Helicon Holiday Cheer

 

http://sendables.jibjab.com/view/tllbAZWoaGZwcYbf

Cultural Participation Handbook

Marcy Cady on our team did a workshop yesterday at the annual conference for the National Guild of Community Arts Education on program planning.  She referenced this handbook on Cultural Participation that she co-authored. Since we ran out of the print outs we brought, I thought that I’d post it here for easy reference.

Who Validates Whose Art?

I wrote a comment I made on a blog post on arts participation by Ian David Moss on the American’s for the Arts Artsblog.  I am reposting it here because I think it is a challenging topic that deserves continuing dialogue.

Hi Ian,

Interesting post on a tough topic. Mind if I challenge you on one thing?

I agree completely that the majority of arts organizations that present what the NEA defines as “benchmark arts activities” are going to have to radically transform to reach audiences that differ drastically in type from their current ones–people who are younger, located in rural areas, less wealthy or from different ethnic or social backgrounds.

On the other hand, I think to remind ourselves that just because 65% of Americans did none of these particular benchmark activities they did not participate in art. In fact, other studies have found data to suggest that art is a critical part of the lives of most people…it just isn’t the kind of art that our system has traditionally validated. In fact, Alan Brown’s work in the Inland Empire, one of the poorest and most ethnically diverse regions in California, suggests that a majority of people in that region not only participate in the arts, but actually create art of some kind. Our conventional definition of arts participation is antiquated and euro-centric, and leaves out many arts practices that are “indigenous” among younger and more diverse populations such as hip hop, quilting, dancing, film-making, and many heritage and religious activities. Many of these are created at professional levels of skill.

I think this underlines your point about the benchmark arts institutions needing to make a radical transformation if they want to reach the other 65%, but offers a slightly different frame on the challenge. If many of those who aren’t coming to conventional arts venues are already doing something creative, something that they enjoy, how do you convince them to spend their time with you instead?

I think the answer has something to do with 1) authentically appealing to what they value in a way that is authentic to you, 2) treating them with respect, and making them feel comfortable and welcome, and 3) showing them a really good time. But even so, at a certain point we might have to accept that every kind of art doesn’t speak to everybody…and that is ok.

The implication for the support system for the arts is slightly different. If our system (mostly) validates and supports some arts and not others…And the type of arts that are validated and supported appeal to some people and not others…And the people who are interested in the validated kind of art tend to be the most privileged in our society… Something ain’t right.

More on the virtuous and harmful qualities of the Internet

Remember the Nicolas Carr article in The Atlantic a couple of years ago called, Is Google Making Us Stupid? The Guardian asked a bunch of smart scientists, writers and experts to comment. Some agree, some don’t. It is interesting reading.

Grantmaking without extra hoops

These days, its unusual to hear about new funding programs … many foundations are struggling just to maintain their current giving levels. So, when George Soros’ Open Society Institute recently announced grants of $11 million to 79 small and mid-sized performing arts organizations in New York City, it was a welcome and needed surprise.  http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703724104575379631712017488.html  Though Though not an arts foundation, Ann Beeson from OSI remarked, “we know the central role arts and culture play in economic stability and social change.” 

There are several distinguishing features of this program that make it worth mentioning (full disclosure: Helicon helped design and implement this program).  The awards were speedy, generous and focused on unrestricted operating support.  But perhaps the most unusual and important feature is that this program imposed no fundraising burden to any nonprofit arts group.  The Fund for the City of New York and Helicon completed reviews of more than 250 organizations for eligibility.  Eligible organizations were asked to complete a one-page form that confirmed or adjusted their data.  No had to spend time writing a multi-page proposal for a grant they wouldn’t receive, or trying to psych out the behind-the-scenes workings of the program. 

This simple and straightforward approach won’t work in all cases, of course, but we’d love to see more funders re-think their procedures to diminish, not enlarge, the demands on non-profit organizations.

Doug McLennan on connecting in a post-mass culture economy

Check out the video and slides of Doug McLennan’s talk from Dynamic Adaptability Puget Sound. He talks about how to connect with the people who care about what you do in our post-mass culture economy and how cultural organizations can rethink their business models accordingly. Its long, about 2 1/2 hours, but its worth sitting down with a cup of tea and watching in its entirety. He offers five principles for success in this new world and some really interesting examples of people doing things differently.

It’s Not About You…It’s About Them

When I was thinking about how to blog on our exciting new report on the motivations of individual donors to artist’s projects and small arts organizations, it immediately connected up in my mind with Doug McLennan’s Dynamic Adaptability session in Seattle on June 21st.

As Alexis paraphrased, Doug commented that:  Its all about creating a strong community around why you exist. Many in the arts are experiencing a “crisis of constituency” because they haven’t clearly defined the “why” in terms that matter to people.

The research on the donors to the Fund for Artists projects we studied for the It’s Not About You…It’s About Them paper brought us to the same conclusion.  To create a strong community around your organization, your project, or your artwork you have to define why it is of value to other people — not why it has intrinsic value, or is of value to you.  Tapping into and appealing to people’s individual values unlocks innumerable doors to their participation, volunteerism, and financial contributions, as we learned.  Check out the paper.

The Power of Why

I’m buzzing from a) Doug McLennan’s FANTASTIC talk at our final Dynamic Adaptability session in Seattle  b) free in flight wireless Internet c)  Seattle coffee.

