ARTSblog

Jessica Cusick

On Saturday, September 28, 2013, Glow, the first all-night arts event in the United States to emphasize the commissioning of new work, will transform the beach in Santa Monica into a world of interactive and engaging contemporary art installations.

Building on the success of Glow’s first two editions, it is expected, once again, to attract between 100,000 and 200,000 visitors to Santa Monica Beach during the course of one night, making it among the largest public art events in the U.S.

In order to produce the event, staff will ask City Council to adopt an ordinance that temporarily suspends local law in the Glow zone for the duration of the event, as was the case in 2008 and 2010. This was the unusual solution that we were able to craft, working closely with the City Attorney’s office.

Use of public space in Santa Monica is by necessity heavily regulated given the broad range of demands and the need to preserve access to one of the most iconic beaches in the country. When we first started discussing Glow we realized that in order to provide the artists the freedom they needed to reinvent our public spaces, and give the public the opportunity to experience them, the event that we were imagining would essentially break every rule in the book. These range from when the parks are open to the public to what can take place on the beach at various times of the year. In 2008, we even needed to take precautions not to impact the grunion run!  Read the rest of this entry »

Narric Rome

On May 10, U.S. Secretary of Commerce John Bryson and the U.S. Secretary for the Interior Ken Salazar released the U.S. National Travel & Tourism Strategy as developed through the Task Force on Travel & Competitiveness.

The task force had been set up through a Presidential Executive Order in January that called for a strategy within 90 days. President Obama announced the Executive Order at a visit to one of the most popular tourist sites in the world, Main Street USA in Disneyworld.

That same day in Orlando, FL, a new slate of members of the U.S. Travel & Tourism Advisory Board was sworn in by Secretary Bryson, including Americans for the Arts President & CEO Robert Lynch and Linda Carlisle, the Secretary of North Carolina’s Department of Cultural Resources—both critical voices representing the arts and cultural tourism community within the larger tourism sector.

In its first three months of work, The U.S. Travel & Tourism Advisory Board (TTAB) developed a set of recommendations to Secretary Bryson to inform his work, and that of the task force, on the development of the national strategy.

Among the TTAB recommendations that relate to the arts and culture were:

(1) the inclusion of the arts as an objective to attracting tourists to secondary markets throughout the country,

(2) how an “authentic” experience is critical to a quality experience, and

(3) the need to include local tourism partners, such as city agencies and destination marketing organizations as partners with the federal government. Read the rest of this entry »

Our friends at Ovation work quickly.

They just posted this video on YouTube covering the early part of Alec Baldwin’s presentation of the 2012 Nancy Hanks Lecture on Arts & Public Policy given on April 16 at the Kennedy Center in Washington, DC:

More to come…

Nancy Hanks

Americans for the Arts is proud to announce that 2012 marks the 25^th anniversary of the Nancy Hanks Lecture on Arts and Public Policy.

The lecture itself is dedicated to an impressive and influential individual — Nancy Hanks, former president of Americans for the Arts (then known as the American Council for the Arts) and chairwoman of the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA).

Chairwoman Hanks was appointed by President Nixon in 1969, four years after the founding of the NEA, and served two four-year terms.

Under her tenure, the NEA’s budget grew by a staggering 1,400 percent! This budgetary expansion is demonstrative of the critical role Chairwoman Hanks played in the development of the NEA and the arts in America.

Hanks proved to be an articulate and effective advocate for the importance of federal arts support during an especially vulnerable time. As members of Congress continued to dispute the very existence of the NEA, she was able to personally persuade dozens of legislators to vote for increased appropriations. Read the rest of this entry »

Neil McKenzie

There is a lot of buzz right now about how the U.S. is in a creativity crisis. Even businesses are getting into the act as a result of the poor economy and an uncertain future.

In a recent study conducted by IBM, executives cited creativity as the key to success, “chief executives believe that — more than rigor, management discipline, integrity or even vision — successfully navigating an increasing complex world will require creativity.”

My guess is that businesses are looking for people who can think “outside the box” while being able to work in a team oriented and collaborative environment. Most organizations require or even demand conformity and the shift to developing a creative business atmosphere may not come easily.

When things are going well in a business the problem is fulfilling demand and increasing productivity to get more goods going out the door. Today the problem seems to be to grow demand in a slow economy and create new products and services for today’s global economy. The days of achieving a good bottom line through cost cutting are probably over.

I wonder if Apple has a creativity crisis? Read the rest of this entry »

Gladstone Payton

On October 18, the U.S. Senate Finance Committee held a hearing titled “Tax Reform Options: Incentives for Charitable Giving” partially in response to the ever-changing dynamics regarding proposals for tax reform, job creation, and deficit reduction swirling around the Nation’s Capital.

