Tag: Arts Advocacy

Arts In America: Webisode Two

Here is the third in a series of five posts I’m creating for OvationTv.com:

On Thursday May 21st, 2009, the University of California Press in association with CORE: and Ovation TV hosted a panel discussion to consider the issues documented in Bill Ivey’s book, Arts Inc. Gaynor Stachan-Chun, Senior Vice President of Marketing at Ovation TV, moderated the discussion with Mr. Ivey, Agnes Gund and Robert Lynch. Ovationtv.com is posting video clips from the event, and discussing the issues raised. Read my intro blog post for the Arts In America series here.

In this clip Gaynor, Bill, and Agnes discuss arts education. Despite overwhelming research showing the positive impacts of arts education on student retention and achievement, arts education is very loosely mandated on the federal level. Each state oversees its own programming. The Arts Education State policy database details the paltry commitment we have – as a nation – to public arts education. Because there is no national mandate for arts education, efforts by governors, mayors, city council-members, and private individuals like Agnes Gund have tremendous impact.

In 1977 Agnes Gund founded New York City’s Studio in a School Association, in response to budget cuts that virtually eliminated arts classes from New York City public schools. For some, that would be a life’s work. Gund’s extended bio is a highlight reel of the development of modern arts programming. In interviewing Mrs. Gund, and thinking about arts education, I kept thinking about why we so desperately need her.

Here’s our interview:

Rob: In this clip you discuss the validity of arts education programming even for non-artists. Arts education programming has been linked to falling dropout rates and rising test scores, amongst other benefits. With No Child Left Behind there’s a major emphasis on standards of technical competency. How do you think we should measure success in the delivery of arts education?

Agnes: Measuring success in the delivery of arts education is, admittedly, a difficult task. It is much easier to use tests and compare scores in arithmetic, reading or writing; 2 + 2 will always equal 4, and grammatical rules dont change. It is harder to set a measure for art or music or dance, which are far more interpretive and subjective and personal.

One way to provide a measure is to evaluate schools that have arts programs against those that dont. There have been studies that show that schools with arts programs do, in fact, produce higher test scores and lower drop out rates and generate more parent involvement. These results are heartening, and while its impossible to know whether they are due to the arts programs alone, it surely is true that schools with music resounding from their rooms and innovative art on their walls create an atmosphere that stimulates curiosity and creativity. If you talk to the principals and teachers in schools like this, as I have, you learn how arts programs help their children thrive in other areas of study as well.

There are other ways of learning about the value of the arts – like watching Issac Sterns wonderful film, “From Mao to Mozart,” or speaking with working artists who have experienced the arts as students and as teachers. Chuck Close, Dorothea Rockburne, Richard Serra and the late Elizabeth Murray, to name only a very few, all benefited from both studying arts and from teaching it to others. Teachers and principals, artists, schoolchildren, all testify to the ways arts education broadens horizons, increases potential and self-worth . Taking an art class in school doesnt mean that a student will become an artist later in life. It does give that student a broader perspective, a keener sensitivity to the worlds realities, a way to express fears and hopes and dreams.

Rob: Over the course of your career you have worked tirelessly to support not only fine arts, but education, and arts education. Do you think public schools should be required to provide arts education for all students? If so, what kind of arts education programming should be required?

Agnes: I believe very strongly that every elementary school, junior high school and high school student should have a good, solid music and visual arts curriculum. From pre-kindergarden on, each child should experience these subjects. If we track children that are involved in solid, well-constructed and well-taught programs from the start of their school years, we will see that they gain skills and applications that transfer to other areas in their lives. When complaints arise that the arts are frivolous, they stem from the fact that art classes arent always taught as broad, deep and important subjects.

The excellent blueprints developed for music and art by the New York City Department of Education demonstrate how seriously and academically enhancing these subjects can and should be. Serious study of the arts allows children to master important principles and vocabulary, to experience creativity, to understand perspective, line, mass, color, dimensionality, sound, range – all the different mediums and methodologies of the arts. These understandings help children express themselves and gain depth in many subject areas.

The arts also teach children how to collaborate. Even when projects are not direct collaborations, children look at their neighbors painting or sculpture, listen to the instrument or voice of another, and they gain ideas and insights. They learn to share projects, to create work together. Art production often involves such teamwork and collaboration, habits of mind and activity which are incredibly useful throughout school and into adult life. Art is intellectually stimulating as well. Children should be taught about works of art within a context of words, images and histories, so that they can better see and comprehend the world through them.

The serious study of the arts, in short, can increase imagination and creativity, inspire communication with others, and increase foundational knowledge. But it has to be a serious study of the arts – sturdy, intelligent and continual.

