Bill Cleveland Interview - Part II

Good morning.
"And the beat goes on...................................."


PART II of the Interview:

BARRY:  What has been, if any, the worldview shift in how we think about the arts?  Are there old values as relates to creativity that are making way for new values?  What are the new values?

BILL:  It depends on how far back in history you go and what you consider new or old. Historically I see art-infused community life, with a lineage that stretches back to prehistory stretching up to just before the industrial revolution. I often refer to pre-historic holy persons as pre-art artists.  One of the holy person’s jobs was to mediate the relationship between the community and the spirit world. A good part of this work involved the invocation of the benevolent spirits as protection against the destructive forces loose in the world. I see an element of those practices in artists working today in service to community development and revitalization. Historically, the separation of art making from community life is a very recent phenomenon. But I think we are turning a corner, just in time. 

Globally, the re-integration process has been taking place under the radar for the last 40 years.  And, ironically, some of the most striking examples of power and vitality of cultural re-integration come from the most damaged and distressing places.  The stories in my book, “Art and Upheaval”,  are about artists dealing with the horrors like Milosevic, the Khmer Rouge, nuclear testing and apartheid. For those of us living under what I call the tyranny of comfort I think these stories say something universal about the creative process as a uniquely powerful transformative force both on the world’s front lines and in less damaged places. If you scratch the surface of a community in need you will find artists responding, making art.

BARRY:  You also talk about the need for the “world’s creative community (to) revitalize and reframe its transformative power and moral integrity.”  How does it go about doing that given the pressures just to survive? And why is it that other countries seem further along in embracing the value of creativity and, encouragingly (at least in a few places) making the link between the arts and creativity?  While philosophical thinking is enormously valuable, we need to link it to practical strategies for moving forward don't we?  

BILL: From my perspective, I see very little connection between the transformative power and moral integrity of certain art making and the economic conditions under which it operates. In fact, my experience over the last two decades documenting the work of artists in communities in upheaval has brought home the opposite point.  In places where poverty and oppression is a central feature of daily life, questions of survival, integrity, and change making are intrinsically connected. In these situations most community members are in the same boat, regardless of whether they work on the docks, in a hospital or in a painter’s studio.  From this perspective the decision to join with others to resist or speak the truth or make a difference is not a question of resources or vocation but rather a function individual conscience and commitment.  It just so happens that many, many artists in these communities are deeply involved as creators in transformative social and political activities. 

One could argue that they had no option. After all, most were literally trapped in the tumult surrounding them. But, amidst the fear and disorder they responded creatively, sometimes with nuance and sensitivity, others with bold strokes. That they decided push back against the toxic tides and stay the course as creators is the most indelible pattern that runs through these stories.

BARRY:  True enough, but you and I live in the nonprofit arts organization world.  Part of that world is suppose to nurture and facilitate artists and creativity, and part of its charge is to increase the access of the public to more of that creativity.  While artists may create and even flower irrespective of the economics and other pressures of the times (and perhaps even because of those pressures), arts organizations and arts administrators do not.  If the nonprofit arts sector is going to play any role in the revitalization and reframing of the transformative power of creativity, how do we help them to do that?  Or do you think that we don't have to do that, in which case isn't that the argument that we don't really need the entire nonprofit arts infrastructure - that art will happen anyway.

BILL:  More and more of the artists who do define themselves as creative change-makers are finding ways around the "you can't do your work if you are not a 501c3” millstone that has defined creative production in this country for the past 50 years.  There are also a growing number of funders who are waking up to the fact that their inflexibility with regard to non-profit status is both stifling and, in many cases, missing the creative boat. The arts world is not the only sector that is discovering this. Funders and practitioners in the community development, education, social services sectors are all recognizing that many of their assumptions about how to support and build caring and thriving communities have not played out.  As a result, there is in the rich web of new cross-sector intersections emerging. These include: public-private-nonprofit, community cultural-social-economic development, and business-education-science-arts. This is where the ferment is happening. It is also why I find more interesting creative ideas discussed in one $6 issue of Fast Company, YES Magazine or even Scientific American than I do at typical three day, national arts conference that can cost as much as $1000. 

I would also argue that many arts organizations do not see themselves as active incubators for artistic or community cultural development. The McKnight Foundation, which has recently sharpened it focus on artists’ support and development, now takes this into consideration when considering grants to organizations.  They are particularly interested in arts organizations that recognize that they are a part of a cultural, social, and economic ecosystem that needs a thriving community of artists in order to survive.

BARRY:  You talk about the need to “see the fundamental necessity of re-integrating of the arts into all aspects of community life.”  How do we go about doing that?  What are the baby steps?

BILL:  The baby steps are already happening.  More and more artists and arts organizations are recognizing that the “artist as genius-hobo-Martian narrative” is a dysfunctional product of our comodified culture. (And hey, more funders too!) These creators see their work and their roles as part of a cultural ecosystem that can only thrive when it is woven into the broader fabric of community life.

BARRY:  Elaborate please.

