Archive: Posts about The Arts
February 17th, 2009, 14 Comments »
I’m giving a talk at Northern Voice this year entitled From Permalink to Profound: Where is the Art in Social Media? Here’s the blurb:
When an artist considers a blank canvas, she dreams of painting something beautiful.
When a blogger looks at a blank WordPress form, or a YouTube user stares at his own image in a webcam, he dreams of describing his lunch.
What are the most popular works that arise from social media? Sex tapes, silly dances, essays on open source software and renditions of Pachelbel’s Canon on electric guitar. They’re sleight of hand or stupid pet tricks, not profound art.
Social media seems to discourage the profound. Why is that? Where is the art in blogging or Twitter or Facebook? Can we create works of deep meaning and lasting achievement in social media?
That’s a big fish to fry in forty minutes, but I’m hoping we can have a conversation about lasting human creation and the social web. I’ve been using the Northern Voice wiki to assemble some of my thoughts and take a shot at my thesis.
If you’re interested, I encourage you to read over what I’ve done so far, and edit, add, disagree, suggest and otherwise contribute in the comments here or over there on the wiki.
To summarize, the central question I’m struggling to answer is something like this: who is making the lasting, universal, profound works of art on the social web?
14 Comments »
November 20th, 2008, 8 Comments »
The Belfry Theatre is, in my view, the best producer of mainstream theatre in the province. They’re more consistent than The Arts Club or The Vancouver Playhouse, and yet they take more risks with the play choices.
Yesterday I got a media release from the Belfry, summarizing their AGM and reporting on their last year’s work. It reminded me that they’re also currently one of the most financially stable and successful theatres that I know of.
They have an huge subscriber base of 6700 people for a theatre that only seats 277. Their average attendance for their mainstage shows last season was a mind-boggling 92%. They recently extended their production runs from four to five weeks when many Canadian theatres are reducing theirs to three.
I’ve always been an keen observer of arts funding and economics, and so was interested to see where the Belfry got its money from. And, as regular readers know, I love a chart. I produced a couple. The first shows where the Belfry’s revenue comes from:
The second shows the blue chunk of the big pie–private fundraising:
I asked Mark Dusseault at the Belfry about why ‘gaming money’, funding from BC Lottery Corporation, is under ‘private fundraising’. He explained that there were various reasons: government accounting practice, no peer review process and the way the money used to be doled out.
When gaming was originally set up we (staff and volunteers from the theatre) had to go and work the events. We spent a couple of days a year either at a bingo parlour or casino. We were, in essence, fundraising. We had to apply to participate and there was no guarantee as to how much money we would make (or lose).
I actually remember doing this once at a casino for some Vancouver theatre company.
The green slice is public money from sundry agencies: Canada Council for the Arts, CRD Arts Development and BC Cultural Services are the biggest contributors. Their entire budget is about $2.3 this year.
Where Does the Money Go?
I suppose the other question is how is that money spent?
I don’t have any great insights into these numbers. I just wanted to explore them a little, and make pretty charts. Do you have any insights?
8 Comments »
November 17th, 2008, 2 Comments »
Last week we had the good fortune to be invited to the opening night of “Brilliant”, an Electric Company show (there’s a company that deserves a Wikipedia entry) playing at the Belfry. Here’s the blurb:
Brilliant! The Blinding Enlightenment of Nikola Tesla is an explosive, extradimensional and alarmingly theatrical exploration of one of the most formidable inventing minds of the past one hundred years.
The story, set in turn of the century New York, chronicles the career of Nikola Tesla, the inventor of alternating current, whose work in the field of electricity ushered-in the modern age.
The show was terrific. It’s the second Electric Company show I’ve seen, and they produce what feels like the most contemporary kind of theatre. It’s lively and detailed and a little provocative. The company draws on all the tools at its disposal–dance, song, gorgeous projections, clever staging–to render a satisfying if ephemeral vision of Tesla’s life. The show was exceptionally well-rehearsed, and the performances, staging and technical aspects were all a delight to watch.
