Cleveland’s great jazz saxophonist, Ernie Krivda was eloquent in his acceptance remarks for his receipt of a Creative Workforce Fellowship this week.  He was one of 20 artists who accepted their fellowship awards at the December board meeting of the Community Partnership for Arts and Culture (CPAC). 

While jokingly thanking the county’s cigarette smokers for their obsession with tobacco – their obsession funds the arts and these fellowships – he also said that artists were similarly obsessed, “with this dark gift that sheds light” referring to the artist’s compulsion to make work. 

Each of the other 16 artists who were present (three could not attend) delivered their own heartfelt comments of gratitude and I was impressed with how each felt that the fellowship award also conferred an obligation to the community which made it possible.  Here’s a few that struck me as particularly poignant.

Conductor Domenico Boyadjin:  “I came from Europe because of the Cleveland Orchestra.  The plane landed and magic happened.  I never expected to find such a rich arts community.  Cleveland is my home from now on.  I will use the award to give free concerts.”

Actress Chris Seibert: “I started at the Beck Center when I was 10.  I went away for 10 years – forgive me.  I came back and found my ‘tribe.’ I just want to make you proud.”

Playwright David Hansen:  “There are challenges and opportunities in any time.  It’s a question of what we do with them.  The work I will do in this fellowship year will be my gift to the community.  I won’t forget it.”

Percussionist Neil Chastain:  “I see this as a tremendous obligation to continue my work and share it with children in the Cleveland schools.  I will finish my book for teachers and kids so that any teacher can begin to have a way to make music with children.”

Poet Sarah Gridley: “I work with words and I’m having a hard time finding the right ones.  I will have to reflect carefully on how to use this gift responsibly and responsively.”

And finally, there was choreographer David Shimotakahara who, after stating he did not come prepared with a speech, burst into a joyous, spontaneous dance of celebration that said as much if not more than words could ever have.

This was a great day for Cleveland and its county’s creative community.  While I have not done the research, and risk being wrong, I do believe that these Artist Fellowships are among the most generous given by any city in the country that uses locally generated public funds to support the arts. 

Good for us.

Two weeks ago I logged in to a live webcast of a Cultural Workforce Forum held by the National Endowment for the Arts. (View the webcast here.) Its purpose was, broadly stated, to explore the condition and role of the artist in America’s real economy. 

Last week I attended two days of deliberations by seven external arts experts who awarded the second round of Creative Workforce Fellowships to 20 Cleveland-area performing and literary artists. This was the second round of artist fellowships awarded this year.  Visual arts fellowships were awarded earlier in the fall.

All these events provided revelations, validations, and raised questions.  Here’s what I’ve been thinking about as a result.

Is everyone (or could everyone be) an artist?  Workforce data is collected by the Office of Management and Budget and updated every 10 years.  Occupations are self-reported and anyone can declare themselves an artist whether they are paid for their work or not, whether they belong to a professional association or have had professional training or not.  The number of Americans who self-report their profession as ‘artist’ is astounding and growing as Baby Boom retirees leave the office and the machine shop and take up photography, needlepoint, pottery, as a hobby.

How does this inflate or distort the perception of the professional artist sector in the eyes of the public?  I think a lot.  Especially when we hear too many advocates for arts education declaring that all children are ‘born artists’ and every human being has inherent creative abilities that are lost without ongoing opportunities to express themselves in school. 

Don’t get me wrong.  I passionately support arts education.  I firmly believe that we all have the ability to think and act creatively and that having hands-on experience in the arts will make us all better, more productive human beings: just as hands-on experience in doing geometry and algebra problems will make us better able to manage our financial and physical lives.  But just because we can solve an equation, we don’t call our selves mathematicians. And just because we have the inherent ability to vocalize and move our bodies, few of us would claim to be singers or dancers when asked what we do for our living. 

The mistake that is made by too many arts education activists is in not championing the fact that some of us, frankly, have a level of given artistic ability above and beyond the normal, and that these individuals deserve the right to have these talents developed.  And that those who have subjected themselves to rigorous training of their abilities deserve the same level of regard and respect as do experts in any other field. 