BILL:  There are hundreds of examples but I will share two that I have worked with: 
The first is the Pillsbury House Neighborhood Center, in Minneapolis.  Pillsbury House Theatre and Pillsbury House Neighborhood Center have been located in the same building for the past 17 years. During this time, they have share both resource and community outreach efforts to their mutual benefit. Recently, Pillsbury has committed itself to more deeply integrating cultural practice into its community building efforts. To accomplish this, they have merged the Theatre program and the Pillsbury House Neighborhood Center, and placing them under the leadership of the Theatre’s Co-Artistic Directors, Noel Raymond, and Faye Price. The long-term goal for this amalgamation is to develop a cultural community hub that will become “a new model for nonprofit human service work that recognizes the power of the arts and culture to stimulate community participation, investment and ownership.  This new model which has been underway for the last year extends these reciprocal relationships to full collaboration. This means that human and health services are becoming a primary gateway through which individuals access the theatre, and the theatre will be a catalyst that creates opportunities for personal advancement and community development.  It’s important to keep in mind that the extraordinary theater work happening at Pillsbury House feeds off of its relationships with the Centers constituents and surrounding neighbors.   They are regularly recognized as one of the most inventive and powerful company’s in the Midwest.

The Center is also creating a comprehensive, creative community development program to strengthen and build “creative clusters” as a way to help fulfill community-building goals in the Powderhorn-Central neighborhood. This goal is informed, and guided by research conducted by Susan Seifert and Mark Stern, at the University of Pennsylvania’s Social Impact of the Arts Project (SIAP). SIAP’s research shows that neighborhoods with very dense, highly interactive networks of artists and arts organizations produce specific benefits for those communities. These benefits include poverty reduction, population retention and growth and increased civic participation. They postulate that the power of culture derives, in part, from the dynamic social networks it creates, particularly among active cultural participants. They also say that the presence of cultural organizations produces high levels of  “cross-participation” in a neighborhood that stimulates residents’ involvement in other civic activities.

The other example is actually two programs that have sprung from a common source.  Community Arts Training Institute ( CAT) developed by the St. Louis Regional Arts Council and the Creative Community Leadership Institute (CCLI) run by Intermedia Arts in Minneapolis. CAT has been a national model since 1997 and is the oldest sustained training of its kind in the country; the CAT Institute facilitates cross-sector training of community arts partners. It's a rigorous 5-month training for artists, social service professionals, community organizers. policy makers and educators. CCLI has a very similar format and has been around since 2002.  All told 320 graduates from these programs are currently working in neighborhood organizations, at-risk schools, prisons, homeless shelters, hospices, labor unions, community centers, jobs programs, and daycare facilities. These graduates are now recognized as a transformational force in the both the St. Louis and Twin Cities area with many in positions of cultural, community development and political leadership. 

These two personify the strategic, long term commitment needed to alter prevailing attitudes and polices that determine how culture manifests in modern life. Other sector bending/blending, rule breakings, sector bending examples of include:

• The San Francisco Symphony:  creating a citizen symphony online.
• The Wing Luke Museum: community sourced and curated exhibitions.
• Liz Lerman Dance Exchange: The Matter of Origins,” a fusion of art and physics.”
• Animating Democracy: Over a decade of investment in and study of how culture and democracy are an essential amalgam.

Another source for relevant strategies is a book containing research I conducted for Art In the Public Interest called Making Exact Change.  It contains case studies of 10 arts organizations who have made sustained (10 years or more) and measurable positive impact on their communities. 

As such, they are not the sole weavers of the fabric weaving the fabric they are contributors. These artists know that there a lot of raw stories and melodies and images caught up in the weave and they are riffing off of them---they are investigating them, revealing them, amplifying them.  They are also interrogating and celebrating them. The hunger for these “true stories” on the street is palpable. I think there is a growing understanding that the essential difference between an authentic story and a false narrative is in the making.  Community engaged artists know that authentic stories are truly hand built, with and for the communities that will bear the consequences of their materialization.  This, of course, is the cornerstone of all effective community building. Something you might call, “slow culture.”

BARRY:  Can you expand on the slow culture movement as you see it.

BILL:  The common element in the many varieties of community arts practice is the  “with, by, and for” nature of the work.  This means that the art making process engages community members in all aspects of creation and presentation.  A good example is Pomegranate Center. They combine design and art with community planning, public participation, environmental methods, hands-on learning and mentoring in an integrated process to help communities become more livable, sustainable, and socially engaged. One prominent expression of their work is the creation of community gathering places—shared public spaces including parks, neighborhood focal points, community trails, and public artworks—that contribute to community distinction, vitality and social interaction.  Pomegranate believes that no one understands a community like its own residents. It makes sense then, that they engage community members at every stage of development: from planning and design through construction.

I like to say that community-based artists and arts organizations invented the “Slow Culture” movement long before Carlo Petrini (God bless him) sounded the trumpets for the Slow Food parade. Supporting indigenous creators whether they are making food or art is a cornerstone strategy for building caring, capable, and sustainable communities.  I have found that when the stories on stage (or on the walls or screen or in the concert hall) speak to the stories rising up in local communities then people respond– not just as audience members, but as co-creators of the evolving community cultural ecosystem.

