“What does make a theatre feel like home? Negotiating mobile phones, sweet wrappers and chatty Kathys is a well-documented headache for theatre staff and spectators alike. The academic Kirsty Sedgman … notes: ‘We may say we want audiences to feel at home in the theatre, but we are still not willing to go so far as to let them act like they are at home.’ So can you make everyone feel at home?” – The Guardian
Category: issues
Eight Trends That Are Changing The Non-Profit Sector
There has also been unprecedented leadership turnover across the classical performing arts sector. “Furthermore, the pipeline for leadership is not there to meet the demands. Changing tastes, an oversupply of product and the delta between the availability and demand for leadership will lead to bankruptcies and dissolutions of many of the classical arts organizations.” – Hunt Scanlon Media
The Experience Economy – It’s More Than The “Product”
“The experience of the product is bigger than the product itself,” said Donald Chesnut, who became Mastercard Inc.’s first chief experience officer in 2019. “It’s everything around it. How well does it work? How does the product feel?” Some 89% of companies employed a chief experience officer or an equivalent role in 2019, up from 61% in 2017, according to research and advisory firm Gartner Inc., which surveyed nearly 400 large companies in the U.S., Canada and U.K. about their customer experience management. – Wall Street Journal
The Newseum Does Still Exist, In A Diffuse Sort Of Way
“Pop-up shows at Washington’s two airports and an immersive display in a 12th-floor suite at the Hamilton Hotel offer the first glimpse of its future. The suffrage-themed displays represent a significantly diminished footprint for the long-struggling museum of journalism, which last year sold its building, laid off 88 employees and moved the remaining staff of about 40.” – The Washington Post
Arts Venues Is Britain May Be Required By Law To Protect Against Terrorism
“Home Office officials are to launch a consultation on legally forcing organisations to increase physical security at venues and train staff to respond to terrorist attacks, as well as putting in place incident response plans – and how failure to comply would be enforced.” – The Guardian
Even Great Journalism Isn’t Enough To Fully Understand #MeToo. We Need Fiction.
“It’s a truism to say our society doesn’t do well when faced with competing stories about what happened; that’s what ‘he said/she said’ has become a shorthand for. … To overcome that reflex, … we need to practice on something with lower stakes than the literal lives of accusers and accused. We need Me Too fiction and metatexts that help us understand this problem outside of a news cycle. And recently, we’ve been getting them.” – Slate
Italian Arts Venues Close And Venice Carnival Is Cancelled As Measures To Contain Coronavirus
Across northern Italy from Venice to Milan, theatres, cinemas, museums, and opera houses (including La Scala) have been ordered to stop operations for a week as cases of the disease spread. – Hyperallergic
Rio Carnival Taboo Broken: First Trans Woman To Lead Parade
Camila Prins says she first realized she wanted to be a woman at a Carnival party at age 11, when, like the other boys, she was allowed to dress like a girl as part of the burlesque festivities. Now, in the final minutes of Saturday, she became the first transgender woman to lead the drum section of a top samba school in either of the renowned Carnival parades put in Sao Paulo and Rio de Janeiro. – Washington Post (AP)
Trump Administration Is Moving National Archives Out Of Seattle. Native Americans Are Furious
“The U.S. government made us paper Indians — our ancestors are here,” Jack proclaimed last week at Sand Point. To close and remove the archives is to physically remove the ancestors (word is the contents of these warehouses would probably be transferred to facilities thousands of miles away in Missouri and in Southern California). – Crosscut
Is This Pliny The Elder’s Skull?
Over the last few years a pool of Italian biologists, anthropologists and geochemists conducted a series of forensic tests on the skull and accompanying lower mandible, which were unearthed 120 years ago on a shore not far from Pompeii. On Jan. 23 the scientists presented their findings at a conference in the museum. The skull, they concluded, squared with what was known about Pliny at his death, but the jawbone belonged to someone else. – The New York Times