It’s been a week since the election. I have spent the time (metaphorically) in the fetal position under the covers. I regret that I’ve not had the psychological energy to weigh in before; I’m now viscerally aware that with age comes a marked reduction in resilience. (Who knew?)
I will confess that one of my first impulses was to throw in the towel on my work attempting to better connect arts organizations with their communities. Even then, though, I knew that was a form of cowardice that I couldn’t, ultimately, abide. It was Diane Ragsdale’s reflection on our situation slapped me silly and began the process of getting me out of my funk:
We arts workers will need to let go of the notion upon which many nonprofit professional cultural organizations were founded: that we exist, essentially, to save the world with art (and, quite often, with Western European Bourgeois Art, specifically). Instead, it seems that our first charge is to live fully in our tragically divided country and participate fully in our tragically broken democracy. Fleeing physically, mentally, emotionally, or spiritually is to deny both our culpability and power to make a difference.
But her reminder of Paul Krugman’s late-night election day post (that I did read live) is what is most affecting me now: “[P]eople like me, like most readers of the New York Times, truly didn’t understand the country we live in.” Like so many others, we didn’t see it coming; and we didn’t see it coming because 1) the reality of–as opposed to our fantasies about–suburban/exurban/rural life is invisible to us, 2) we have made little or no effort to learn about those communities, and/or 3) we don’t truly value the experiences of those communities.
Yes, there are virulent racists and rabid misogynists who voted for the next president, but there are not 59+ million of them. Many of those voters chose to hold their noses and opt for support of values, vitally important to them, with which we passionately disagree or, like working class jobs, we’ve given little thought; but we also know that many Clinton voters held their noses to support equity, justice, and/or a historic possibility.
I am the grandson, nephew, and cousin of Iowa farmers, raised in that state in a town of about 25,000 people. If I, who came from that world, can lose sight of their experience, it’s not surprising that so many of us were blindsided. BTW, if you want a good dose of humble pie, read “I am the rural uneducated person.” (Try substituting “arts establishment” for “media” as you read it.)
Years ago, when Building Communities, Not Audiences was in the planning stages, I was invited to speak with a group of staff members at the National Endowment for the Arts. (I am indebted to Jamie Bennett for that incredible opportunity.) When I described the book’s content, Joan Shigekawa, Sr. Deputy Chair of the Endowment, asked me, “But what about the disaffected middle class?” I knew I had been nailed because I was not specifically addressing that world in the book. I did a brief politician’s dance of words around the topic and resolved to make sure I never lost sight of her question.
When I encourage arts organizations to build relationships with new communities, I’m always asked “What communities?” The pragmatic answer is to begin with those with which some relationship already exists. But it’s true that the knee-jerk first thought–often encouraged by funders–is always some target community, often a community of color. I encourage broadening that thinking but it’s true I’ve seldom (though not never) mentioned segments of the middle class. Going forward, I must do better in responding to Ms. Shigekawa’s admonition.
I am seeing people referring to the arts as “weapons of mass inclusion” to be tapped at this moment in our history. That’s a great sentiment. To live up to that description we must include, along with others, rural, suburban, and middle class communities in our planning. Thus far, we’ve not devoted enough of our time to this. There are, of course, shining exceptions. Let me point to Art of the Rural and Springboard for the Arts (because they are the ones I know best) as two among a goodly number that do support work that impacts rural and/or middle class lives.
And to be clear, we’ve not devoted nearly enough thought and energy to building relationships with any new community, but that’s a much, much different discussion.
Ms. Ragsdale, at the conclusion of her election reflection exhorted us to “. . . walk out into our communities, with our senses wide open, and absorb ‘the relations between one thing and another.’” I’ve been advocating that for years as the basis for community building. What I now see is that we need to be doing that not just in urban neighborhoods but also in suburbs, towns, and villages across the country. For the good of our communities and, frankly, for the viability of our industry, we must, collectively, learn from and work with all of them. We can be a powerful force for furthering understanding and for building unity if we do things to make us so.