And, hey I’m not just talking about community-based arts here.  I’m talking about community-informed, community-responsive arts at every level.  What do Willy Loman, King Hedley, and the Joad family have to say to job starved communities like Detroit and Fresno and Charlestown. What does a dance like Martha Graham’s, “Time is Money” or “Appalachian Spring” have to say about hard times and hard feelings in Des Moines or Tallahassee.

BARRY:  Perhaps we need to delve more into what actually constitutes "community" and what only passes for real community.  I think the whole concept of "community" may need to be drilled deeper as I suspect it is one of those concepts that can neatly fit myriad definitions and perspectives and that there is really little consensus on it.

BILL:  As you can imagine, the word “community” features prominently in my day to day interaction with clients and colleagues. We say we work to build bridges and make translations between “community” arts resources and the needs of the broader “community”.  We call it Arts-Based “Community” Development. Others call it community cultural development or just plain community arts.  But, of course, as the field has grown and proliferated, so has confusion about what it is and what it is trying to do.  And so the need for clarity of purpose and intent has become critical to us in our work at the Center.  So we have a dictionary of sorts. It is not intended to provide “the definition” but rather, a working definition to advance some degree of clarity in our communication.

So, we begin with “community,” which we define as groups of people with common interests defined by place, tradition, intention, or spirit.

Then we actually try to define the field of arts-based community development, or “ABCD”, which we say is  arts-centered activity that contributes to the sustained advancement of human dignity, health or productivity within a community.  These include arts-based activities that: 

·         NURTURE and HEAL people and/or communities
·         EDUCATE and INFORM us about ourselves and the world
·         BUILD and IMPROVE community capacity and/or infrastructure
·         INSPIRE and MOBILIZE individuals or groups

Since we use words like sustainability, accountability and excellence we define those, and many other mangled and abused words and terms, as well.   We also understand that that bringing human creativity and the arts back to the community commons will require a dramatic shift in the prevailing view of how the world works. It will require a new paradigm that views the arts and human creativity as central the development of a healthy world in all aspects. To advance this notion we offer the following three assertions as a foundation for this audacious task. 

• Arts-centered learning is necessary for the healthy development and growth of every child.
• Robust and pervasive cultural development is necessary for the creation of healthy, productive and sustainable communities.
• The development of a worldview that supports a sustainable future is not possible without the active participation of society’s creators and story makers.  

BARRY:  When you say that transforming your three assertions in support on an arts infrastructure “into widely held assumptions and an unquestioned support for our creative capacities and resources will continue to be a challenge" – isn’t that putting it extremely mildly and leaving one with the impression that this challenge is just something to be met, when in reality it is something we haven’t been able to really address in decades.

BILL:  There was a time in this country, not long ago, when slavery and child labor were unquestioned norms and universal education and women’s suffrage were considered pipe dreams. The three assertions that you mention are basic tenets of a democratized culture.  I believe they are also essential to community health--- just like access to adequate healthcare, employment, shelter, nutrition, etc.  It is true that cultural rights are not legally codified here as they are in South Africa and in the Universal Declaration of Human rights, but I believe we ought to act as though they were.  Fighting for universal access to cultural resources and the means of cultural expression makes both common and moral sense.

You’re  right about the difficulty.  We are an irreverent nation that finds it easy to trivialize artistic activities that fall outside the comodified realms of decoration, entertainment, and investment. When the chips are down the arts community unusually falls into the trap of arguing economics, solely, which of course severs the cultural head from the rest of its body.  Most of us have a very difficult time making the case for cultural, social and economic equivalency. But it needs to be done.  Yes, it’s hard, but not impossible,

Consider this: Recession or no, this is still the only a place on earth where average annual expenditure for pink flamingo garden ornaments exceeds the budget of the national arts agency.

BARRY:  Without meaning to be contentious, isn’t saying this is 'hard' quite the understatement?  How, specifically, might we begin the long process then of changing that?   Without some sort of way out of this forest, without some suggestions for what to do and how to do it, without some sort of attempt to fashion a plan, these kinds of discussions, while enormously satisfying, are not much more than the equivalent of an all night college bullshit session. 

BILL: I don't think there is any national "we" that is going to change this state of affairs.  And I also do not think that the mainstream arts community and its advocates are going to a driving force for this kind of significant shift in attitudes about art and culture, particularly in the political sphere.  The hard part about changing attitudes about the arts is that unlike many issues that are debated in public square culture does not translate well as an issue.  Art is an experience, not an issue.  Art making is an experience, not an issue.  In France every kid can tell you that French culture is what distinguishes a French person from an English person. But there, art and the much larger realm of culture (language, food ways, traditions, etc.) are intrinsically linked.  Of course, as France changes through immigration this is becoming a hot button issue.  In the US, "culture" is both hundred conversations and silence.  The vibrancy and identity of local communities here are most often defined through culture.  But, you will never see an American Presidential race determined by a candidate's position on the arts as has happened in France.

