Category: issues

Think of arts and you think of… Pittsburgh? Absolutely. Over the past 20 years the city has transformed itself from rust bucket industrial to cultural Mecca. “We’re the town of Mr. Rogers and Andy Warhol, which speaks of what we are and what we’re becoming.”

The lives of artists in Canada aren’t getting better – at least in economic terms, reports a new study. Though there are more artists than ever, “in 2001, artists made $23,500 – or about 26 per cent less than an average annual salary for all workers. The gap had increased from 1991, when they made 23 per cent less than the average.”

“Close to one-half of Canada’s artists live in just three cities — Vancouver, Toronto, Montreal. And while the number of artists across Canada has increased by almost 30 per cent in the last decade, they’re earning on average 26 per cent less than other workers in the labour force, a study released yesterday shows.”

A new study measures the economic impact of Lincoln Centre on New York City. It’s significant. “Direct spending on operations by Lincoln Center and all of its resident organizations, the report says, totaled $530 million in 2003; fully $350 million of that figure represented spending on employee wages and benefits. This translated into 9,000 full-time, part-time, and contract positions, equal to approximately 5,500 full-time employees.”

After 9/11, arts institutions in Washington DC struggled to find audiences (and income). But the post-9/11 slup is officially over, with attendance (and income) on the rise. “The upturn is attributed to the rise in tourism, resumption of school field trips, economic security enjoyed by the theater-going public, and rise of the Internet as an easy way to buy tickets, according to managers of many of the region’s 60-plus theatrical companies.”

A group of Texas “writers, musicians and arts patrons are placing newspaper ads against President Bush this week, declaring ‘the Texan in the White House doesn’t speak for us’.”

Web sites are of great value to museums, with the potential to reach a far wider swath of the public for a smaller cash outlay than most forms of advertising. But what if the public can’t find your site? It’s a nightmare scenario being experienced by the UK’s Horniman Museum, which has found its site blocked by automatic web filters and its e-mails discarded by spam blockers. Why the nasty treatment for a legitimate art museum? Try saying the name a few times, and you’ll get the idea.

The man charged with relaunching London’s South Bank Arts Centre is furious with the city’s political establishment, declaring “I don’t know any other country in the world where politicians don’t actually want to come along to arts events.” According to Michael Lynch, the long-overdue overhaul of South Bank has been an example of the disengagement of UK politicians from the arts. “He suspects that politicians fear they will be categorised by the public as highbrow, but he is concerned because when those in positions of power do not see arts events for themselves, securing funding becomes more difficult.”

California’s State History Museum is nearly broke, and could close in the next few months if a sudden influx of cash is not found. The state’s first lady, former journalist Maria Shriver, is proposing to convert the institution into a museum celebrating the contribution of women to California’s history, but a backlash began the moment Shriver stepped into the fray, with detractors accusing her of strong-arming the museum board. Shriver insists that the board approached her, and that she is “happy to help.”

Colorado’s Scientific and Cultural Facilities District is the fancy name for a sales tax that has raised hundreds of millions of dollars for arts and cultural groups in the state. But the tax is up for a renewal vote this fall, and the public is likely to want tangible assurances that the money is having a positive impact. “Cultural organizations have bigger budgets and larger staffs because of the tax. And SCFD funding has helped create cooperation among groups in terms of programming (even some shared mailing lists), and more sophisticated, persistent marketing.”