(Get out from under the covers and) Engage!
Doug
Photo:
Some rights reserved by Laurelinde
I’m sure this call to engage is meant in the best, most encouraging way, but you can lead a horse to water . . .and there’s still no way to pry most Americans out of their own personal, home- enclosed entertainment systems and mobile screens to see a show, attend a concert or dance, join a book discussion group, or participate in many of the cultural activities those of us so committed to the arts as to work in them hold dear. Sadly, a president has been elected who’s emerged from “reality tv,” one of the most debased genres of our times, cartoons for the chronologically adult. Having recently driven Chicago -Dayton-Raliegh (including a night in Winston-Salem) and back, off the higheays in Indiana, Ohio, West Virginia and N Carolina, I saw the plethora of franchise eateries, cheap stores, salons and religious supply outlets filling the malls, watched Fox News beamed to motel breakfast lobbies, saw scant evidence of the arts non-profits support ( or even movie theaters) having an obvious presence. Want to look cold reality in the eye? It’s my belief only persistent encouragement and accessibility to basic “art play” – coloring books, singalongs, building blocks, active family-and- friends watching sessions, reading aloud with feeling – can orient kids to assume active engagement with creativity as a natural aspect of their American birthright. Until early childhood education (in the home and just beyond it, in community gathering places) is emphasized and ennabled by people who love what they’re doing (and get valued/paid accordingly), no amount of audience development funds will draw most citizens from their homes to enjoy anything but our most flagrantly commercialized escapes and sporting events. Well, that’s not exactly right either. We did bypass a convention in Indianapolis of reportedly 60,000 members of 4H clubs, engagement with, I assume, is functionally relevant to rural Americans (and I do not intend that comment as snark, nothing wrong with 4H clubs as far as I know).
I enjoy going out to hear live music (including jazz and classical, both which I performed at the university level). However, I find that the performers don’t like me. Not because I drag politics into venues (in fact, I usually defer on political discussions with people I don’t know well). Not because I proselytize about my faith (I try to let my actions speak louder than my words). In fact, I’m usually sitting quietly in the audience, applauding what I enjoy, when the performer tells me that they don’t like me. Well, perhaps, I shouldn’t take it personally. But they clearly do.
Yesterday, hearing a performer talk about the greatness of Fidel Castro and Che (no, there wasn’t Latin-influenced music before or after the comments) and the idiots who don’t see that. Like me.
Having sat through a performer taking their privileged microphone over the past 30 years to tell me about how horrible Reagan, etc. is and that no thinking person could deny that. Like me, even if I decided I could deny that through reading Hayek and Von Mises.
Having been told that anyone who believes in “orthodox” religion is a troglodyte undeserving of any consideration in the public square. Like me, although I’d prefer Thomist to troglodyte, frankly.
Fact is, if I go to hear music I am seeking excellence in musical conception and performance. Someone who has put thousands of hours in the practice room perfecting their craft. Someone who performs with nuance and subtlety developed by listening to the masters who have gone before them, and then determining how to make it their own in a unique way. That is what I am happy to support despite the cost, the hassle getting out of the house, needing to get up at 6 the next morning, etc. And I am oft rewarded.
However, if I want to hear a someone speak about the politics of the day, historical context, the subtlety and nuance of how to connect human nature, our time, and what the masters have said before, I really don’t want yesterdays’ sound bites from MSNBC. I don’t want a hack travelogue (I’ve actually stopped in a religious supply store between Chicago and Dayton, Mr. Mandel, and am better for it based on the book on the thinking of Aquinas I bought and read). I want someone who can take the best thoughts of 2000+ years of development, and enlighten it in an unique way.
Mr. Borwick, I think you see the shadows on the cave wall, and are trying hard to understand them…and that is admirable and unfortunately rare. I would caution (others, perhaps) that respect is not seeing where we are, and figuring out how to drag us to where you think we should be. Respect is 2-way.