So, when we make our case in the policy world we are always hitching a ride on some other public concern such as the economy, quality of life, or education. These are all legitimate and at times, powerful advocacy arguments.  But, economic and educational arguments for cultural support all are secondary to the larger and more critical conversation about the intrinsic relationship between culture and art, which arts folks avoid like a plague.  ("When we say culture we mean art”) By culture here, I mean the integrated system of socially acquired values and beliefs that creates a shared sense of meaning and identity that, in turn, manifests the shared body of knowledge that is the lens through we see the world.  This shared knowledge and understanding is where art and the creation of social, economic, political and spiritual meaning all come together.  But when you try to separate art from all this you are traveling down the slippery slope of an increasingly disconnected and often trivialized conversation.  I guess what I am saying is that we need to clean up the messy way in which we both conflate and separate art from this broader definition of culture. 

Unfortunately, I think the thin-ice conditions that have historically impacted America’s cultural economy have weakened the sector’s imaginative muscles.  This is supposed to be our stock in trade. We are in the imagination business, are we not?  Where is the audacious, expansive, thinking that we need?  The irony here is that I think some time in the next 20-30 years brain scientists will likely end up making the unequivocal case for the arts as essential for human and social development.

BARRY:  Where indeed and isn't that a fundamental question?  Where is that thinking?  What happened to it?  What can we do to resurrect it, or are we somewhat kidding ourselves thinking it once flowered to a greater degree than truth would bear out?

BILL:  “That thinking” is alive and well.  It’s just not being exposed to the same degree as Charlie Sheen’s and Lindsay Lohan’s trivial travails.  You will find it out there, mostly at the local level because that is where audacious thinking and doing get tested. Blogs like yours and other digital infection agents are the perfect vehicle for sharing the interesting ideas and voices that are already out there percolating. It would be nice if we could create some local creative think-and-do tanks (I distrust thinking that is disconnected from doing) to add to the conversation.  The 30 people in Between Grace and Fear are iceberg tips, with each representing an informal a thinking-doing network of thousands.

End of Part II.  Part III Friday.

Don’t  Quit.

Barry

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Interview with Bill Cleveland - Part I

Good morning.
"And the beat goes on..............................."

The Role of the Arts in Community Building and a Better Society

Published last year, Bill Cleveland co-authored / edited the work Between Grace and Fear – The Role of the Arts in a Time of Change – 30 interviews with a variety of people and perspectives  - all centered on this focus:  “the role that artists and arts organizations should play in contributing to a more just and sustainable society.”

I think Bill is one of our sector’s better thinkers.   An activist, teacher, lecturer and musician, he also directs the Center for the Study of Art and Community, located on Bainbridge Island, in Washington state.

I found the book fascinating and challenging – and the chance to consider the really bigger issues for the arts instead of always focusing on funding, audience development and the more pedestrian tasks we deal with daily - an exciting proposition.  Bill agreed to an interview, and we went back and forth over a several month period trying to make some sense of the role of the arts in community development, and building that more sustainable society.  One thought led to another, then to another.  At the end, we were left with more unanswered questions and ever newer paths of inquiry. Such is the task of discussing the role of the arts in the world. 

I tried (as I do in every interview) to play “devil’s advocate”, to provoke the subject, and to encourage candor (while trying to let the person say what they have to say in their own words without too much insertion of my own thinking) -- and while much of what Bill had to say made me wonder about things, I found myself more frequently in agreement with him than doubting or questioning his positions and ideas.

I think (and hope) this interview will spur your philosophical thinking about the role the arts play in both responding to, and shaping, our world.  We should all spend some time in consideration of the bigger picture, if for no other reason than it helps to frame the more mundane aspects of our work.  This is a long interview, and so I am going to break it into three parts and post one part today, another Wednesday and the final entry on Friday of this week.  The first part tries to establish some common vocabulary and the context for discussing the role of the arts in world change. 

One of the assumptions for Between Grace and Fear is that there is a major shift taking place in society’s worldview, and that’s where we started this interview:

BARRY:   If a major shift in worldview is taking place, what role might society’s arts and cultural resources (artists, arts institutions, and cultural creatives) play – both in the formation of that changing worldview and in its final incarnation? 

BILL:  I don’t think you can point to one thing that art does in response to the shifting sands of human history. The evolution of human consciousness, which I believe has been and is taking place, (albeit incredibly slowly), is very much a three steps forward-two steps back kind of a dance. Art making is an intrinsic part of that boogie -- provoking, documenting, celebrating and reflecting on the pushing and the pulling, which of course, depending on where you stand, can be construed as either going forward or backward.  

One of the core questions we asked the interviewees for Between Grace and Fear was whether they thought we were entering a uniquely profound period of change, either in the material sense or, in consciousness. There was pretty much a consensus that major transformations were taking place.

BARRY:   But is there really a worldview shift going on?  Some might argue that major transformations are taking place in some places, with some segments of society, but not necessarily universally.  Also some of the transformations may be movements backwards, not forwards.  And isn’t promotion of profound changes in thinking one of the roles of art historically?  Does art move worldviews or react to them? 

BILL:  Like I said, “three steps forward, two steps back.” (That’s the glass have full version) For more pessimistic souls it’s probably the other way around. When I refer to major transformations I am not inferring any particular qualitative directional judgment to these shifts.  I’m just saying that things like the rapid re-structuring of the world economy, the pace and scope of population shifts through migration and dislocation, the impact of technology on communication and knowledge making, the rapid pace of climate change, and the impending water wars are all happening simultaneously and gaining speed.  Any way you look at it, millions of people around the globe are having their worldview challenged in some pretty profound ways.  Some folks are confused, some are digging in or fighting, some are responding in very creative ways.  

