2011

Ok - my New Year's resolution is to commit to this blog and keep it up to date. And get it out to more people.

First, farewell to 2010. The Times this a.m. had a diagram of the S and P 500 for the year and it looked like this year was - extreme highs and extreme lows, ending generally higher than when we began. Too much happened to digest the whole year, but here are a few thoughts and observations about what has happened int he world of art and ideas that probably has impact for 2011.

1. The economy
I am more interested in the economy as metaphor than the actual details of it that are better left to analysis by others smarter about this than I am. But the extremes represent what I have been saying since this all started in 2008 - we are in a period of high volatility and there are no signs of the end of this. The impact of this volatility on the arts is huge and a real challenge for those of us trying to run organizations. Resilience and innovation are the name of the game for us if we are to create and sustain institutions that can withstand this kind of volatility.

2. Politics and the electorate
Just like the economy - no stability and no apparent rationality. My own view of the mid terms, as the dust cleared, is that people are pissed and they are voting their anger, even when the results are so likely to redound to their detriment not their advantage. 2011 is going to be a wild and crazy year in politics especially at the national level. I am happy to be in California which, to my way of thinking, voted completely wisely and sanely, rejecting the, horrible beyond imagining, Carly Fiorina and Meg Whitman. Sanity prevailed over anger, thank God.

3. The arts.
I think we're in a real period of transition here - a post modern moment that has fully exploded into a chaos of creative output, some of it enlightening and much of it not. I've been surprised at how little outrage had manifested itself in works created by artists critiquing contemporary America and what we have come to. Are artists as shell shocked as the rest of the country? Where are you when we need you? The work I have seen with the most urgency has been in Africa where artists are creating under dire conditions and driven by the need to speak out in inhospitable, even dangerous environments.

4. Ideas
I continue to believe that the unsettled state of the world provides the basis from which creative, provocative ideas will emerge. In the area of the nonprofit arts, the last two years have been a wake up call that some of us are starting to respond to. New organizational models are emerging, new ways of engaging with audiences, creative responses to technology and the changing demographics are emerging in a very exciting way - so much so that those still hanging on to their old ways of working and thinking look more and more obsolete every day.

I'm looking forward this year to sharing with you what I can find that inspires us to keep doing this very important work.

April 17, 2010

I have been wanting to do this for a long time - finally got around to it. I'm interested in the intersection of art and ideas around the world and how art impacts our lives. And I am eager for dialogue so write back and tell me what you think!