Category: issues

“As core arts audiences grow older and attendance declines among young people, big arts organizations across the country are reaching out to potential new audiences in innovative ways. Seattle has become a center for this kind of outreach.”

“Tulsa’s major performing arts groups are facing the 2009-10 season with something that approaches optimism. Three — the Signature Symphony, Tulsa Symphony Orchestra and Tulsa Ballet — have put together ambitious programs for the coming season, increasing the number of performances they present.”

“Tens of thousands of students at public and private colleges and universities around the country will find arts programs, courses and teachers missing — victims of piercing budget cuts — when they descend on campuses this month and next.”

“The art community is not meeting its duty of always questioning those in power. And I say duty because the art community, as a counterpart of the press, has been given special rights written into the Bill of Rights, known broadly as freedom of the press, for the explicit purpose of keeping power in check.”

“This comes at a time when we’re opening the Center for the Performing Arts and telling the world that the arts are important to us, while at the same time we’re saying that we don’t feel it’s important enough to be a department-level position,”

“Popular culture and mass media are no longer very popular or mass. By and large, both entertainment and art appeal to niches, cultural tribes that range in size from tiny to smallish. But our hunger for massively shared cultural moments has not disappeared. In our Balkanized era, Barack Obama simply is the pop cultural colossus.”

“Funding for cultural services will be cut by about 20 percent as the Office of Cultural Affairs is merged with the Library Department.”

“To be sure, the frequent presence of artists in the White House provides us with reason to be hopeful that the new administration will be a good partner for the arts community. But taking advantage of this opportunity will require a dramatic rethinking of the way we engage with policymakers.”

“The Los Angeles County Arts Commission will distribute $4.42 million in county-funded grants to nonprofit cultural organizations – a 2% belt-tightening from last year’s total.”

“Advance ticket sales for the Edinburgh Festival’s 2009 season have soared by up to 40 per cent, leaving Fringe bosses baffled but delighted. Recession-wary ‘staycationers’, the weak pound, or punters taking no chances after last year’s box office fiasco have all been credited with helping the dramatic sales boost in the midst of a downturn. … The Fringe is desperate for a strong year after last year’s annus horribilis.”