Not everyone can be called an ‘artist’ in the same terms of skill and accomplishment.  We easily acknowledge that doctors, lawyers, machinists, mathematicians, chefs, race car drivers, scientists, etc., are professionals in their fields by virtue of some natural ability, an affinity for the work they do and the highly specialized training they have undertaken to become experts.  We should define and acknowledge artists the same way and expect a demonstrated level of skill and accomplishment before we confer or assume that title.

Thankfully, one place where the perspective on and the respect for professional training and accomplishment in the arts is well understood and regarded is right here in Cleveland. 

We know about our professional training academies: Cleveland Institute of Art, Cleveland Institute of Music, Oberlin and Baldwin Wallace Conservatories, dance, art and music programs at local colleges and universities.  So we understand and support the professional training of artistically talented individuals.  But now we also acknowledge the accomplishments of the most promising and experienced artists among us through the remarkable fellowship awards made possible through the public funds managed by Cuyahoga Arts and Culture and administered by the Community Partnership for Arts and Culture.

Just as fellowships in science, medicine, engineering, etc. acknowledge the stellar accomplishments of individuals in these fields and help these experts advance their work, so too, now,  Cleveland has acknowledged the value of the accomplished artists among us and is supporting the advancement of their work on behalf of an ever-more-robust creative workforce and innovative cultural climate. 

Few if any local municipalities provide the level of public recognition and support that Cleveland now does with these remarkable fellowships.  Congratulations and Bravo/Brava to the 20 newly named Creative Workforce Fellows.

I would be remiss if I did not also acknowledge the 50 year-old Cleveland Arts Prize, founded by the visionary Martha Joseph and Klaus George Roy.  The Arts Prize has been lauding local talented individuals for five decades, through an internal selection process that has recognized more than 100 arts patrons, arts institutions and late-career and emerging artists in our community. 

A final word.  Wouldn’t you think that, with this level of creative talent in our community, Cleveland would be an inherently more innovative, risk-taking, entrepreneurial city than it is?  There is a disconnect between the conservative, timid outlook of our civic leadership and the visionary energy and talent of our creative workforce.  Imagine what could happen if we instilled some of our creative ability into the civic and political realms here.

Members of the brand-new White House Office of Urban Affairs (there hasn’t been such an Office before!) came to Cleveland to learn from us and others in Ohio about what has worked and what is not working with the implementation of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) funds. (Think ‘stimulus.’) More than 50 representatives of government agencies, nonprofits, and philanthropies throughout Ohio attended the half-day session held in the Cleveland Foundation’s Minter Conference Center.  They came from Youngstown, Cincinnati, Columbus, Lorain, Toledo, Akron, and Cleveland. 

The Fed sent representatives from the Departments of Labor, Housing and Urban Development, and Energy.  And the State of Ohio sent representatives from the Departments of Housing, Commerce, and Energy.  Mayor Jackson, Sherrod Brown, and Dennis Kucinich sent representatives as well.

The messages from the White House were:

• The door is open. 
• We are listening. 
• We want to learn from you. 
• Be bold in your vision for recovery. 

The information from this session will be shared with the White House Interagency Working Group on Urban Policy, and be used in making program improvements in 2010 and in developing the 2011 federal budget.

As the facilitator for one of the two breakout groups (mine was Energy/Workforce Development/Job Creation; the other was Foreclosure Crisis and Land-use Revitalization), I can report a very energetic discussion with people eager to share both the challenges they faced as well as the successes they were seeing.  The White House representatives pushed again and again for specific examples of barriers to implementation – and they got an earful.  Plus they all left their e-mails for follow up. 

Cleveland was chosen as one representative region, and the second in the White House’s “Learning Through Recovery” listening tour.  There will be a select few other stops before a report is compiled and distributed. While I can’t possibly chronicle all that was said, I can report that there were many ‘kudos’ given for ARRA and for the administration’s commitment to listen.  On the critical side, here’s a few of the key points that surfaced in my group.