Lowering and capping the value of tax deduction to charities for the top wage earners under the tax code has been proposed by the Obama Administration in recent years to help raise revenue to help curb national deficits, pay for the health care reform and fund the now scaled-down American Jobs Act.

Since being removed from the jobs bill, treatment of itemized deductions such as the charitable deduction has become part of the growing dialogue about tax reform, sparking heated debates on whether a cap on such deductions would have a negative effect on the giving patterns of donors to charity and giving rise to the committee hearing.

The nonprofit arts sector (including Americans for the Arts) has been working closely with such organizations as Independent Sector, the Alliance for Charitable Reform and the Council of Nonprofits to ensure that any changes to charitable giving not be negatively impacted especially during the economic downturn. Read the rest of this entry »

Narric Rome

Not long into my tenure at the U.S. Department of Education during the Clinton administration, I came to understand the limits of what the federal government can do for K-12 education.

At the time, the department boosted funding to support the hiring of 100,000 new teachers and the launch of a new national afterschool initiative that is now a $1.1 billion program.

Arts teachers were among the 100,000 new hires and many of the programs embraced the arts. Federal investment had an important impact, but many arts education advocates would not rank these two accomplishments as major successes. Why? Because a new arts teacher and a new arts afterschool program did not appear in every school in every community.

We need to remember that the federal share in total education spending is only 11 cents on the dollar. The remaining funds come from state and local sources.

Which brings me to federal policy. Read the rest of this entry »

Kathy Smith

The recent events in the Kansas state government were like “déjà vu all over again” for those of us in Topeka. In 2005, our city council decided that our local arts council would no longer receive funding from the general budget, or any budget for that matter.

In response, the Topeka Community Foundation moved ahead with plans to create a privately funded entity, ARTSConnect, which would be a part of the United Arts Fund network.

This was a welcome concept among those in the arts community – a stable, sustainable plan for general operating funds, plus an organization who would help to provide that umbrella for all organizations and individuals who are passionate about the arts and our community.  Read the rest of this entry »

Una McAlinden

Yes – when you live in Washington State! With more cloudy days than sunshine – you often have to sing, dance, act, and create in the rain! Yes, these activities are usually happening in buildings, but the rain is ubiquitous. And during our coldest wettest spring on record, we’re singing the praises of the arts this month as Washington State celebrates Arts Education Month in May.

From the grand Olympic mountains to the lush rolling hills of the Palouse, support of arts education is heard in harmony from the Governor, the Superintendent of Public Instruction, the School Directors Association, city and county governments, state and local PTAs, local media outlets, and from communities across the state.

ArtsEd Washington (the Washington Alliance for Arts Education) led the efforts to begin highlighting and recognizing the importance of arts education back in 2006 by memorializing an “Arts Education Week” during the third week in May.  Read the rest of this entry »

Tim Mikulski

As previewed by Marete Wester last week on ARTSblog, this week has been chock full of data and recommendations from our own organization’s National Arts Policy Roundtable (NAPR); the U.S. Department of Education’s first look at national arts education from 2009-2010; and the President’s Committee on the Arts and Humanities (PCAH) recommendations for the field.

The PCAH report, released today, seeks to put into practice President Obama’s campaign commitment to arts education as the committee has spent the past 18 months assessing the status of the subject, conducting research, and identifying ways to improve and advance arts education.

Their report offers five recommendations to “clarify the position of the arts in a comprehensive, well-rounded K-12 education that is appropriate for all students; unify and focus efforts to expand arts education offerings to underserved students and communities; and, strengthen the evidence base for high-quality arts education.”

PCAH recommends the following:

1. Build collaborations among different approaches – “move beyond internal debates in the arts education field about modes of delivery of arts instruction in order to address more pressing issues of equitable access and infusing more schools with a creativity-rich environment.”  Read the rest of this entry »

Kevin Spacey

Just a few short weeks ago, actors Alec Baldwin, Kerry Washington, Kevin Spacey, and Hill Harper joined more than 550 arts advocates representing 40 states from across the country on Capitol Hill for National Arts Advocacy Day 2011.

This year’s event took place at a critical time when legislators were battling over program cuts to reduce the deficit.

The day began with the Congressional Arts Kickoff where several members of Congress spoke to advocates about the importance of arts funding.

Rep. Mike Simpson (R-ID), who chairs the subcommittee that oversees funding for the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) and the Smithsonian, said that while some in Congress believe that government should not support the arts, “I respectfully disagree.”   Read the rest of this entry »