Critical Correspondence

MRPJ#26/The Model?: Extras

If I could imagine a different system, it would be for presenters to see their spaces and programs as cultural centers, where the creation of work is also supported and respected; where one looks holistically at what the field and the community can gain from their active involvement in contextualizing, supporting and advocating for performing arts on any number of levels. There is a passivity that I see a lot at APAP (not NPN), where this is still considered a “marketplace” and not a quest to become the best curator and arts animator that you can be. I think APAP is just starting to grapple with how to raise the professionalism of presenters and rethink the field at large as an arts ecology that we all need to sustain. NPN has always reflected this approach and has developed set of values that are artist-positive and see the blurring of roles artist/presenter/manager/producer, etc. Both need to be more active on pursuing equity between artists and presenters, we have lost so much ground in the past 5 to 10 years in this. I see the field retreating with the contraction of funding resources and not having consistent venues to discuss cultural policy, etc. — Loris Bradley in interview

The reason that I can’t lay this out as a model is that a lot of people have different reasons for doing the work they do. A lot of people aren’t really clear about what their reasons are, but I feel fundamental about mine: I’m interested in the aesthetic of the artists that I work with and I’m intrigued by my personal relationship with each of the artists that I work with. Out of that relationship has to develop an understanding of where the artist is coming from and how we can develop something together. (…) That’s one of the key things that we have to consider with this current climate and what’s happening politically, not any time in the near future in this country will this be a viable middle class lifestyle. That has to be at the core of your commitment to what you’re doing across the board. If you’re working at a presenting organization, and you’re a little higher up in the structure that’s viable. If you’re working at a funding organization that’s completely viable, but if you are working on the artists’ side, it’s not really viable right now unless you decide to be a booking agent, and going into that area brings up a whole lot of questions for me. — Barbara Bryan in interview