In one scene, Tesla and Edison have a kind of singing and dancing duel at the World’s Fair. In another, Tesla walks among human-sized pigeons whose physicality is extraordinarily bird-like. The piece de resistance is a hilarious rendering of what early film looks like–all silent, flickering and performed at about double speed.
Plenty of Telling, Too Little Showing
One side effect of all this on-stage action is that the few ‘regular’ scenes feel banal and talky. This is probably reinforced by the play’s portrait of Tesla as an hermitic automaton. Very little character gets revealed–nobody really undergoes a change, in the classic dramatic sense. Two supporting characters thus feel pretty moot. In truth, I’d be happy to dispense with them, so that we just experience the dream-like story and stage magic for 90 minutes.
I also wanted a clearer explanation of Tesla’s inventions. The play takes pains to tell us just how extraordinary and ingenious the man was, but pretty much fails at showing us what he did. There’s plenty of talk about alternating current and direct current (wondering illustrated, I might add, with Slinkies), but nobody establishes why one is better. There’s passing mention of other inventions, but we’re mostly expected to take Tesla’s genius as a given. I’m not disputing that genius. But I do think it’s the play’s burden to explain it clearly.
My final complaint is that “Brilliant” was strikingly similar to “Studies in Motion: the Hauntings of Eadweard Muybridge” (I wrote a short post about it two years ago). That’s not surprising. They’re both biographical studies of difficult, creative inventors working in the first half of the twentieth century.
All of these are minor criticisms. “Brilliant” has already played in Vancouver (though I gather the Belfry’s is a ‘revamped’ production). But if you get a chance to catch the show, I heartily recommend it.
Alas, the Nerd Bias Reigns Supreme
Incidentally, Tesla’s Wikipedia entry is proof that the online encyclopedia has not beat the nerd bias. I checked a bunch of other Wikipedia entries for towering figures–Ghandi, Mandela, Picasso among others–of the 20th century. Not one of them had an entry as long as Tesla’s.
Disclosures regarding my relationship with the Belfry: I just figured I’d take a shot at this. Let’s see…in my final year of university, I did an independent theatre history study course and wrote a history of the Belfry Theatre. So, you know, I’ve always felt a little indebted. I have written a couple short pieces that, years ago, were presented in the studio theatre there (also, indebted). I have friends and colleagues amongst the Belfry’s artistic staff. Our tickets to the show were comped, because Julie and I have done a very little ad hoc consulting for the Belfry. We seriously considered the Belfry as a venue for our wedding…the list goes on and on.
2 Comments »
October 10th, 2008, 3 Comments »
Back in August, I mentioned the Conservative government’s cuts to arts programs, and their controversial grab for greater control over funding for film and TV production.
In roughly $5 billion worth of programs spending, Prime Minister Harper’s $45 million cuts feels like a rounding error. Did they hope to make the cuts quietly, or make a bold statement about tightening belts and, maybe, cultural funding? I’m not sure, but it feels like the issue broke the wrong way. Arts funding became an unexpectedly prominent issue in the campaign, providing fodder for the opposition Plus, the move may have provoked some previously apathetic non-voters to action.
As the Globe and Mail reports, Prime Minister Harper has repealed the problematic clause in Bill C-10. It feels like damage control:
The Conservative Leader’s about-face comes as Tory hopes of a majority fade, and support for the party is sagging in the crucial battlegrounds of Quebec and Ontario.
The move appears to be aimed at appeasing voters incensed at the provision in C-10, and at the nearly $45-million in recent cuts to a swath of other arts and culture programs.
The Globe also notes that all four opposition parties have promised to reinstate the $45 million in cuts.
3 Comments »
October 2nd, 2008, 1 Comment »
Former classmate, founder of Theatre Skam and occasional reader of this blog, Amiel Gladstone, has adapted and directed Chekov’s classic “Three Sisters” in a new production entitled “My Three Sisters”, running this week at the Metro Studio.