• Washington doesn’t know what’s needed at the local level. It’s a disincentive to boldness if we are threatened with an investigation when we try to be creative or innovative beyond the very narrow restrictions of many regulations.  Give us more flexibility in the use of funds as we see what is working in our different communities.
• Reporting is a nightmare.  Many low-bid contractors do not have the capacity to do the paperwork needed and cities must take on this burden, with no additional support.  Let us add administrative costs above the bid to cover this expense.  Also, coordinate the application reporting requirements of different federal agencies.  There is so much duplicate entry required.  Reciprocity is needed.  Can’t information get shared electronically? 
• Write the guidelines and reporting requirements in English!
• HUD is great at coordinating and connecting services and agencies.  Other departments should model HUD.
• There should be a vision of a healthy community to guide planning and allow for a holistic approach in the use of funds rather than a siloed one.  Healthy communities need healthy people and livable environments.  It’s not only about infrastructure.
• There needs to be a strategy for a ‘soft landing’ when the stimulus funding ends.

The White House representatives seemed pleased with the meeting and promised to stay in touch.  The foundation will link to the report when it is finalized.
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Last week a number of arts community members gathered to welcome Karen Gahl-Mills, the newly named executive director of Cuyahoga Arts and Culture (CAC) – our county funding agency for the arts.  And for once we didn’t have to warn an incoming executive to prepare for the Cleveland winter.  Ms. Gahl-Mills spent a bit of her teen years here and she currently is the director of the Syracuse Symphony Orchestra – in a town that understands a Great Lakes winter better than we do.  She will begin her official duties February 1, 2010.

Thomas Mulready’s introductory video interview with her will give you a sense of her enthusiasm and readiness for the job.

Ms Gahl-Mills has an impressive background, with the range of experience that will serve her well in understanding the diversity of cultural activities here.  And her background – in nonprofit management as an arts executive, as a practicing artist herself (cello and voice), and her for-profit work in film and television will give the arts community some comfort that she understands where they are coming from.

Although it seems that the funding from the Issue 18 cigarette tax has just begun – the artist fellowship grants have not yet all been awarded – the renewal of that tax is already on the minds of the arts community.  2016 is not that far off in terms of gearing up for a campaign.  Although the operating support grant cycle is just beginning to enter its second round, the arts have already begun to depend on these funds.

A week ago the Ohio Arts Council came to town on a ‘listening tour’ to meet with various segments of the cultural community and the public, to help inform a new strategic plan for this agency.  The OAC lost nearly 50% of its funding since the start of the decade – from a high of $32 million for the 2000-01 biennium, to $13 million currently. 

Once one of the most generous of state agencies, the OAC has seen its predominance in the field diminish significantly.  Cleveland’s organizations, as well as those across the state, have seen their funding cut three times in just the current allocation – and this, after grants were already awarded and the costs they support already incurred.  Few for-profit enterprises could continue to succeed with a business model this capricious. 

See my blogs of June 30, May 1 and February 3 this year for related comments.

So thank the gods of culture for CAC and the wisdom of the voters of Cuyahoga County.  Issue 18 has put Cleveland at the forefront of local communities in the U. S. that pro-actively support the arts; we are fifth in the level of local public support nationally.  But that does not change the fact that the arts world itself has been permanently altered in recent years.  Last week I discussed how we have seen the end of an unprecedented era of growth in traditional and historical aspects of arts and culture.  But the world shrinks daily and younger generations have very different views of what constitutes art and culture.  Things will never be the same and there is no going back.  If we are to see Cleveland’s cultural community thrive in the coming decades, it must re-invent itself in light of a permanently changed financial environment and a new global and demographic cultural reality.

So, welcome to Cleveland, Karen, and every best wish as you join in the conversation about how the arts will continue to stand as a critical pillar of Cleveland’s economy, its place as a center of creativity and as a re-invented, but still signature element in the region’s quality of life.

