The Cuyahoga County Cultural Arts Roundtable (CCCAR) representing "the" arts community has been in existence over a year, meeting every month to discuss the once-impending arts levy, which had been attached to the now-deceased convention center issue. However, they inherited a sense of immutability and solidarity at the Cleveland Playhouse in July, during the fight for parity this summer when the group actually took a vote on how to respond to the measly 15% share of proposed public funding. There is the Arts and Culture Coalition (ACC), Creative Cleveland Coalition (C3), Cool Cleveland, Nia Arts Advocates (NAA), The African-American Community Arts Committee (AACAC?), and others. It seems that soon we will have more groups and initials raised up around here than protestant denominations. This is a good thing according to Julie Adrianopolis of Community Partnership for Arts and Culture (CPAC). Groups forming to participate in this organizing and planning process are better than inaction. True that. The difference being as of yet there is no Godhead, doctrine or vision that the community has taken to heart to bind us together. Believe me, "Mo' Money, Mo' Money, Mo' Money " is neither vision, nor doctrine, nor Godhead to believe in. It is also evident that several groups with the same agenda don't know of each other's existence.
My money is on business as usual even with public funding if a fundamental shift in thinking doesn't occur about how we in the arts community relate to the rest of the world and each other. Cleveland with its diversity, talent, resources and high visibility must set the standard.
Why are we, the arts community, here, and who are we? The arts community and some of the "Johnny Come Latelies" paint a picture of stratified, elitist, race conscious, "let me get mine" or "let me keep mine" fiefdoms just like any other community if not more so. Even though I slammed Dennis Eckhart and the Cleveland Growth Association this past August, I have a feeling they have nothing on us. So all of the things that "go without saying," we better start saying them.
Say what? The arts community is not separate from the greater community as much as set apart. Not privileged and owed as much as servant-leader by proxy because no others are up for the task. Not down trodden as much as sacrificial lamb. Artists throughout the ages have been revered and rejected in one breath so why should we be different? By nature we are in this world but not of it. Say amen somebody.
The executive director of Sankofa Fine Arts Plus was relating to me a meeting she facilitated in which a local artist was making his case to get a commission. After his portfolio review he pulled out a Kalimba (African thumb piano) and as part of his presentation started to play it. If you have been in the arts any length of time this is just par for the course and you think nothing of it. You might even give "authentic artist points" for this. If you are a corporate business type or a corporate arts type you've just identified who you want to have a 100 ft restraining order against just for "general purposes", because obviously he is "NOK- Not Our Kind." We are not of this world though many of us have learned to mask it well. Could NOK mentality be responsible for the deluge of groups coming into being?
I had breakfast with Tom Schorgl of CPAC recently and posed the question, "If there was no chance in hell for public arts funding, what should the arts community be doing?"
My question wasn't suggesting that as a possibility and in fact Tom was so adamant that the prospects for funding are good he could barely wrap his mind around the hypothetical question. I was asking if a school of hard knocks arts education didn't lead to more pay for organizations and individuals, where should this frenzy of activity be leading?
Half way through Arts Organizing 101 we have learned if we organize they will come. The county commissioners will come to our meetings. We have a voice. The old guard business community will come to realize business as usual isn't as easy as it used to be. We have power and this is a new day in Cleveland. People in other arenas like Health and Human Services will come to build alliances. We have resources that can be channeled.
What else is there to learn? That everybody is better off with dialogue, networking and evangelism. The business community in many quarters seems very willing to enter into mutually beneficial partnerships with the arts but apparently lack the wherewithal to enter into a new paradigm for such a relationship.
And then there is dialogue with the Council of Smaller Enterprises (C.O.S.E.) whose leadership has more than shown they want to integrate themselves with the arts, offering insurance for artist and grants opportunities. Steve Millard and C.O.S.E. will be the new breed of business thinking in this region.
Let's go back to our summit results, our original dialogue session and raise a mantra. What were those quantitative and qualitative gaps that can be filled by defining us and finding common ground between the arts, private sector and public sector? How does the arts community best dialogue with, work with area CDC's (Community Development Corporations)? How do we continue to work with developers and City Council in developing live-work spaces and other policy to create that (with few exceptions) elusive creative district. How do we become the top Artists' City... funding or no funding? Clearly funding will help whittle down the competitive advantage held by just about every other major city in our league and give us a great boost. However, do we not need to be good stewards over existing resources? Are we good stewards by gathering all of our marbles together and not trading and sharing?
