A friend of mine was recently lamenting the parlous state of the one-and-only non-profit theatre in her city — you can tell this was not New York — which was in danger of closing, unless it found an angel philanthropist. Then I learned that last week the Madison Repertory Theatre closed down — at least a half-million dollars in the hole.  

So I decided to see where similar theatres stood. I was pleased to find that last fall the Theatre Communications Group started doing “Snapshot Surveys” of its members,
some 460 theatres in 47 states, on fiscal matters. 

The first set not only indicates danger — little surprise there — but also shows just how quickly the world has changed for theater in the last six to eight months. 

Last September, of the 241 members who completed the survey, 41.5% reported a surplus, while 36.5% said they had ended their most recent season in the red. The rest broke even. Subscriptions and single-ticket sales were growing.

[Read more…] about Sleepless Off-Broadway

There are several short-hand ways to indicate approval or disapproval. Internally, The New York Times used to publish a list of “winners and sinners” and the Columbia Journalism Review has a column called “Darts and Laurels.” From time to time, I’m going to give out a few Raspberries and Strawberries.

First, a strawberry to Philadelphia Mayor Michael Nutter, who told the Associated Press that “he believes the arts are key to generating revenue and strengthening the community” and that “getting children engaged in the arts must be a priority.” Nutter has also created an Office of Arts, Culture and the Creative Economy, and has increased funding for the arts in his proposed budget. Read the whole story, which was published Sunday in the Philadelphia Inquirer.

Next, a raspberry to Dan Brown, author of The Da Vinci Code. The number of people who




called Leonardo by the name “Da Vinci” was bad enough before he mistitled his book. Now, as this article from the Christian Science Monitor makes clear, even people who know better are doing it. We now have “The Da Vinci Experience” exhibit on view at the San Diego Air & Space Museum and the “Da Vinci: The Genius” exhibit at the Oregon Museum of Science and Industry, to name two. Even some curators and critics are calling the master by his birthplace. Pity.  

Even the New York Philharmonic wants to cash in on the star power of Gustavo Dudamel, the
talented, glamorous new music director of the Los Angeles Philharmonic — and there’s

nothing wrong with that. Just by chance, I stopped in on the NYPhil’s website today, and discovered that a one-of-a-kind T-shirt, autographed by Dudamel and violin master Pinchas Zukerman after their mid-January performance at Lincoln Center, is up for bid on eBay.

The minimum bid is $100, and proceeds go to the NYPhil. At the moment there are no bids, and you have until 11 a.m. PDT on Mar. 12 to make a bid. It’s the only bit of Dudamel memorabilia on eBay now — but who knows where this could go?

Picture credit: © Dan Porges

[Read more…] about Dudamel — T-shirt star?

You may have missed the most interesting arts story in Sunday’s New York Times, because “Pulling Art Sales Out of Thinning Air” appeared in the business section. It was a profile of Larry Gagosian, with a “nut graf” — the paragraph giving the gist of the story — saying: “Everyone is vulnerable. Especially Larry Gagosian.” 

Some of the choice bits:

His business is the ultimate black-box operation, a never-ending and international swirl of cash and canvas that is built for maximum secrecy. What is certain is that his overhead is a multiple of his competitors’. Also certain is that the prices of work by the young artists he has been luring into his galleries — prices that have doubled or tripled in some cases, courtesy of his imprimatur — are falling like bank stocks. Worst of all, the days of the $75 million private deal have ground to a halt.

[Read more…] about Eye on Gagosian

In honor of the Armory Show in New York — where, barring a miracle, sales are likely to be slow — today I was going to post a cartoon that’s on view in an exhibition at the Morgan Library & Museum: “On the Money,” a collection of New Yorker cartoons, is full of very funny drawings by artists commenting on money and how it defines us (whether it belongs at the Morgan is a question for another day, and also related to money). But late yesterday, I learned from the Morgan that it could not grant permission for me to reproduce it. So — you’ll have to visualize.

The cartoon, by Whitney Darrow, Jr., shows an man beside his painting, and reads “Buy now, save up to $50,000.” It was published in September, 1951. Darrow meant the man to be the artist, but now it could well be a dealer, too! 

UPDATED: Last night I ran into a senior figure in the art world, who told me that he’d been told that sales during February’s five-day ADAA Art Show, which I wrote about for the Daily Beast (link), came to just 14 sales among the 70 dealers. I posted that here, with a caveat, and set out to confirm. When I finally reached Linda Blumberg, ADAA’s executive director, she said that was wrong. Speaking from the Armory Show, she did not have numbers at hand; but, she said, more dealers sold something than not, and some sold many pieces. “Granted,” she added, “more were at the lower end of the price scale.” But not all, as I mentioned in the Beast piece.  

I won’t be writing about the Armory Show, but The Art Market Monitor has been keeping track of several reports from the floor.