I’m an avid, daily reader of ArtsJournal, Douglas McLennan’s one-stop electronic newsletter that collects news and blogs from worldwide media and keeps me informed on relevant issues in the arts.  Today, the always interesting Andrew Taylor’s Artful Manager blog pulls together some thoughts on a rather scary but important topic: that the life and times of the last 50 years (1952 – 2000 or so) was an historical aberration in American life and that the arts enjoyed a period of ascendancy during this time that never was before and never will be again. 

Since most of us grew up and have lived our professional lives in this period, to think that what we knew will never again be, and that what we know will not, even cannot, provide guidance for dealing with a world changed by the recession, is worrisome, if not downright depressing.

If this notion that we have been living in an aberrant historical reality is true, what does this mean for the arts?  Indeed, what does it mean for all nonprofits and the philanthropic infrastructure on which they all depend? 

Business consultant Neill Archer Roan discusses a Harvard Review article, The Quest for Resilience by Gary Hamel and Liisa Valikangas.  Hamel and Valinkangas offer an observation about this ‘aberrant period’ that nonprofits would be well advised to consider.

“… successful organizations resist change and falter.  They deny warning signals.   Their success has taught them that they have good judgment, that their models of reality are coherent and accurate, that their strategic ‘gut’ is superior.  What they know obscures what they need to learn.”

For nearly all of the past five decades the arts and their funders have been obsessed with capacity-building – first for growth (called advancement and focused on improving artistic excellence) and more recently for sustainability – which also included expectations for advancement/growth; in audiences and in technological, professional management and financial capacities. 

Both funders and organizations have been dancing the dance of advancement for a long time.  But the world has changed.  If it will never again be the way it was, and all our lessons from the past cannot provide a guide to the future, how do we plan?  What do we need to learn?  What must we “un-learn” in order to approach the future with eyes open and a fresh and flexible attitude of what might be?

If advancement is not the expectation, what is?  Retreat?  Downsizing?  Popularizing?�
Or, rather than advancement, maybe the future holds expansion for the arts.  Expansion of a more global view of human culture.  Expansion into the realm of more active participation in the arts, rather than passive appreciation. Expansion of the value and role of creativity in business, education, politics and human affairs.  

It is clear that we go forward into a changed and unknown reality.  And when the future is unknown, one must make the effort to dream a new and better reality into existence.

Among the final sessions at this year’s Grantmakers in the Arts conference was a panel that included speakers from the Nonprofit Finance Fund, National Arts Strategies, and the Mellon, Boston and Doris Duke Foundations.  The uncertainly titled “One Step Back, 2 Steps Forward?” session took a pragmatic look at what new strategies funders are employing in response changing needs in the arts and how these new approaches will likely affect grantmaking in the future.

First, there was an overview of the current arts environment and what organizations were doing themselves.  In short, the arts are less healthy than other sectors and money for the arts disappeared first and faster than for human service nonprofits, with support from individuals being the first to go.

More specifically, the national overview aligned pretty well with what we see here.

• While 30% of organizations operated at 8% above break even during 2008-09, 56% of them expect a long term negative impact.
• 70% of organizations have prepared ‘worst case’ budgets for the future.
• 50% are asking funders to re-purpose grants already made for more flexibility.
• 50% have reduced staff
• Debt service is taking precedent over program support
• Reducing and/or shifting program focus has also created challenges
• Super-small groups are the least endangered as they have the greatest flexibility.
• Mid-sized organizations are at greatest risk.  Many cannot sustain the increased infrastructure they have built in recent years.
• Some of the largest organizations are in serious trouble due to heavy reliance on endowments which have been decimated.

None of this information was surprising or unexpected at this point in this “stressful economic retraction” as one panelist named it. 

(I’m going to get to the Fable part in a minute.  I promise.)

While there were some interesting new strategies being employed by funders, most of these emerged from intensive evaluations and a lengthy process of re-positioning.  These were not things that many foundations can immediately employ without their own study and planning processes.  

But during the conversation, Russell Willis Taylor, the witty and (as she might admit) acerbic head of National Arts Strategies referenced a “provocation” paper she had written for the Doris Duke Charitable Trust: The Grasshopper or the Ant.  The paper both
reinforced and challenged some sacred cow notions about the value of endowment gifts.  I commend it to any organization contemplating an endowment campaign.

