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Mercy Killing of Your Museum

August 2, 2006

by:

Joe Patti

I don’t know that there are many people who read this blog that don’t read Artful Manager, but just in case there are, I want to point you at his entry today. The Hennenius Group post he quotes is worth reading and seriously considering. (I don’t know how the heck I missed it.)

What Anthony Radich has to say is sure to be controversial. It seems counterintutive that a guy running an organization “dedicated to the creative advancement and preservation of the arts” would be suggesting the dissolution of arts organizations. In fact, if he were an elected politican, I’m sure there would already be television and print ads out there blaring that Anthony Radich wants to close your arts centers and we oughta chuck him out in November.

I don’t know what it says about arts folks (other than that they don’t read Barry’s blog) that two weeks after it was posted that there hasn’t been any real grumbling about Radich’s proposal to “euthanize nonprofit arts organizations”.

But that is the subject of another entry.

I’ve never made a secret of my belief that not all arts organizations have a right to exist and expect funding. I am against the “Field of Dreams” mentality. I have frequently felt more organizations should merge their resources and efforts. But I certainly recognize the dearth of organizations as well as evinced by my recent perplexion (is that a word?) at the lack of local professional arts organizations.

Contradictory, sure. But by some definitions, the ability to hold two contradictory thoughts in your head at the same time is a sign of enlightenment.

But that too is subject for another entry 😉

One section of what Radich said put me in mind of an entry I did two years ago. Quoth Radich:

Let’s pull some of the nonprofit arts programming off the arts-production line and free up funding and talent for reallocation to stronger efforts–especially to new efforts tilted toward engaging the public. Let’s return to the concept of offering seed money for organizations that, over a period of years, need to attract enough of an audience and develop enough of a stable financial base to survive and not structure them to live eternally on the dole. Let’s find a way to extinguish those very large groups that are out of audience-building momentum and running on inertia. Instead of locking arts funders into a cycle of limited choices, let’s free up some venture capital for new arts efforts that share the arts in new ways with the public

As I said, this whole argument reminded me of an entry I did on an Independent Sector proposal to change non-profit funding to a more focussed model. The proposal they make runs a little counter to Radich’s since he talks about getting organizations off the dole and the IS proposal essentially encourages foundations to deepen their commitment to support specific organizations. Radich also talks about funders having too few choices, but the IS document as well as the additional sources I cite in that entry seem to indicate funders have too shallow an investment in too many places.

Overall though the two are similar in suggesting offering comprehensive seed money to organizations to help them get off the ground. Both also use language that places funders in the position of venture captialists investing in the promotion of their agenda in return for rock solid accountability.

I wonder if some of the problems Radich sees with organizations being weak and played out might have its origin in the funding method encouraging people to stretch their resources in too many different directions until they aren’t viable any more.

Since Andrew Taylor posted Radich’s proposal, (and the Independent Sector one two years ago), I think I shall go over to his blog and ask him.

State of the Arts

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The Young Helping The Younger

July 31, 2006

by:

Joe Patti

I was perusing over at SmArts & Culture blog and read an entry Mary Ann posted about a well-intentioned, but not entirely successful attempt to “introduce young professionals…to arts patronage.”

It reminded me of another group of young professionals who have successfully raised money to send kids from NYC to arts and music summer camp. Giving Opportunities to Others (GOTO) raises money by essentially having a lot of great parties to support their commitment to send kids to arts camp for at least 3 years. They started in 2001 and not only have expanded the number of kids they send each year, but have also apparently expanded to Boston so they can send kids from that city to camp. (Judging from some of the costumes, it is probably best that the Boston people have their own parties. 😉 )

The organization is entirely volunteer run. That’s pretty impressive given the size and complexity of the events they are organizing. The other thing I thought was interesting is that while some of the GOTO members went to summer camp when they were younger, none of the NYC group went to the camp they picked to send the NYC campers to.

Bit of disclosure, I worked at the organization that ran the camp when GOTO started sending kids there. It is pretty hard for me to feel guilty about promoting a group that sends kids to arts camp by throwing fun parties. And while the organization acknowledges that many people are motivated to volunteer by the networking opportunities, there many more ways to establish a network without similar time commitments. Even if someone is entirely motivated to participate by a desire to land new business, I will bet that at least some of them having never thought to volunteer their time before will end up doing so for more altruistic reasons throughout their lives.

General Musings

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Grandeur Reduced to A 20 Inch Monitor

July 26, 2006

by:

Joe Patti

Another story from the “Could This Be The Wave of The Future?” file, (and the “Don’t Dismiss It Until You Ponder It” subfolder), NPR had a story yesterday about museum collections going online. The story starts out talking about how many smaller museums with interesting collections have had to either scaleback activities or close their bricks and mortar presences due to lack of funding. Now the only way to view the collections of some of these museums are online.

