I Wanna Be Curator/ instigate! 5

Phoebe Washburn

vs.

Leslie Mutchler

This was going to be a melee of Henrique Oliveira, el Anatsui and Phoebe Washburn because of Texas connections earlier this year. But I changed my mind at the last minute.

I’ll tell you ’bout what I sees.

When I Was Your Age…

… you could actually get an education from public schools.

During Thanksgiving dinner I got into a discussion about education. I mentioned the righteous return of auto shop and cosmetology to high school curriculum in Austin and received a history lesson on New Math and how useless it was to a whole generation of students/emerging workforce in the 70s. Of course this lead to talk of No Child Left Behind and the unfortunate practice of “teaching to the (TAKS) test.”

I took the opportunity to point to our understanding of how babies learn and grow through experience and trial & error. Why is it that our understanding of how we, as human beings, learn is ignored and we use a compulsory 19th century system rooted in creating a workforce for the ever disappearing manufacturing industry? The arts (& PE) are essential opportunities in allowing for the application of basic reading, writing and math. Our experiences color our perception of the world. Maybe it’ll take playing music and keeping the beat to understand arithmetic? Maybe it’ll take playing Rosencrantz to understand tone in writing? Maybe it’ll take building a paper sculpture to understand physics?
(Why yes, I do agree with Sir Ken Robinson)

Coincidentally, this shows up in my inbox this weekend…

Fellow arts supporters,

The AISD Strategic Plan that will guide Austin students’ education for the next five years is up for discussion by the school board this Monday, with a vote likely December on 14th.

The current draft still lacks language strongly supporting Fine Arts instruction as part of a strong core curriculum for every student. For AISD purposes, Fine Arts includes music, choir, theater, dance, visual and digital arts.

To ensure the arts are strongly represented in the Strategic Plan, district staff and the AISD Board need to hear from every one of us.

Please take a moment and go to this link:
http://www.austinisd.org/inside/initiatives/strategic_plan/
Click on the Online Survey and in the top box, copy in this message:

Please the revise the draft language of Action Step 1.10 to read as follows:
“1.10. Increase access and support for high quality Fine Arts instruction as part of a strong core academic curriculum for all students.”

Then please email the Superintendent and AISD Board with the same message at the below addresses:

trustees@austinisd.org, superintendent@austinisd.org

Time is of the essence. Thanks for taking a moment to speak up for the arts in education today!

For more information, please contact Susan Moffat, Co-Chair, Friends of the McCallum Fine Arts Academy, at barbaro@bga.com

________________________________________________

Supporting Research
1. A 10-year University of California study involving over 25,000 secondary students found that students with consistent involvement in the arts performed at significantly higher levels on all academic measures than those who did not take fine arts courses.
www.aems-edu.org/researchBrochure.pdf
2. Arts education has a measurable impact on at-risk youth in deterring delinquent behavior and truancy problems while increasing overall academic achievement. (YouthARTS Development Project, 1996, U.S. Department of Justice, National Endowment for the Arts, and Americans for the Arts).
3. Students of the arts regularly outperform their non-arts peers on the SAT by 39 to 56 points, according to the College Board. SAT scores continued to increase for each additional year of fine arts study.
http://www.menc.org/information/advocate/sat.html
4. A recent study by the Texas Cultural Trust, 20 Reasons the Texas Economy Depends on the Arts and the Creative Sector, called the creative sector “the hidden power behind the economy.” In the section titled, “Why Texas Needs to Support the Creative Arts in the Schools,” the report highlighted the comparative advantage of teaching these core academic skills and their demonstrated impact on economic growth and human capital development.
http://createtexas.org/downloads/tct_20-reasonsrevised.pdf
5. Texas Speaker of the House of Representatives recently highlighted a survey of 400 of America’s top employers that called for a more creative workforce. The report concluded, ” …employers rank arts study and experience in performing arts and entertainment as the top factors for instilling creativity in the workforce.”
Ready to Innovate: Are Educators and Executives Aligned on the Creative Readiness of the U.S. Workforce?
www.arts.state.tx.us/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=279&Itemid=16
6. The Dana Foundation recently released new studies linking arts instruction, the brain and learning.
www.dana.org/artseducation.aspx
7. In an August letter to America’s schools and education leaders, U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan stated: “At this time when you are making critical and far-reaching budget and program decisions for the upcoming school year, I write to bring to your attention the importance of the arts as a core academic subject and part of a complete education for all students.” Secretary Duncan went on to say that the most recent NAEP report card suggests greater focus and funding should be directed to the growing deficits in arts education.
www.ed.gov/news/pressreleases/2009/08/08182009a.pdf

I’ll tell you ’bout what I sees.

Quick Hits This Weekend

After EAST there is:

• Blue Genie Art Bazaar Dec 3-24
• Thornton Road Studios Holiday Art Show Dec 5 & 6
• Travis Heights Art Trail Dec 5 & 6
• Young Artists @ Arthouse Exhibition @ SVT Gallery Dec 6, 5-7p
  (these youngins make great work!)

I’ll tell you ’bout what I sees

I Got What I Got

Last night there was a gathering.

Some things were said. I don’t really remember what. My peanut brain was working overtime trying to orchestrate the flow of ideas.
But its okay because I recorded the conversation. I’ll write up a report and share it ASAP.

I’ve been getting messages from partcipants. I think I need to have more focused discussion(s) next. Maybe a series. We’ll sees.

I’ll tell you ’bout what I sees.