Also on the NAS website is a terrific paper by National Arts Strategies Vice President Jim Rosenberg, about effective financial practices for arts organizations (with applicable information for other nonprofits as well). This paper also contains a terrific self-assessment framework for arts organizations.  NAS is happy to have this paper widely circulated and I hope you check it out.

Toil away, all you ants - and grasshoppers. �

This is a second posting from my experiences at this year’s Grantmakers in the Arts conference in Brooklyn, but I want to start it from an unusual place – a quote by our own Mayor Frank Jackson, overheard in a recent interview on Cleveland Public Radio: WCPN ideastream.  It’s probably the most brilliant and insightful thing I have ever heard the mayor say: “Cleveland needs to be where the world is going – not where the world is.”  Amen!

To paraphrase the quote, and to link it to an interesting plenary speech at the conference by pollster and author John Zogby, I would say: The arts need to be where the world is going – not where it is, or where it has been. 

To launch GIA’s 2009 “Recession Conference,” which most of us expected to be focused on the doom and gloom of the economy, Zogby painted a more positive scenario for the future based on his years of work looking at the meta-trends in American society.  Challenging the notion that we will never be able to change entrenched and destructive political and societal realities (think climate change, health care, obesity, etc.), he catalogued some remarkable changes that we have already made in relatively recent history: “We recycle, we stopped smoking, we stopped littering, we turn out the lights, we have begun to understand we are not the only ones on the planet.”

In his latest book, The Way We’ll Be, Zogby defined some new categories of consumers, and pointed out how the arts are much higher on the list of necessities for these groups. 

There’s the “First Globals” - cosmopolitan 18-30-somethings, 56% of whom have passports and think of themselves as citizens of the world.  They are cultural omnivores, not stuck in traditional ways of viewing or validating art and culture.

The “Secular Spiritualists” are likely to be older; people with experience who are redefining the American Dream as something far less possession-based.  These folks are  living longer and looking for ways to make meaning in the rest of their lives through authentic and creative experiences.

Among the lessons for the arts, in Zogby’s view are: Get’em young through social networking, and give them opportunities to participate, learn and explore their own creativity.

Among the lessons for the arts from Zogby, Mayor Jackson and the GIA conference itself are: Imagine a healthy arts community in a changed and changing world, and make the leap into the future.  Be where the world is going.
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I just returned from the annual Grantmakers in the Arts (GIA) conference in Brooklyn.  And as usual, I am so full of ideas and inspiration that it will probably take a couple of blog posts to get to all the stuff I want to share.  But if you want a blow-by-blow now, you can check out David Moss’ blog as he reported from the conference each day.

First, for fun, I took a few hours to walk to Manhattan across the Manhattan Bridge and back to Brooklyn on the Brooklyn Bridge - about four miles, round trip.  At one point on the Brooklyn Bridge, looking out across the water, I stopped precisely at a point where the Statue of Liberty was narrowly caught and framed between two buildings.  Had I stopped one step  further forward or back it would have been hidden from view.  Now that was a New York moment.

Second, for fun, while there is always a lot of art at these conferences (Wynton Marsalis and the Urban Bush Women performed for us this year) there is also a Late Night Cabaret at these conferences that is something unique and very special.  Most arts Grantmakers are artists themselves and many are performers and so we get together after the day’s meetings and dinners are done to perform for each other.  Highlight this year – a spot-on, screamin’ cover of Janis Joplin – feathered hair, stompin’ feet, Southern Comfort and all.  Piece of My Heart and Down on Me.  Amazing!  There were fabulous acapella jazz stylings, a little opera, folk guitar and banjo, and poems.  Who says conferences are no fun?

But the serious stuff was truly serious.  Billed as “The Recession Conference: Navigating the Art of Change,” GIA took on the recession with an attitude of opportunity.  Right off the bat, foundations were segmented by groups (corporate and community foundations, family and other private foundations, local and state public agencies), and asked to share the innovative steps we were taking in response to the recession. 