Within the arts and culture sector artists work okay with new organizations but the relationship between these two groups and traditional organizations is somewhat weaker. That needs to be worked on. Last week's interview with Sequoia Versillee pointed out that she felt no particular tie to the Cleveland Museum of Art, though she attended the Cleveland Institute of Art directly across the street and frequently visited the Museum as a student. The interview also brought to light that as an artist, she had expectations of this institution. Fill in the blank: felt no particular tie to __________________.
Now let's go one step further and fill in the blank with a new organization on one end and a traditional organization on the other. I am not suggesting the museum is or is not at fault. I am saying a situation exists or is widely perceived and why aren't we addressing it so we can at least live up to the word "community?" Nuff said.
Dialogue. On one of the 4 of 5 listservs I belong to, one of the members was pretty irritated at Cleveland Public Art over a perceived behind-closed-doors move. So spitting this out on your listserv is O.K., but what is better is making sure CPA hears it and expecting a response. They would now he in a position to respond to you, your listserv and its "six degrees of separation." Yo, that's a lot of folks and a great platform.
A local writer blasts a small group of "experts" over an off-the-shelf Jim Dine sculpture raising the ire of many at the courthouse. Well hell, that's what writers do, but I can't help thinking that that could have been me on that team doing my best and just plain missing the boat. Where is the accountability? Where is the faith? If there had been faith in the team that they did their best, the writer might have slammed the process whereby they were selected instead of attacking their credentials and short sightedness of the selection team.
In other arenas so far we are neither holding ourselves nor others accountable for proselytizing and the flavor of the day is, once again, we dismiss you because you are NOK. It is expressed not in action, but rather inaction. Not in sharp comments or insults (that would be refreshing) but in polite smiles that hides NOK agendas.
We pay our $25 to see "high art" but we want nothing to do with the root that created it. Others of us gladly collect the $25 on the other end and summarily reject and pimp those people who are the embodiments of the process that created the product. Yeah, I feel ya. They are fair game because they are NOK because they whip out a Kalimba, or make it look easy, or don't have a business, or are Shudra and not Brahman, etc. Repeat after me... God complex. Indeed, if the culture some admire from afar was alive and well and living across the street, it is evident the tolerance and acceptance would drop to near zero. I know that some of this NOK attitude is the unlimited need vs. limited resources thing. I also know situations in which the sum of the parts is greater than the whole more than abound and would benefit us all.
This NOK attitude swings bottom to top, left to right, and from deepest darkest chocolate to the other end of the attitudinal spectrum. It causes people who consider themselves on the bottom of the rung to take shots at the top of the food chain and never get their message to its target.
COMMUNICATION. Last week when I was considering crashing a reception for Terri Hamilton Brown hosted by the African-American Community Arts Committee I called around to see exactly who this group was. The Ph.D. who invited me, who by the way, isn't in the arts or business or politics didn't know. I called a member of the "Friends of African and African-American Art" at the Cleveland Museum of Art, Sankofa Fine Arts Plus, several artists and arts folks. None of them had heard of this group. So now there are 3 or four groups initiated by Black folk who haven't connected. I'm using this group as an example of rampant non-communication in the arts. If you are wondering why I am not addressing that groups would gather under this African American banner you may be the one whose "best friend is Black" and the only person of Color you really know. Though most of these groups espouse diversity and inclusiveness and mean it, I say what an absolute travesty they are still necessary, in the arts and needing to address issues of parity and representation. What a tribute this is to the NOK god in Cleveland. Hopefully you're still reading. There are many in the community who get it. They are white collar conservatives who can fly to L.A. for lunch and a movie; dancers, musicians some whom barely have their feet on the ground others who are so left-brained we are in awe of their inspired creativity; there are arts administrators and yes entire organizations who get it. I speak to them once again. The things that "go without saying", we better start saying them.
"White-collar conservatives flashing down the street Pointing their plastic finger at me. They're hoping soon my kind will drop and die, But I'm gonna wave my freak flag high . . . HIGH!" -Jimi Hendrix
White collar conservatives, wave your freak flag too. Bring it to the gathering. Let's stage a coup. We will buy the fishes and you bring the bread. Nourish this sickly art scene back from near dead.
from Cool Cleveland Contributor Cavana Faithwalker (:divend:)