Over the last two decades or so I have been privileged to see, first hand, how some of these things have been playing out in the US and overseas.  I’ve seen it in prison systems, through democratic revolution and post conflict reconstruction, and through political and social upheaval. Is it all good?  Of course not. Is stuff moving, changing, and mutating everywhere?  Absolutely. The greatest impediment to positive change is lack of inertia. Authoritarian dictatorships are inertia killing machines. The second greatest impediment to positive change is missed opportunities when tectonic plates start moving.  All I’m saying is that the plates are moving.  The question is whether we will we be nimble enough to make a new dance or will we just end up on our butts.  There are folks in the arts tribe who have pretty good sense of balance and function quite well in change constant environments. 

Whether we are entering a particularly exceptional chapter was another story. Some observed that humans have always perceived their moment in the sun as the great hinge of history.  Others pointed to our abuse of the earth and its consequences as epochal enough to make the grade as a singular, if not “the singular moment” in human history.  They all agreed though, with our contention that human creativity has been the central mechanism for both the rendering of, and our reflection on, the human footprint. 

As to the causes and effects of worldview, David Korten provided us with a useful frame both in our discussions and in his own book “The Great Turning”. He posits that over the past five millennia the dominant way of thinking about how the world works has been propagated through a series of stories about how prosperity, security, and meaning are created. These stories, which he calls the Empire stories, favor concentration of power and wealth over more equitable forms of living. There is no escaping the fact that artists have been as much a part of shaping this narrative, as they have been involved in challenging it. One of the major themes that emerged in all of our interviews was that new stories are needed to provide the foundation for new beliefs about the planet and our place on it.  Another was that this significant shift in human consciousness is not possible without the participation of the world’s story makers.

BARRY:  Sometimes I think use of the word and concept of "stories" can be very confusing.  It's hard to come up with any consensus on what that necessarily means, and so I wonder if assertions about storytelling are valid, or that the mechanism is truly useful.

BILL:  You are right, to a point.  The words "story" and "story telling" have suffered the same fate as words like "art" and "community."  Nevertheless we use them and confusion ensues.  So, it might be helpful for me to say what I mean by story.  Although I think storytelling, in the traditional sense is a venerable and powerful art form, when I speak of story I am talking much more broadly.  From my perspective, the story is the most complex and powerful form of human information sharing and communication - combining the complexities of human consciousness and character with time and place and events built on, and reinforced by a foundation of assumptions about the way the world works. The web of stories that comprise community or tribal identity is sometimes referred to as a story field. Tom Atlee one of the sponsors of the Story Field Conference describes it as  “the frame that defines what we think is real, acceptable, and possible, and directly shapes our lives and our world, often, without our even being aware of it. He is in alignment with David Korten on the seminal power of story in his belief that when you “change the story field of a culture and we change what is real, acceptable, and possible...”

The stories that infuse and influence our lives come in many forms; image, song, conversation, through curricula, worship, holidays, street names, social norms... the list is endless. I sometimes like to point out that everything that surrounds us, animate and inanimate, is connected in some way to the vast web of stories that forms our world view. 

The "stories" Korten refers to are Meta stories or worldview constructs (or frames).  Here is a  short version of his ""Security" construct.  

"EMPIRE STORY: We depend on decisive, righteous rulers with strong police and military powers to secure our liberty and social order from enemies foreign and domestic and extract retribution from those who do us harm as a warning to other miscreants. Those who oppose the righteous rulers who protect us from our enemies are also our enemies as they threaten the moral and social order.

EARTH COMMUNITY STORY: Beware the self-righteous who seek positions of absolute power to impose their personal version of the moral order in the name of liberty. They are prone to use the police and military powers of the state to secure their own power and privilege in disregard of the rights and well-being of others. Retribution against those who challenge them perpetuates violence and strengthens Empire. Social order, freedom and physical safety are best secured by vital caring communities that build trust, share risks, and create resilience in the face of crisis. Healing troubled relationships eliminates the cause of violence and strengthens Earth Community."

Whether one agrees with his analysis or his alternative "story, this concept of "story" or "worldview frame" is, to my mind a useful way to understand the dynamics and power of belief systems and the role of stories in their development.  Stories from history, religion, marketing messages, and most importantly, those that are embedded in thousands of years of art have influenced, and continue to influence, what we believe to be true.  

Here are my two versions of the Creativity Story from Between Grace and Fear:

Empire: Most people are not very creative. This is because creativity is a gift, like being smart or having a talent. It is also kind of magical, and not particularly well understood. There is no disputing that creative people are valuable, but unfortunately they do not have the discipline necessary for strong leadership. This is because they are often unorthodox and unpredictable. It’s good for scientists, engineers, and designers to be creative. But learning how to make art or becoming an artist is not very practical or useful. Art can be important, but it’s not basic like shelter or food or education. Some artwork can be valuable, beautiful, or inspiring, but it is often so difficult to comprehend that someone else needs to tell us what is going on. All in all, everyday people really don’t have much to do with art or creativity.

