Providence, a lot of focus was put onto Twitter, and what use it could be to connect with patrons and have them join in on the conversation. Those of you who use Twitter already know how quickly life flies by tweet by tweet (if you’re new to the idea of Twitter, read up on an excellent article on what Twitter is at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twitter). A few days ago, a female blogger who goes by the name “Broadway Girl NYC” wrote a post called “The BroadwayGirlNYC Dating Service: Let Love Shine on Broadway.” Her blog and her original post can be found here and her twitter page is: http://twitter.com/broadwaygirlnyc

On a whim, she designed a contest of sorts — she challenged her single Twitter followers to write a tweet and add the hashtag “#SingleOnBway” (a hashtag is a way for Twitter people using the same term in their post to find other people who want to talk about the same topic) as a way for single folks to find each other and potentially make a connection via public messages on Twitter. If there was a spark, they were told to send a tweet back to BroadwayGirlNYC, and she would choose two winners to give two free tickets to MCC Theater’s “The Pride” for a “blind date.”

The response has been amazing. Read the rest of this entry »

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Podcast: Download (Duration: 4:45 — 4.4MB)

Americans for the Arts President & CEO Robert Lynch discusses a recent trip to Art Basel Miami Beach in this audio podcast. While the huge arts fair is a boon for visual art collectors and art lovers, it has also provided a great opportunity for Americans for the Arts to find new, influential voices who will advocate for the arts. Take a listen to Bob discuss new partnerships and key meetings with South Florida members.

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Last night, PBS NewsHour aired an interview of National Endowment for the Arts Chairman Rocco Landesman. The interview provides some good insight into his background and some important questions and answers about his role as NEA Chairman. Click below to watch the video.

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Since everyone else is talking about Avatar, we may as well continue the conversation in Arts Watch and on ARTSblog.

I saw the movie in IMAX 3-D on New Year’s Day, along with what seemed like the entire Washington, DC metro area. 

We bought our tickets two days ahead of time, and arrived at the theater two hours early to get in line for our seats. When we arrived at the theater, flashing signs indicated that the movie was sold out for the next three days. It’s been a long time since I’ve ever seen this much hype around a movie. The hype, in my opinion, is well-deserved.

I woke up Monday morning to the news that after the weekend, Avatar had already exceeded over $1 billion in box office sales.  Talk about economic impact.

The movie was made using the digital 3-D Fusion Camera System, co-developed by Director James Cameron. All of this new filming technology got me wondering:  If we didn’t have art in schools, communities, or non-profit arts organizations, could this movie have been made? Read the rest of this entry »

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Podcast: Download (Duration: 6:27 — 5.9MB)

Robert Lynch, President & CEO of Americans for the Arts, takes this ArtCast as an opportunity to thank all the tireless partners who helped make 2009 such a big year for Americans from the Arts. He reviews some of the key successes of 2009 and then discusses the 50th anniversary of Americans for the Arts, which begins in January 2010. He also focuses on this year’s Annual Convention, which will be a Half-Century Summit in Baltimore, Maryland from June 25 – 27. For more information on the Summit, visit our website.

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