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Why Educate Your Palate If All They Serve You Is Hamburgers

March 12, 2014

by:

Joe Patti

Playwright Mike Lew criticizes the logic behind blaming a lack of arts education for a decreasing attendance at arts events.

Take the basic argument of “We need more theater in schools so more people will go see theater later in life” and substitute comparable forms of entertainment where young people are already dropping boatloads of money. The very logic of the construction collapses.

Consider the following assertions:
-No one likes cooking anymore because we stopped teaching Home Ec in the schools.
-We need more video game training in classrooms to ensure the next generation of Xbox users.
-If we don’t teach kids how to listen to standup comedy, Louis CK will go bankrupt.
-Kids who never played live music in school just plain won’t pay for a Jay-Z concert.

Now consider the converse, swapping out theater for things that we do teach in schools:
-Good thing we taught kids biology, because zoo attendance is up 50%.
-Colonial Williamsburg is popping thanks to US History classes.
-Now that we have English in schools, bookstores are saved!
-My classroom had a PC, therefore this ipad is nonsense.

Some of his examples are a little flawed. Whether it is due to the lack of home ec classes or not, people actually aren’t cooking.

Much like cooking, arts attendance and participation is influenced by the example provided by parents and educational environment. I would argue with both the arts and cooking, the more you know, the more you will be willing to experiment with unfamiliar fare.

But as Lew points out, interest doesn’t depend on you being introduced to the arts in school. People will make the decision to attend if the opportunity appears interesting enough.

While his contentions that the problem is based in inflexible timing of performances, dearth of social opportunities, programming choices that don’t resonate with the lives of young people and general lack of hospitality are not new arguments, it doesn’t mean he is wrong.

As I was reading some of his examples, I thought that it wasn’t logical to draw a direct line from biology to zoo attendance and English classes and bookstores because there are plenty of other positive outcomes that can result from these classes. The same can be true of the arts. English, sociology and anthropology can as easily lead to the arts as directly arts education when you think about the stories people tell and the way they express themselves.

Give his post a read, he makes many interesting points in his contribution to this ongoing discussion.

Art(ist) Education, Audience Relations, State of the Arts

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The Curse of the Experienced Eye

March 11, 2014

by:

Joe Patti

Ken Davenport recently talked about how he enjoyed Broadway shows much more when he was younger. Part of the reason he has a harder time now is because he analyzes the show with the eye of a producer. The other reason is because when he was younger, he was often ignorant about disparaging news about a show in the absence of social media and websites and thus approached each show without any bias.

I am much the same way. I can’t attend a show at a place I have worked earlier because I feel left out of the social interactions and behind the scenes activity that I was once an initiate of. I also have difficulty watching a show that I have contracted in because I want to be backstage checking things out.

As Davenport says “As a theater pro, I know I’m enjoying a show when I’m not thinking about what went in to making it.” In my case, it is a question of whether the show is of sufficient quality and interest to me that I want to sit in the audience for the whole show rather than watching from the wings or attending to various details.

I was wondering if other arts people out there had a similar experience to Ken Davenport and my own.

I don’t have any problem attending and watching the entire performance I don’t feel personally invested in. But there are other complications that have resulted from my training.

Attending shows first became a chore when I had to write a critique of it from some perspective. With the onus of either taking notes or trying to remember what went on, the shows weren’t as enjoyable any more.

Today, without that responsibility, it is easier to enjoy a performance. Except, now I dread being asked what I thought of the show as soon as the curtain comes down. I usually beat a quick path to the door so that I can have the time to digest what I have seen without being pressured to respond.

Often I know there was something I didn’t like about the show, but it can be difficult to pin down what it is exactly in the moments after the performance.

Then there is the issue of knowing the show wasn’t great quality and watching everyone else fly to their feet to give a standing ovation. It is times like this that I wonder if it is better to have a discerning, critical eye and know the show barely deserves enthusiastic seated applause, much less a hair trigger standing ovation or would I be happier having not developed that skill so I could just sit there and enjoy the show without reservation.

It is something of a two edged sword since the same skill will reveal delightful, intriguing choices that deepen your appreciation of artists’ work.

Some of this is unavoidable and just the cost of growing up and experiencing the world. My high school science teachers removed some of the magic from my childhood by explaining the reality, but later that same knowledge was the basis of a different sort of awe about the world.

So does anyone else face issues like this? Do you have similar circumstances where you can enjoy yourself and then others that require a degree of self-restraint?

General Musings, Working In The Arts

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Whisper Sweet Nothings In My Ear

March 10, 2014

by:

Joe Patti

Last summer there were a number of stories about how the Seoul city government installed a giant ear sculpture into which citizens could make comments. The ear was served something of a dual purpose as a comment box and art installation. The comments were recorded and then played inside city hall. Sensors measured how long people stopped to listen, archiving those that gave pause for potential further action and composting (term the article uses) those that aren’t popular into music.

It has taken about 6 months of that percolating in the back of my consciousness for the obvious to occur to me. Duplicating this effort would be a visually and procedurally interesting way to collect feedback from the community about what you should be doing. If your organization is in a high traffic area, you could put it out on the sidewalk or move it around your community setting it up at the mall, fair grounds, park and other public places so that people could tell you what they thought about your organization, the programming, outreach efforts, etc.

Basically, it might provide a good opportunity to hear from the people who never set foot near your organization. Some big sculpture is probably much more interesting and engaging than having a survey firm cold call every phone number in town in order to reach those in your community you aren’t already serving. Granted, the feedback from a phone survey can provide more scientific results, but it probably wouldn’t be as effective at building relationships and goodwill.

The other obvious use is to plop it down in your lobby to try to capture some responses from attendees who won’t provide responses to your written or online surveys. Just the novelty of interacting with whatever figure you choose to use might elicit a number of responses.

Of course, if you go the talking Paul Bunyan statue route and have a staff member get your sculpture to respond, you might actually be able to (gently) guide the discussion to topics to which you are interested in getting answers.

Audience Relations, Info You Can Use

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We Are Audience, You Will Be Assimilated

March 5, 2014

by:

Joe Patti

Often we use some really general terms when referencing the people who support our organizations which tends to make us think of them as monolithic entity. Having written this blog for 10 years now, I bear more than my share of guilt despite my continuing effort to conceive of them as brains, rather than butts in the seats.

Blogger Nick Sherrard offered a little kick in the pants back in December with a post titled: Hey Arts Organisations, I am not Audience: Why arts organisations should stop talking about people behind their backs

He sums it up best in this passage (my emphasis):

The fact of the matter remains that ‘audience’ does actually mean people who take part in turning up, tuning in, or downloading what you do.

If you don’t believe me go ask them.

Turn to the nearest person who doesn’t work in the arts and ask them what an audience is.

I think that describing people in terms they wouldn’t understand themselves is generally not a good idea —its talking about people behind their backs.

He goes on to point out that what we term as our audience is actually a group that is comprised of different segments, each of which have different expectations of their relationship with our organizations.

He uses the terms customers, fans, superfans and collaborators, but there are obviously many gradations as you care to define. The first step toward that though is recognizing there are differences and discerning what the expectations of each are.

Audience Relations

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