We’ll be posting Doug’s slides and the video of the session up here as soon as possible, but I wanted to share a few takeaways.  Doug spoke about the way that the Internet is changing how we communicate and consume culture, and what that means for cultural institutions. One of his key points was that technology enables us to more easily do things that we do anyway–communicate, connect, talk to one another, share things, make things. His main point was deceptively simple:  you need to know why you do what you do in order to know how best to do it, and what technology can help you.  Some other points:

• We’ve shifted from a mass culture model to a niche culture model. The mass culture model wants to find what is least offensive to the most people. In a niche culture model, the audience doesn’t have tolerance for the “mushy middle”, they want what they want…or they’ll get it somewhere else.
• Assessments of your audience by demographic characteristics are nice, but they still leave a lot of questions unanswered. Its not just who the audience is, but what they do, why and how. Ask them.
• Whereas content is becoming niche, infrastructure is moving toward open source.
• We are moving from the “attention economy,” where sellers have to compete for the attention of the potential buyer to the “intention economy,” where buyers claim their intent to buy and sellers create a relationship with them to get their business. Behaving like we’re in a mass market economy is a recipe for failure.
• There is plenty of content, don’t add to the noise unless you add something your consumers specifically value.
• Its all about creating a strong community around why you exist. Many in the arts are experiencing a “crisis of constituency” because they haven’t clearly defined the “why” in terms that matter to people.
• There is not one online strategy that will work for all generations.
• Rather than a producer of content, arts institutions should rethink themselves as a provider of infrastructure for the cultural experience to occur
• How to motivate people to do something once they visit you online? Motivate the desire for social capital (e.g. Guardian MP investigation).
• To get people engaged you need their attention, a reputation, and a community (eg. TED conference is now an online community of ideas as well as a network of advocates in the “real” world)

These are just notes, more later when I post up the video and slides.

Games to save the world

There has been a lot of pro and con talk in recent years about the amount of time (three billion hours a week!)  people are spending on video games.  Con side arguments include that excessive gaming leads to distraction or disassociation (both challenged by recent scientific studies) and that time playing games is diverted from more productive “real-world” activities. In this TED talk game designer Jane McGonigal convincingly argues the other side:  that multi-player games actually cultivate skills and attitudes that are critical for solving complex real world problems, and that their potential is currently WAY under-exploited.  Gamers exhibit:

• A desire to act immediately to solve problems combined with the belief that they will succeed
• The ability to weave a tight social fabric and work with large communities towards a common goal
• A willingness to work tirelessly until the goal is accomplished
• A desire to accomplish awe-inspiring missions

She calls gamers “a virtually unprecedented human resource”–the only problem is that their attention is focused on virtual worlds.  I love that McGonigal’s idea is based around inspiring people to solve hard problems for fun and meaning, rather than terrifying them about what will happen to them if they don’t (triggering escapism and denial).

McGonigal has made it her life’s work at the Institute for the Future to redirect gamer energy toward solving real-world problems. One of these games, Superstruct, poses several scenarios of doom that will lead to the end of the human race and pulls together the energy of thousands of players (10883 currently) to come up with innovative ways to adapt and overcome.  Several scenarios specifically explore the role of museums in various futures, the results of which the Center for the Future of Museums used to generate the background material for the visioning session Marcy attended.

I can see a game framework being really fruitful for the cultural sector, which is often paralyzed by the high stakes problems it currently faces. Many leaders of cultural institutions and foundations fear investing in solutions that don’t work and risking embarrassing failure. But games force you to take risks and expect you to fail many times before you succeed–that’s why you have multiple lives.  The most successful companies know that failure is the price of innovation. Pixar, with nine blockbusters under its belt, makes failure an explicit company policy and seeks to “screw up as fast as possible.” What could we come up with for ideas if we developed a problem-solving approach that integrated failure as a critical step?

I have yet to play around thoroughly with the museum scenarios from Superstruct. If you do, please let us know what you think.

A day spent with a futurist

In our work we’re often pushing cultural organizations and funders to confront demographic, technological and economic trends in their planning for their future. We ask people to consider pretty radical possibilities that might mean drastic changes in the way they currently think and operate.  Sometimes we’re not well liked for it. Last week I attended a visioning session held by the California Association of Museums at the American Association of Museums conference that made me think we’re still not thinking nearly broadly or boldly enough.

Led by futurist Gary Golden the group of 20 or so museum leaders and cultural experts were told to consider how the following list of trends might effect the future of our sector:

• Demographic transformation (not a surprise to those of us in California);
• Reverse gender gap (the increasing education rates for women);
• Energy price volatility (also a biggie for car-loving Californians);
• The growing divide in wealth;
• Digital content increasingly being associated with “free;”
• Erosion of authority (multiple acceptable perspectives);
• “My culture” phenomenon (the self-curation of knowledge).

The day made me realize there are a lot of gaps in my thinking about the future for the organizations and artists we work with.  We tend to focus on things that will obviously impact culture, like consumers growing preference for virtual cultural experiences and demographic shifts. Rarely do we consider things like environmental degradation, peak oil or unemployment, although the impact of these trends might be larger and more close at hand. Paradoxically, the ubiquity of the Internet and digital technologies may actually be the primary asset that helps cultural organization navigate the future, although this has been the trend that has seemed most threatening in recent years (fears about iPad replacing books, YouTube and Netflix replacing live entertainment, etc).

What do you think? What trends are you watching?