[Dixielandjazz] The Arts Admoinistration

[Steve barbone]

We often hear the bad news, that the arts are suffering because of budget
cuts etc., etc., etc. Below are excerpts from an article about an Arts
Renaissance in New York City. Left coasters might do well to send the
complete article to their Movie Star Governor as an educational piece.
Cutting funds? That's OK, just make them up, PLUS, from personal donations
from YOUR and others fortunes who came about because of "The Arts".

The entire article is Very long, this is about 1/4 of it edited for brevity
and content. Note especially the view that "Art is good business" and pass
it on the the Philistines who run politics in your area.

Cheers,
Steve


The Arts Administration

By JENNIFER STEINHAUER - October 23, 2005 - NY TIMES

MAYOR Michael R. Bloomberg is not wildly fond of looking at art.

This should not insult anyone. Spectating is just not his thing.  .  .  .
Television? Movies? Concerts? Happenings? Never, rarely (unless they feature
Will Ferrell), reluctantly and not on purpose.  .  .  .

But in the most striking paradox of his mayoralty, his administration has
done more to promote and support the arts than any in a generation. Under
Mr. Bloomberg, public art has flourished in every corner of the city .  .  .

Mr. Bloomberg doles out city arts awards, and holds quiet dinners for
less-endowed arts institutions, where he woos potential donors and board
members over cocktails and burgers. He has donated millions of dollars from
his own fortune to various art groups. .  .

The mayor's arts agenda has infused policy-making throughout the municipal
government. The administration has created the first public school arts
curriculum in a generation . . .

Beyond that, Mr. Bloomberg knows, art brings in tourists and deep-pocketed
sophisticates.  .  . Art, in short, is good business

"It's not about personal aesthetics," said Patricia E. Harris, Mr.
Bloomberg's closest aide and the force behind much of his art agenda. "I
think it is very pragmatic." .  .  . Even the grating hold music at the City
Hall switchboard was replaced by Wynton Marsalis performing with the Lincoln
Center Jazz Orchestra.  .  .

The larger city was brought in on the change, as public artworks began
popping up all over the five boroughs with the Bloomberg administration's
direct help. What was going on here?

Then, word leaked out about something that gets every New Yorker's
attention: large sums of money. It was disclosed that Mr. Bloomberg had
given $10 million of his own money to the Carnegie Corporation to benefit
162 small and medium-size cultural institutions around the city, in awards
ranging from $25,000 to $100,000. (The mayor has repeated this gesture three
times; the latest gift was $20 million.)

The donation blunted criticism about his budget-cutting. But it also sealed
the view that he was friendly to the arts. "The Carnegie gift was very
smart," said Gabriella de Ferrari, an New York art critic and curator. "He
is there for the art world. And remember, some of the things we do are not
exactly uncontroversial."

That, it seems, is part of the appeal.  .  .

As a board member of Lincoln Center in 1999, Mr. Bloomberg used his largess
and lobbying to get "The Peony Pavilion," a 20-hour classic Chinese opera,
to New York after officials in Shanghai refused to allow the performers to
leave China. 

Mr. Bloomberg attends Broadway shows because that is what mayors do, but has
been overheard more than once complaining about it - don't get him started
on "Hairspray." "He is more into participation than observation," said his
spokesman, Edward Skyler. "That is just the way he is. He would rather be
running than watching sports. He would rather be learning Spanish than
watching a movie. He would rather be making policy than listening to
speeches." .  .  .

Ms. Harris, who oversaw Mr. Bloomberg's philanthropy at his company, is the
city's unofficial curator .  .  .  Her development of a mandated arts
curriculum for public school students is the first of its kind since the
city gutted arts education during the 1970's fiscal crisis.

Ms. Levin is also working with the city agency that preserves and develops
housing on a program to address the long-standing problem of artists who are
being priced out of the neighborhoods they help gentrify.