To see the rest of the interview, click here.

Arts In America: Webisode 1

Here is the second in a series of five posts I’m creating for OvationTv.com:

On Thursday May 21st, 2009, the University of California Press in association with CORE: and Ovation TV hosted a panel discussion to consider the issues documented in Bill Ivey’s book, Arts Inc. Gaynor Stachan-Chun, Senior Vice President of Marketing at Ovation TV, moderated the discussion with Mr. Ivey, Agnes Gund and Robert Lynch.

Read the intro blog here.

How we define Art’ and Culture’ really influences how we buy and sell our work as Artists. In this video clip Robert Lynch discusses how Native American cultures do not have Professional Artists. In response to Lynch’s statement, Agnes Gund forwards the idea that defining what it means to be an artist sometimes leads to a perception of art as elitist.

When I tell people that I am a dancer, they frequently ask if I am professional. I always have a hard time answering the question. What does it mean to be a professional artist? Is it an economic distinction? Are they asking – do you make a living being an artist? Perhaps they are asking – do people pay you for your work? I have the sense that in many people’s minds being professional is an economic distinction. Lynch and Gund point out in this clip that how we define our work influences the reception of our work. How do you define your work? Is asserting professionalism in art creating a divide between you and your audience?

I had a chance to ask Robert Lynch a few questions about the part of the discussion in this clip. Here’s the Q &A:

In his book on the Creative Economy, Thomas Borrup cites that community is defined by a set of terms (including social, civic, economic, and physical bonds), and in this first video excerpt you talk about how Art is hard to define, and that usually our definition or art is limiting. Why is it important how we define art?

Robert Lynch: I think it is important to think about definition simply because so often defining narrowly has really meant being exclusive, only certain kinds of art will be considered excellent, or worthy of funding, or valuable to study. In a democracy we should be looking constantly at what others tell us we should believe and we should actively question and contribute to the dialogue. When it comes to public policy which is what the panel was about the discussion of definition is critical because policy at the federal, state and local government as well as private sector levels is what dictates who will get money, what categories will even be considered, what our children will study, and even how goods/art will be regulated, marketed, celebrated, and made accessible.

Do you ever question our government’s spending priorities? We’re spending billions and billions to save companies too large to fail, and not enough on smaller bailouts – including arts bailouts – that would reap larger and broader economic benefits. Why do you think the arts are not receiving more support?

Robert Lynch: I question government spending priorities all the time, especially in the arts. Regarding why the arts are not receiving more support there are several reasons. But first it is important to understand what support “they” are getting and of course what “they” include. The not for profit arts include about 100,000 not for profit 501c3 organizations in the US like museums, opera, ballet, etc. The for profit arts include another 550,000 businesses such as music stores, art galleries, design firms, Hollywood, Broadway etc.

To read the rest of the interview, check out the post on Ovation here.

Arts In America: Introductory Post

Here is the first in a series of five posts that I’m creating for OvationTV.com:

Bill Ivey’s new book, Arts, Inc.: How Greed and Neglect Have Destroyed Our Cultural Rights, combines personal and professional experience with policy analysis to make a case for reshaping America’s cultural system. Twice elected Chairman of the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences, Ivey was Director of the Country Music Foundation from 1971 to 1998, before serving as the chairman of the National Endowment for the Arts (from 1998 through 2001.) On Thursday May 21st, 2009, the University of California Press in association with CORE: and Ovation TV hosted a panel discussion and book signing to consider the issues documented in Ivey’s book. Gaynor Stachan-Chun, Senior Vice President of Marketing at Ovation TV, moderated the discussion with Mr. Ivey, Agnes Gund and Robert Lynch.

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Arts, Inc. Discussion Panelists

(from left to right: Gaynor Strachan-Chun, Robert Lynch, Agnes Gund and Bill Ivey)

Their conversation touched on a lot of really interesting issues, including: the value of creativity, how we pay for the arts, and what leaders might do to help the arts. As a citizen, and an advocate for the arts, I question our government’s spending priorities. We’re spending billions and billions to save companies too large to fail, and not enough on smaller bailouts – including arts bailouts – that would reap larger and more widespread economic benefits. Michael Kaiser, arts organization guru and current President of the Kennedy Center wrote in the Washington Post that “the arts in the United States provide 5.7 million jobs and account for $166 billion in economic activity annually.” According to the GM website, that company employs just 252,000 – and that’s globally – not just in the United States. Why are we not spending more to save arts institutions? Given the many compelling priorities facing the administration such as the economy and Healthcare reform, and the competition for funding, I think public discussion about the arts, arts education and America’s cultural system is critical.

To read the rest of the post go to the OvationTv.com website here.