This second piece provides the alternative that lens I think is needed to move art and creativity from the margins to the middle of community life.

Humans are essentially creative beings.  Our creativity is naturally occurring and massively abundant.  It is also the most powerful of human capacities. By the age of four, every child has employed it to learn the language, symbol, and social structures that they will depend on for the rest of their lives. An arts-centered education is necessary for each person’s full development. We use the creative process every time we apply our basic skills to solve problems, communicate complex ideas, and envision the future. We need our creativity to help us build caring, capable, and sustainable communities.  Art making too is an intrinsic and pervasive human activity.  It is one of the most powerful tools we have for engaging the imagination and strengthening our creative capacities.  It is also extremely useful. Art helps us commemorate, celebrate, mediate, communicate, entertain, worship, heal, design, initiate, and learn.  Art helps us make sense and meaning in our complex world.  We use art to tell our stories, explore the mysteries, and articulate our dreams.  

BARRY:  In your conclusion to the book you talk about A Perpetual Revolution.  Has it been a revolution or more of an evolution? 

BILL:  It’s been an evolution of course, but then what we call revolutions are usually shifts in the tectonic plates of history responding to long evolving dynamic social, political and economic tensions that have been building up over time. Unfortunately, as our capacity for material change has increased exponentially so has the build-up of historic forces that manifest these abrupt evolutionary moments.  We are now at a place in history where the tremors are fairly regular and constant, or perpetual. Our real struggle, of course, is that human consciousness has not kept pace.  And the implication for the arts of that is what?  

Given the developments in the middle east (Egypt, Tunisia, Bahrain, Syria, Libya etc.) perhaps we need to consider the phenomenon and how what is going on (including such things as China's recent reaction in arresting one their foremost - and outspoken - artists) in terms of global shifts, and whether or not art itself goes through similar phases when there is an explosion that results in fundamental change. 

Our artistic history is a reflection of the history of the world and often provides a powerful alternative lens into the dynamics of human events.  But, artists whose work is meaningful in the moment, or over the long haul, are not separate from or immune from the power of transformative events.  Artists are citizens, who suffer in famine, lose family members in Tsunami's, and get arrested when they question the authority of depots.  

BARRY:  As the world becomes ever more interconnected, does the world not increasingly yearn to move towards a more insular, isolated, vivisected way of thinking about things – in part as a defense mechanism?  Or does it move more in the other direction – towards community and shared purposes?  Again the recent global experience may suggest something different.

BILL:  Fear is a powerful motivator.  (Just look at our most recent elections) The interconnected world can be stimulating and inspiring.  It can also be overwhelming, particularly for those who experience the world as a constant bi-polar struggle between good and evil. When change manifests as political, social and economic intrusions that appear beyond ones control it can be shattering, threatening,--- fear producing.  This can be as true for a middle-class Tea Party pensioner as it is for a Waziri tribesman. 

You ask, “Is the world moving towards a more isolated way of thinking,” Unfortunately, for those who see the world through the lens of those dichotomous Empire stories the answer, increasingly, is yes.  People are constantly being challenged to distinguish the “true” and the “real” from the relevant, the incomplete, the out of context, from lies and just plain trash. The interconnected world demands greater levels of perspicacity from everyone in its path. This is particularly hard when your powers of discernment are blinkered by a largely 2-D view of a 3-D world. Interconnectivity also means that there are bits and pieces of many worldviews coming at us all the time. As the pace and volume of information and actual social, economic and political change increases (exponentially mind you) those historic tectonic pressures mount. Some folks flee or build a firewall of some kind; some huddle with the more like-minded, some switch channels entirely and join Al Qaeda or a militia. 

BARRY:  And how would you characterize the rise of social networking? Some might argue that the preoccupation with one's smallest tribe (really a tribe of one) while a prime example of interconnectedness, is also the opposite - a move inwardly with the self as the center of the universe and an obstacle to open intersections  (No I don't think I want to "friend you"..........)

BILL:  Given the option to imagine that humans are not intrinsically interdependent,  some homo sapiens will default to the “I am the center of a universe of my own making” mode. We are, of course doomed, if this delusion becomes the common worldview. But there is hope—great hope. And, believe it or not this is where the arts come in. It’s not just me saying this. As we point out in the book, people like Daniel Pink, Paul Hawken, Thomas Freidman and Korten all point  to human creativity as essential for changing course. For the most part, the scientists, philosophers, politicians, philanthropists, educators, community leaders, and art folks we interview in the book concur.

Here’s why. The growth of a sustainable society needs more people who can navigate the 3-D highway, safely. To do this they need to be skilled in problem-solving, critical analysis, and holistic and systemic thinking. They need to be agile and assertive learners. They need to able to suspend judgment, play nicely with others, and laugh at themselves. They also need to be both world citizens and as my co-author Pat Shifferd says, also “ identify with a particular place or community… to help preserve the unique cultural traditions and natural landscape of that place.”  In short, we need a heaping dose of the most powerful of human capacities—our creativity. My friend Tou SaiKo Lee, who is a poet and organizer in Minneapolis calls these folks super-heroes---but not in the traditional sense, because he thinks with a little work all of us can don a cape and leotards.