While this was an expected topic for sharing, we were also asked to imagine a healthy arts community in 2020 and describe what we would/could be doing to support that vision.  We were then asked what GIA could do to support our work toward this goal. GIA will use our responses to frame their advocacy and service planning and programming.

One thing was clear: under the leadership of its new Director, Janet Brown, GIA sees itself as an increasingly pro-active advocacy and policy organization. The new theme for the organization, stated often and proudly throughout the three-day conference, was that GIA will be LOUDER and BOLDER in support of the arts going forward.

So Tom Hanks was just here and Cleveland basked in the glow of his attention, charm, and the loyalty he maintains to his professional roots here at the Great Lakes Theater Festival. We are proud he got his start here back in the ‘70s and that pride is renewed whenever he gives generous praise for his time in our city during public appearances – which is often. 

But wait, what happened when he appeared on David Letterman the night after he left here?  It was a silly bit about “the Tom Button” that, when pressed, summoned him from wherever he was to appear and respond to the button-pusher’s needs.  So Tom rushes in and plops himself next to the late night host and asks what he wants.  When it is apparent that nothing is wanted and Dave pushed the button for fun, Tom responds mock-angrily, “Well I was just in Cleveland [uproarious audience laughter] doing a fundraiser …” 

Why the laughter?  Still.

I’ve heard that George Burns once said that words beginning with “K” sounds were just naturally funny.  So is it our curse, no matter what we do, how far we come from the days of bankruptcy and river conflagration, that our city’s name will always elicit laughter? 

Why isn’t PITTSburg funny?  A burg that’s the pits.  Maybe it is and the folks there wince at jibes and jokes at their expense just as much as we do.

I hate always being on the defensive; a constant apologist for my beloved city – don’t you?  Maybe it will take a couple of generations of folks coming from elsewhere to get past the knee-jerk guffaws at the mention of our name.  Or maybe we should change it?  Ohio City* sounds pretty good to me right now. 

* see my blog of February 25 this year for an interesting idea.

This past week the foundation was host to Helmo Hernandez, the president of the Ludwig Foundation of Cuba, one of only six charitable foundations in that country.  The Ludwig Foundation is dedicated to the support of contemporary art in Cuba and of the artists producing that work, and to advancing cultural exchanges. 

I was privileged to spend some time with Mr. Hernandez, showing him around a number of Cleveland’s cultural institutions.  A highlight of his visit was a lecture he gave at the Cleveland Institute of Art.  His lecture – basically a history of Cuban art – was revelatory.  There is so little we know of the culture of our tantalizingly close but forbidden neighbor. 

He suggested that the world should recognize a third governmental structure in addition to socialist and capitalist forms: 3rd World Revolutionary Government.  In these governments, he said, the art is necessarily revolutionary – abstract and avant garde.  The main role of the artist is to be part of the critical consciousness of society.  What blew my mind was the fact that Cuba has an established Cultural Ministry and the nation’s artists – complete with their critical focus on society – are political heroes. 

The work of the contemporary Cuban artists that we saw in Mr. Hernandez’ slides can stand proudly alongside the best artists anywhere.  The cultural exchanges with other nations (but not the U.S.) are impressive and vigorous.

But while the art scene in Cuba is vibrant and competitive with the best contemporary culture anywhere, the nation itself remains desperately poor.  Cuba is now in what they call a Special Period – “We have lost the support of the Soviet era, and the American embargo still keeps us isolated.  We are alone at last,” said Mr. Hernandez.  “Life has stopped in Cuba.  We have to think about how to survive, and so we are changing all the time.” 

The last slides he showed were, at first confusing – glass Coke bottles with the top half cut off.  And a wine glass made of parts of two glass bottles cut and joined together to make the cup and the stem of the glass.  He explained that, because of the embargo, Cuba cannot import basic needs – like water glasses and so people must make their own by recycling existing material.  Broken refrigerators become bookshelves, for example. 

And, although they have no wine, people make wine glasses, if only as a symbol.  “Because,’ he said, “we deserve wine.  We have creativity, courage and intelligence.  But the most important thing for us to remember is dignity.”