Yakkety Yarkitecture

As I prepare to get ready for the Houston edition of [artcrush] (opens Nov 14 at Box 13!) I come across this review of Didier Fiuza Faustino (btw, thank you Frieze for releasing all your articles) asking “Why do architects want to be considered artists?”
Then, I’ve been following BLDGBLOG for a bit to educate myself on architecture, I come across a response to “Who would want to be an architect?“

Next week TODAY Women and Their Work are hosting an Architecure and Desire Panel to accompany Erin Curtis’ Perspective Threshold

At the same time, Austin Museum of Art is doing a slide lecture on Chuck Close

At UT this weekend there is a conference: Transnational Latin American Art. Its too late to register, but I wonder what they’re gonna talk about.

I’ll tell you ’bout what I sees.

Time Is Running Out

Some deadlines I thought you might want to know about:

• NYFA is conducting a seminar at AMOA tomorrow night! Oct 14 7pm RSVP
• Box13 Artspace in Houston proposal deadline: Oct 16
• UTSA Satellite Space in San Antonio proposal deadline: Oct 26
• Idea Fund: deadline Oct 30
• Art Alliance Austin Call for Submissions – Temporary Outdoor Installations: Nov 2
• Creative Research Laboratory Call for Entries deadline: Nov 23
• Hunting Prize: deadline Nov 30

I’ll tell you ’bout what I sees.

National Summit On Arts Journalism

I don’t know what happened with the stream. I thought I had it covered with my little work-around with vodpod, but I guess not.
You can find the archived stream here.

I’m glad I had the opportunity to hang out with other Austin arts writers graciously hosted by Claire Ruud and Fluent Collaborative.
I discovered a kinship that I wasn’t aware of. But it is a kinship found in confusion, grief and frustration.
Awwwww shit, I feel a multi-post rant comin’ on.
Let me start at the beginning.
A couple of months ago NAJP summit announced its competition. With prize$ attached, my intere$t was piqued. But I haven’t been as productive as I’d like. Even with productivity at levels of my heyday, I don’t think I would’ve applied. The page is down now since the event has come to pass, but they were looking for “sustainable” projects, “looking for viability, both as a business and as a journalistic enterprise.” But when they said they are looking for new models for art journalism, I wasn’t thinking new business models, I thought they were after relevant distribution and delivery systems of cultural coverage. You know something other than ye olde newspaper with hand-cranked website.

Along those lines, I was excited for Bad at Sports and Giant Robot. They both represent different models that have found success. But I wasn’t expecting Bad at Sports to get far since they didn’t have a sustainable business plan in their crew of volunteers and donation solicitations. I clearly remember discouraging text as they were looking for NEW models and giggling at the number of submissions with no mention of business model or combo of volunteer and donations.
So as hard as NAJP tries to spin it, the rules were indeed changed.
CONFUSION!
But I wasn’t as put out by these shufflings as others were and decided to watch the summit. After all, Artsjournal has done a decent job of creating a platform for art journalism.

…

I Wanna Be Curator/ Curatorial Idol 5

I know I owe you some words. A lot of words.
I haven’t even worked on this, which has been brewing for almost 2 years. I wanted to post this back in August. I’ll try to update with the format I’ve been using, but for now I’m gonna ask you to do some leg work and check their websites.

“Pigeonhole” or “What is it exactly?”

Jenene Nagy
Mark Creegan
Nancy White

I’ll tell you ’bout what I sees.

We’ve Got Spirit…

Yes we do.
We’ve got spirit,
How ’bout you?

I proclaim a challenge. An opportunity if you will, for schools surrounding the University of Texas at Austin.

Ya see, Austin is regarded as a friendly town. For the most part this is true (although I feel this has begun to erode) and plenty of organizations rely on volunteer workers to conduct their large scale events (see First Night Austin and Art City Austin as two art examples). Thanks to Dan Boehl and …might be good I’ve been paying more attention to these volunteer-heavy visiting artists’ projects.  The cited Jim Drain for the Blanton, Liz Glynn at Arthouse this weekend and Pablo Vargas Lugo for the Blanton. This latest project needs 350 volunteers to conduct the project and they are still looking for help.

I’ve been listening to football fans complaining about the weak schedule the Longhorns have this year and how easy victory should come.
Howzabout some competition?

Are you a student or representative of St. Edwards University, Austin Community College, Southwestern University, Concordia University, Huston-Tillotson University or Texas State University? Why not come out in droves and show the UT community how art is supposed to be supported?
While we’re at it, why not have UMHB, Temple, TLU, UIW, OLLU, Trinity, UTSA, A&M come on down?

Hell, if Houston can represent at Nohegan, surely Rice or U of H can bus somebodies over?

To volunteer send an email to eclipsesforaustin@gmail.com

CHALLAAANGE!

I’ll tell you ’bout what I sees.

[speaking very slowly] In… what… way…

In 1930, the Republican-controlled House of Representatives, in an effort to alleviate the effects of the… Anyone? Anyone?… the Great Depression, passed the… Anyone? Anyone? The tariff bill? The Hawley-Smoot Tariff Act? Which, anyone? Raised or lowered?… raised tariffs, in an effort to collect more revenue for the federal government. Did it work? Anyone? Anyone know the effects? It did not work, and the United States sank deeper into the Great Depression. Today we have a similar debate over this. Anyone know what this is? Class? Anyone? Anyone? Anyone seen this before? The Laffer Curve. Anyone know what this says? It says that at this point on the revenue curve, you will get exactly the same amount of revenue as at this point. This is very controversial. Does anyone know what Vice President Bush called this in 1980? Anyone? Something-d-o-o economics. “Voodoo” economics.

Whoo-weeee!
Besides all the new shows opening this fall, each institution is hosting lectures!

• AMOA
• Arthouse
• Blanton -1 -2 -3
• Mexic-Arte
• Umlauf
• UT

I’ll update calendars soon and tell you ’bout what I sees.