[Note to new readers: This is a very old and widely read post. In the interest of providing up-to-date information about thinking on this topic, you can find updated definitions of terminology related to community engagement and related arts management tools on the ArtsEngaged website here.] I'm on a roll talking about types of engagement (New Thought on Audience and Community Engagement). So I thought I'd take a crack at one I've not … [Read more...]
New Thought on Audience and Community Engagement
[Note to new readers: This is a very old and widely read post. In the interest of providing up-to-date information about thinking on this topic, you can find updated definitions of terminology related to community engagement and related arts management tools on the ArtsEngaged website here.] Let me make it clear up front that I am talking about a concept in progress here. That caveat out of the way . . . . As I have said before here, there … [Read more...]
Communities Take Care of Things
Communities take care of things . . . that matter to them. That sentence, without the ellipses, made it into my notes from some conference in the last year or so. I have no idea what conference. That's one of the big problems with a life lived in conference sessions and without adequate notes. The statement has been staring at me, gnawing at my mind from the series of legal pad pages that serve as home to blog post ideas, for months. … [Read more...]
What Is the Arts Business?
The problem with unconscious assumptions is that they are . . . unconscious. Even for me, spending time as I do questioning the status quo in the arts, the basic nature of the arts enterprise–deeper even than the "business model"–often remains unexplored. But the arguments for and against community engagement inevitably have at their root this fundamental question. What is the arts business? Individual or Community Resource? A good (and … [Read more...]
Public Benefit
Public benefit (or one of many closely related concepts) is becoming an increasingly important element in rating grant applications and in assessing the value of arts organizations to their communities. As I discovered in my recent work on a grant review panel for Cuyahoga Arts and Culture, there needs to be much more discussion of and, eventually, agreement about what this means. This is far too big a topic to be addressed in one or even … [Read more...]
How to Engage
I have been spending time of late trying to figure out the best path to engagement on the part of arts organizations. I am a firm believer that systemic engagement (mainstreamed engagement) is at heart the only way that will bear much fruit. Add-on activities won't get done. Seriously, where are the resources to do more? Or they will be marginalized internally and externally. Internal stakeholders will not see it as important; the community will … [Read more...]
Lessons from the Ballpark
Blogging comes with an “occupational” hazard. Everything you do ends up having the potential for becoming a blog post, often when you least expect it. (Wait until you see the upcoming essay that began at a Jimmy Buffett concert!) Last month I was minding my own business attending a minor league baseball game with friends, thinking not a whit about the arts and community engagement. Then something remarkable happened. Between innings, a young girl … [Read more...]
Placemaking
In October I am speaking in Washington, DC to the Community Development Interest Group at the National Assembly of State Arts Agencies annual conference, Assembly 2012. (That was a mouthful!) They are going to be focusing on Creative Placemaking. When asked what my topic would be, it seemed like "Beyond Placemaking" might be energizing, for them and for me. I've written previously (Creative Placemaking) about my concern that "placemaking" might … [Read more...]
Things Change
I have always been a sucker for revelations about how social, cultural, and technological change has impacted arts experiences. I was blown away when (many, many years ago) I heard a presentation at the College Music Society's annual conference highlighting the fact that before the 20th Century, the loudest thing typical people ever heard (by far) was a symphony orchestra. No machines, no cars, certainly no jet airplanes. So the effect of hearing … [Read more...]
Civic Practice
Michael Rohd, the Founding Director of Portland (OR)'s Sojourn Theatre has recently posted an extremely thoughtful reflection on community engagement and theatre: The New Work of Building Civic Practice. As I've said before, I am aware of the danger of echo-chambering in the blog world, especially in this case since the things he says sound so much like my rants. But, as in the past, I simply can't help myself. Mr. Rohd identifies the central … [Read more...]