For others…a thought exercise. You want to save the world with art. You don’t have an audience to listen to you explain why your art will save us. You tell us we are idiots for not being in your audience as you diminish us. And then you kvetch in the echo chamber. Perhaps reading the ancients about the virtue of modesty is in order. Instead our goal might be to use your art to bring Beauty into the world (and yes, Thelonious does count). And that Beauty helps people see the world a bit differently…taking an extra moment to see and understand their environment. And having done so, being more interested in hearing some more music. And creating a virtuous cycle.
Mr. Mandel, you got me to try to listen to Ornette again, to see the authentic beauty in his playing. You’re a better man for having gotten me to do that. But perhaps an uncharitable man in how much you seem to despise people like me.
You get me wrong, sir. I do not dislike, much less despise, people “like” you, and dnt see anything I wrote that would suggest otherwise. I dont like being prosletized from the stage, certainly if I know what I’m in for. I dont care for didactic works, in general. Like you, I seek musical excellence for personal enrichment and/ or entertainment. And I have found much music I’ve liked from people whose politics/religion/personal morality are nothing like mine, I imagine. I also try not to pontificate on poltics in my music reviewing, though I have taken liberties regarding that from time to time. I did not mean to disparage people who stay home to watch whatever they do – that’s their choice, and I think presenters should realize it’s a perfectly fine choice for most people, evidently, honestly – and always has been. Most people dont participate directly in the arts. I think I’m better for engaging with the arts as I do, and I try to encourage others in this activity, but the only way to get people into it is to make it a part of life early – and I dont mean buying sympohony tickets. I don’t disparage people who read religious books or have a faith, i simply dont want them to impose their beliefs on me. And the thing of course that has been most disturbing to me about the election is not that someone like you has won — unless you’re a New York real estate mogul whose career has been fraught with bankruptcies, litigation, questionable dealings and whose personality is by my native midwestern standards vain and vulgar. It is that we have a president elect who has no experience in government, has no history of collaborating well with others, evidently has some personal issues about the roles of women, and seemingly targets marginalized people as scapegoats. I dont despise the people who voted for him. Maybe you’ll think this is condescending, but I despair for them – that is, I gather, you. Not condescending, because I also despair for myself. What would Ornette say? It’s okay to despair and get over it.
Should be “certainly not if I dont know what I’m in for.” That is, I rather agree, artists shouldnt lecture their audiences highhandedly, or maybe at all.
Mr. Mandel, I thank you for your response. Although your initial and latest comments almost read as if they were written by two different people, I will trust that that perhaps the earlier was rubbed raw with passion and that the later comment truly reflects what you strive for.
That said, for many of us, we don’t want our lived lives to be political (personal should not have to always be political). Dragging the political into a discourse about how to bring more Beauty into the lives we all live tends to disengage us as it is usually delivered as if it were old-timey castor oil.
And I may not have enjoyed the fact that in the privacy of the voting booth I needed to seriously weigh the qualities of a man I considered vulgar to his core and a woman who clearly deplored my beliefs. But I would suggest that if one had a perfect model to predict demand curves for the Chicago Symphony, that the variable “Who won the 2016 presidential election” would be small to non-existent. So appeals to the recent election to explain how to better share the arts seem to be both didactic and insignificant.
So yes, please reach across the aisle to introduce the young to Beauty (my at-the-time 3 year old used to dance around when I played Monk recordings while cleaning the apartment on Saturday, responding to the child-like wonder that to me is part of Monk). Realize that for those of us whom our Faith is a core part of our life, we may encounter Beauty there as well (e.g. Mozart requiem as part of the All Souls feast, the iconography of the Eastern churches). And that Art should be something that connects what is cleft, not something that scores cheap political points and stops those of us without a microphone or significant media “soapbox” from continuing to engage and enjoy Art outside of our homes..
And again, thank you Mr. Mandel for engaging my concerns….and thank you Mr. Borwick for raising and hosting the questions and discussion that might be a bit uncomfortable for you.