BARRY:  While I couldn't agree with you more, there is a fundamental problem in asserting that the arts are the best / only / even a good path to the instilling / teaching / imparting those essential skills to people.  We have made that claim for some time, without any real proof whatsoever.  Perhaps if scientists were to argue that the arts are critical to accomplishment in their fields it would resonate better than people in the arts making that claim. 

BILL:  There is a big difference between how modern society defines "the arts" and the realm of  human creativity that I think is essential to the advancement of human consciousness.  I do not feel that "the arts" (or any other isolated area of human endeavor)  is the answer, particularly in their current state.  I do believe that the shift in worldview that needs to occur will require an unparalleled unleashing of imaginative discipline.  Many people who are not artists have harnessed these capacities in the 20th and 21st centuries to build and create amazing things and make a whole lot of money.  At this point in time, though, human creativity needs to be applied differently.  We need  a dramatic increase in creative horsepower aimed at a wide array of interconnected global issues like poverty, climate change, and HIV/AIDS.  To do this we need to be very intentionally cultivating flexible, inquiry-based, adaptive learning capacities of our future citizens, our institutions, and the systems that connect them.  It just so happens that the pedagogy needed to support a rapid growth of creative musculature has been around for a long time.  A small glimmer of it can be found in what we call it arts education. Before our children enter formal schooling, creative inquiry is how they learn 60% of all they will ever know.  

Artists know and understand how to exercise and apply this creative musculature. We don't have to invent a new technology to grow these capacities. It’s already here and guess what, many scientists and social commentators are pointing this out.  Daniel Pink's book, A Whole New Mind, is basically a summary of the kind of exciting new research that is taking place on the frontiers of brain science, neuro-psychology, and sociology about the untapped potential of human creativity.  Physicist Fritjof Capra, one of the pioneers of complexity theory has written three books that cite cutting edge research the biological and physical sciences to argue the creative impulses inherent to both natural and social systems defines what it means to be alive and conscious.           

End of part I.  Part II Wednesday.

Don’t Quit.
Barry

Listening to Lessons Learned

Good morning.

“And the beat goes on…………………………….”

In a provocative posting (read the whole piece and the thoughtful comments) on Blue Avocado, former Program Officer for the San Francisco Foundation, John Killacky offers brutally honest insights and conclusions about current arts philanthropy and funding, based on lessons learned during his tenure.

For the most part, John’s words are far more succinct and eloquent than any paraphrasing I might offer and so I shall let him speak for himself as he raises important questions:

SKEWED PRIORITIES:
In John’s own words: “There is a crisis here, as arts funding remains disproportionately skewed toward the classical behemoths. With organizations like Philadelphia Orchestra and New York City Opera imploding because of structural deficits, I worry that precious philanthropic resources will be further diverted to maintaining what was, instead of capitalizing a more representative future. By merely preserving the past, we fail as cultural stewards and act irresponsibly.”

EXCELLENCE MATTERS:
He concludes that the failure of funders to center on artistic excellence in multicultural support, opting instead to focus on operational infrastructure stability, often allocating insufficient resources over too short a period of time, has contributed to the inability of culturally specific organizations to achieve long term viability and artistic growth.

As John said himself: “Excellence matters -- and there was not a lack of artistic excellence -- but what was missing were the multiple perspectives in philanthropy needed to judge excellence in culturally specific organizations.

As a result, a separate "other" track was created for these organizations, a kind of affirmative action track with far less resources. By creating this separate track, we may have unintentionally entrenched a two-tiered caste system.

In addition, support to culturally specific organizations often focused on administrative infrastructure building and considered artistic quality a lower priority. This was a mistake, resulting in further undercapitalizing artistic efforts.

Maybe philanthropy should have taken a page from venture capitalists’ playbooks, investing more deeply at a significant level over a five- to eight-year time frame, as well as offering a range of non-cash, value-added assistance by sitting on boards, mentoring, and coaching of senior managers, in addition to artistic support. This is not hands-off, outsourced grantmaking. Focus on the triple bottom line and then get out!

Another problem I now see was that support was often not tied to the marketplace: box office, tuition, and auxiliary income are crucial. I once attended a performance with a colleague doing a site visit. The work was stale and there were only six of us in the audience, still the group met my colleague’s requirements for funding. Longevity with diminishing artistry is not success.”

ARTIST SUPPORT AND RISK TAKING:

“Noting the continuing long term trend of underfunding of artists, it is time to reverse this and provide artists adequate time, money, and other resources. Focusing support on individual artists may be particularly pertinent for culturally specific art practices that do not lend themselves to organizing within the 501(c)(3) nonprofit construct.

For many venture capitalists, there is a rule of thumb regarding start-up investing. It suggests that on 1/3 of your investments you will lose all of your investment. On another 1/3 you may make or lose a little. The other 1/3 is where you make your money, and one or two is probably where the bulk of the return is. Unfortunately, this kind of risk-taking would seem foolhardy to funders.