There is, in fact, a website called MoOM–the Museum of Online Museums which lists all these collections. They range from noted museums like the Smithsonian, MoMA and The Art Institute of Chicago to more obscure and interesting sites like The Gallery of International Cigarette Pack Graphics and The Grocery List Collection which boasts the largest collection of found grocery lists.

Now if you are asking how some of these sites qualify as museums and if images existing only as 1s and 0s in the ether of the internet can be considered a collection, you aren’t alone. (After all, everyone could boast they had the Mona Lisa in their museum with a little work.) The NPR story tackles the debate about what constitutes a museum and what it means to curate a collection.

The guys who run MoOM absolutely believe that seeing art in a physical museum is often a necessity and can be a transforming experience. But they also believe there are a lot of interesting collections of material out there that people should see, but that they wouldn’t necessarily ever want to drive to. They also point out that one would never have the time to visit all the bricks and mortar museums out there either so having the art online provides welcome and needed access.

But does a cool webpage of scanned skatepark passes deserve the appellation “museum”? NPR quotes Wilson O’Donnell, director of the museology program at the University of Washington in Seattle as saying no. His analogy that an online museum is no more a museum than Wikipedia a valid source of information is a little out of touch (Peer review of articles by the journal Nature found it as accurate as Brittanica.), and his reasoning quoted by NPR isn’t completely compelling.

My blog and others have countless examples of how being well trained doesn’t necessarily ensure the production of a quality product. I think the same could reasonably be said of a curator at a prestigious bricks and mortar institution. The inclusion in the story of a professor of Native American Indian studies saying that mainstream museums haven’t done a good job representing Native American cultural groups futher clouds the concept of who is qualified to assemble a collection. (Additionally, the professor is quoted as saying most tribal groups resist the term museum in favor of cultural center because it connotes something that is old and dull.)

If you really start trying to identify the elements that separate a museum from a really neat collection, I suspect you will eventually get frustrated and be reduced to paraphrasing Justice Potter Stewart’s “I know it when I see it.” It is no easier to do than making a similar list comparing a bench and a coffee table. Is the collection of magazine covers featuring the US Flag from one month 1942 more valid than the site featuring steel and coal magazine ads from all of 1966 simply because the former is on the Smithsonian site?

This story encapulates the whole dilemmia of technology and art. In some ways, technology throws open the doors to opportunity enabling possibilities and a reach previously unattainable. Concurrently, technology threatens to dilute or isolate us from the potency and relevance of works.

But damned if you can definitively say where the line between the two is.

Arts in an Age of Technology

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Pledges for Your Pledges

July 24, 2006

by:

Joe Patti

I received a thank you letter for a donation I made that is something of a testament to just how important customer service is in the non-profit sector. I made a donation to a public radio station about 5,000 miles away from where I live. I like the music and while I don’t listen all the time, I do so enough that I feel obliged to help support the cost of the high speed internet stream I am using.

(By the way, I am willing to wager that my relationship with the station represents a strong possible future of radio listenership.)

Anyhow, I received a nice thank you letter and noticed that there were about 2 paragraphs thanking me, 4 telling me what my benefits would be and seven paragraphs making pledges to me.

The first pledge is prompt service by phone or email rendered personally to me by the person whose business card was inserted in my letter. The first thing I wondered was if the station was well enough organized to make transitions appear seamless as staff turned over. There are going to be some people who never call their rep and others who will establish a relationship with the staff member. A well-kept database will make donors love the station forever if donors feel important to whomever they speak.

The second and third pledges promise my contribution will be processed as quickly and accurately as possible and my thank you gifts will be sent out promptly.

The fourth pledge is that “All appeals for contributions will be honest and straightforward.” (I guess I have quoted and summarized to an extent that I need to cite WXPN as my source.)

The fifth pledge is to “raise funds in the most efficient way we can, assuring that as much of your contribution goes to supporting the music you love.”

These last two pledges are a real acknowledgment of the negative perceptions about fundraising that have emerged in recently years in reaction to outright scandals and stories of how funds have been used for purposes barely connected to the ones solicited.

The final pledge is to continue to bring me the music and programming I rely on them for. While general and vague, this pledge might be important to some people in light of the controversy at WDET this past year. They changed their format and angry donors threatened to sue saying they were solicited under false pretenses since the station knew they were going to change.

As I read over the letter, I wonder if my own acknowledgment letters need to do less thanking and citing of specific instances donations have helped and promise more fidelity and honesty. I don’t know that these latter issues are as important to donors in my community as they are in others. I do think that the the letter portends a possible change in what people will value in the organizations they give to. If nothing else, I will be keeping my eyes open for other signals.

Audience Relations

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