Americans for the Arts
Arianna Huffington and The Huffington Post's New Arts Section
Posted by Jul 23, 2010 0 comments
Americans for the Arts
Last year at the Americans for the Arts Annual Convention in Seattle, funders and arts organizations alike were in a panic about the economy and draconian cuts in arts support and services.
This year in Baltimore, while the economic picture remains challenging, clear progress was evident as funders and arts organizations discussed new ways of adapting and shifting models. It’s all about collaboration and the blurring of lines between private and public, for profit and nonprofit, high art versus populist art.
This past year, the Obama administration brought in film artists to help brainstorm on a solution for capping BP’s gusher in the Gulf of Mexico. Rocco Landesman, head of the National Endowment for the Arts, talked to cabinet leaders asking how can the arts help with their problems, which developed into a partnership with the Department of Housing and Urban Development and the Department of Transportation.
Liz Lerman’s Dance Exchange is working with the U.S. Navy on a huge arts-based learning project. And Peter Sellars, stage, film, and festival director, wants to know why shouldn’t artists bring their creativity to bear on solving the ills of the California prison system. Why not, indeed?
Read MoreIn April at the Arts Education Partnership National Forum, Secretary of Education Arne Duncan stated that “the arts can no longer be treated as a frill.” Of course we in the arts community know that art education cultivates critical thinking and analysis skills. But business leaders are also realizing how urgent the need for increased arts education in our schools has become.
During “Arts Education and the Innovative Workforce,” our recent webinar in partnership with The Conference Board, telecom entrepreneur and Qualcomm co-founder Harvey White reinforced Duncan’s statement by stressing that if America’s workforce is to remain competitive on a global level, art education is indeed not a frill but an economic necessity. White quoted former Secretary of Education Richard Riley, who stated that in the future, businesses will seek out employees that can “solve problems we don’t even know are problems yet.” The technical skills that students learn through STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math) subjects are certainly necessary, and even align with arts education—after all the objective of engineering is to creatively solve problems using science and math. However, STEM alone cannot provide all of the critical analysis and creative problem solving skills that future business leaders will require to succeed in the global economy.
Read MoreI’ve discovered a number of return-on-investment (ROI) tools we use to maximize our resources at TimeLine Theatre, a non-profit theater in Chicago.
Read MoreContemporanea has embarked on the task of procuring data by launching the following study: The Latino Experience in Museums.
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