Category: issues

Extension of copyright is all the rage lately, with companies and individuals scrambling to protect their exclusive rights to various moneymaking characters, songs, and images. On the surface, such protection seems at least somewhat reasonable, but isn’t the public interest hurt when the government repeatedly prevents classic songs from entering the public domain? “We rightfully grant the monopoly called copyright to inspire new creative work. But once that work has been created, there is no public justification for extending its term. The public has already paid. Term extension is just double billing.”

Leading British writers are meeting with the government to express concerns that “the proposed new law on inciting religious hatred will stifle artistic liberty. Salman Rushdie and more than 200 writers of various faiths signed a letter from the writers’ group English Pen which was sent to the home secretary, Charles Clarke, earlier this month seeking an “urgent” meeting with him.”

“The new study finds that only 10 percent of Illinois arts leaders receive any employer contribution whatsoever to their retirement savings. Other fringe benefits are in similarly short supply. And a striking 50 percent of Illinois arts groups make no contributions to the costs of their employees’ health care. The study finds arts managers to be mature, highly educated and highly skilled. Nonetheless, it finds, their tenures tend to be shorter than in other non-profits, and their paychecks relatively small. Although higher than the national average, the average salary in Illinois for a non-profit arts leader is $49,911. Workers at major cultural institutions, of course, earn significantly more. Still, the most frequent salary amounts were $35,000 and $25,000.”

Schools that go beyond basics and include arts studies produce better students. “A study of 23 arts-integrated schools in Chicago showed test scores rising up to two times faster there than in demographically comparable schools. A study of a Minneapolis program showed that arts integration has substantial effects for all students, but appears to have its greatest impact on disadvantaged learners. Gains go well beyond the basics and test scores. Students become better thinkers, develop higher-order skills, and deepen their inclination to learn. The studies also show that arts integration energizes and challenges teachers.”

Lincoln Center chairman Bruce Crawford is resigning. When he assumed the post in June 2002, he said he would stay three to five years. “In the interview in his office yesterday, Mr. Crawford, who turns 76 in March, said there was no significance to his leaving on the early side of that projection.”

The California Arts Council has a new director – Muriel Johnson, a veteran Republican politician and arts advocate from Sacramento. But she won’t have much to work with. The $3.2-million arts budget governor Arnold Schwarzenegger proposed Monday means that California again will likely rank last in the nation in per-capita state spending on the arts.

American ticketing behemoth TickeMaster has established a new division for the arts. “Ticketmaster sold 100 million tickets valued at $4.9 billion in 2003. It serves more than 8,000 clients worldwide.”

The California Arts Council has a new director. Muriel Johnson, is a recently retired chairwoman of the Sacramento County Board of Supervisors, where she helped direct a budget of about $1.5 billion. She takes over an agency whose budget was slashed last year from $18 million to aboput $1 million.

The state of Utah is considering leveling its sales tax across the state. That concerns arts supporters in Salt Lake City, because a major source of revenue for the arts comes from a special sales tax levy…

Australia needs to reconsider how it funds the arts, writes the head of the Australian Council Jennifer Bott. “Australians now spend $10 billion annually on arts goods; 85 per cent of Australian adults attend cultural events or performances; 78 per cent read for pleasure on most days; and close to 30 per cent of Australia’s children are involved in after-school arts activities. All this builds a grid of new arts stakeholders whose needs must be considered by the Australia Council along with its more traditional areas of focus. The arts develop qualities that are the building blocks of the new economies shaping the world. Demand for the arts is growing but, by and large, funding is not.”