Philanthropy should always be seeding the future along multiple frontiers….after awhile, if an artist or artist organization does not get traction in its community, then perhaps aesthetic Darwinism should prevail – yet, without small and emerging culturally specific organizations to allow artists to find their initial stage legs, I worry about subsequent generations realizing their potential in larger venues”.

BREAKING THE FALSE BARRIERS:

“It is time to give up the false dichotomies and biases between professional/amateur, high/low, esoteric/popular, and contemporary/traditional. Instead, philanthropy should be investing in the cultural interests that allow people who live in our communities to lead more expressive lives".

ROBERTO BEDOYA'S PERSPECTIVE ON POLICY FORMATION, the ABSENCE OF ARTISTIC IMAGERY and the BIAS and PREJUDICE INHERENT IN THE CURRENT SYSTEM:

In a related piece (to John's arguments), Roberto Bedoya's White Paper on the Color Line in U.S. Cultural Policy published by NAMAC (National Alliance for Media Art + Culture), "examines the deficiencies in cultural policy assumptions, formation and research mythologies as they relate to the allocation of resources and the articulation of value in the cultural sector. He argues there is a strong bias at work in many cultural policy research efforts to privilege the notion of objectivity, along with a reluctance to engage with the social meanings and motives framing this research. Further, he posits that communities of color are most affected by the impact of Western research methodologies and he offers the concept of "stewardship" as a new framing term for the policy community. Stewardship, he explains, is the idea where cultural policy makers and assessors measure an organization’s success by listening and learning about the stories, images and worldviews that drive an organization’s mission instead of the purely empiricist research prevalent in most cultural sector research methodologies today."

As Roberto says himself:  "The absence of a policy frame, a discursive space for the experience and knowledge associated with multiple worldviews, is creating a color line in U.S. cultural policy. The lack of awareness and acceptance among some policy researchers and policymakers of the variety of experiences in our society and work, coupled with the reluctance and at times deliberate inability among them to work with phenomenological knowledge, draws this line."

Moreover, he argues: Policy Studies is a field that overwhelmingly embraces “policy” as an empirical science that separates facts from value. This separation, within the cultural policy field, fails to engage with the phenomenon of imagination and how it affects decision-making within artist-centered cultural practices and the support structures for artists and their creative processes. It also fails to engage with the utopian and ideological goals and effects of empowering talent and community that animate the missions of many ethnic-specific organizations and community-based organizations. Empirically based cultural policy research is adequate when studying the quantifiable components of the cultural sector.  Yet when it comes to artists, creativity and an understanding of how imagination enlivens our social imaginaries, a post-empiricist phenomenological-oriented policy research is a more appropriate way to proceed."

PRESERVING OUR INSTITUTIONAL MEMORY AND PASSING THE KNOWLEDGE FORWARD:

John’s honest and frank appraisal of some of the challenges to arts funders raises for me yet one more issue – and that is how do we preserve institutional memory and insure that current and future leadership can benefit from the lessons learned and wisdom gained from those who "have been there and done that" already. Our failure to create mechanisms and methodologies that will allow us to pass down all that is learned from one generation to another is a foolish and costly mistake and misstep.  And though this has been discussed before, we have yet to address the issue in any systemic way.  All that knowledge being lost is a powerful condemnation of our myopia, and a tragedy that cannot but make all our jobs needlessly more difficult. 

I have spoken to several retiring funders and program officers in the past couple of years – all of whom had very definite thoughts, opinions and ideas about what the funding community is doing wrong, and how it might do a much more effective job in advancing art, artists, arts organizations and access. But you rarely hear the themes and sharp criticisms echoed by those departing  leaders - except perhaps as whispers to their most trusted colleagues. To a large degree, I think perhaps many of those people felt constrained while in the employ of foundations, corporations and government, and not free to express their true feelings as to the direction their employers were taking, the approaches adopted, and perhaps even the underlying mission statements and broad strategies in furtherance of those lofty goals. It is only after they leave that some of them feel they can say what may have been on their minds for quite some time. Even then, not all are at ease in sharing all the conclusions they have come to. That is a problem for us. We need their frank assessments and keen insights, and to learn from their mistakes. We must develop some way so they can (and will) share all that they have learned from their time and experience, and not hold back and reserve their conclusions - even when those conclusions are painfully critical.

Maybe, as far as the philanthropic / funding sub-sector goes, GIA could tackle this problem and at least put the issue on the table for consideration and dialogue. I would love to see a panel of past program officers of foundations large and small, together with retired government funders at local, state and the national levels in a no-holds barred offering of their straightforward, candid assessment of a wide range of obstacles and barriers as well as opportunities and open doors to how we fund the arts. If I ran a foundation and had an opening for my arts program officer position, even before putting out the job description, the first thing I would do would be to invite four or five former arts program officers at other foundations and government funding agencies to lunch and ask them what is and isn't working in arts funding based on their recent experience.

We need a lot more John Killackys', and the continued analysis of people like Roberto Bedoya, coming forth with lessons learned over time, sharing their regrets and pulling no punches in their advice. And we need to listen carefully to what they say and hear the well-intentioned advice offered. And to do that we have to create some kind of system that preserves this knowledge base.  Otherwise we just plod along in a false vacuum.

Have a great week.

Don’t Quit
Barry