I saw the show last night and it had the pacey energy and unpredictability that I’ve come to associate with Skam productions. Ami has (mercifully) reduced the typical three-hour Chekov to a mere 85 or 90 minutes. In doing so, I think he’s shaved a lot of scenes down to their essence. The result is more energetic and dreamlike production than I’d usually associate with Chekov’s work. The play has always had an ephemeral quality for me, and Ami’s direction makes it all the more surreal. A cake (yep, it’s a lie) hangs suspended over the corner of the stage. One of the leads plays the ukelele. The three sisters-looking like lost brides–glide across the stage in blousey, satiny white dresses.
You can’t go wrong adding a few songs to a play, and Ami’s got the cast singing blue-grassy tunes by the likes of Neko Case and Veda Hille (who seems to be a fairly regular blogger). Combine this with the white dresses, surreal undertones and warm hues in the lighting and set, and the whole production reminded me a bit of Oh Brother, Where Are Thou?
The cast is terrific–they’re a wonderful, talented ensemble. But here’s the best part: the three sisters of the play’s title? They’re actually played by three sisters. The Stubel sisters are all performers (here’s a profile from the Georgia Straight on the youngest), and it’s a rare pleasure to watch their natural sisterly chemistry on-stage. One of the sisters, Camille, is actually eight months pregnant. So that adds an extra frisson of danger to the entire affair.
It’s rare that I’d recommend Chekov, but there’s too much to like about Skam’s production.
1 Comment »
September 18th, 2008, 3 Comments »
As you’re probably aware, New York’s Metropolitan Opera has been showing live broadcasts of their performances in cinemas around the world. The newish GM of The Met, Peter Gelb, launched this audacious program in 2006, and it’s been wildly successful. According to Wikipedia, by the end of the 2007 season, nearly a million people attended the screenings, generating $13.3 million from North America and $5 million from overseas. Apparently they plan to expand by another 30% for the 2008-2009 season.
I’m not a fan of opera, but the screenings are reportedly a joy to watch. From Peter Conrad in The Observer:
I remained sceptical until I saw the relay of The Barber of Seville in March. Bartlett Sher’s production of Rossini’s opera is a whirligig of sliding walls and speeding carts; characters scramble up ladders or vault on to sofas, juggle oranges and sashay through impromptu flamenco routines.
Watching it in the cinema was like having not just the best seat at the Met but all the best seats simultaneously. Thirteen cameras alternated between the stage, the orchestra pit, the wings and even the fly tower, so my eyes felt as if they were attached to irrepressible pogo sticks.
A while back, I watched an interview with Gelb in which he discusses The Met’s declining audience, and the new life his idea has brought to the company (and, I suspect, the genre as a whole).
Even in Victoria
I was reminded of The Met’s innovation yesterday when we visited our local multiplex. We saw “Burn After Reading”, which is a good, not great, Coen brothers film (and it features one of Brad Pitt’s worst performances).
On the way in, I noticed this sign advertising The Met’s simulcast season. The season runs through next May, and all but two shows are sold out:
Ironically, one of the two shows that’s not sold out is the one I’d be likeliest to see: Dr. Atomic. I heard an interview with composer John Adams, and it sounded kind of fascinating.
In any case, The Met’s idea seems like a win for everybody: the opera company, the movie theatres (another medium in decline) and opera fans who can’t afford to go to New York.
3 Comments »
September 3rd, 2008, 3 Comments »
Last Saturday, I was fortunate enough to enjoy two good Fringe shows: TJ Dawe’s “Totem Figures” and Charles Ross’s “Sev” at the Victoria Fringe. Both are ex-classmates of mine from UVic, and both are entertaining one-man shows about, among things, making art. I usually don’t go in for art about art, but these were both engaging shows with none of the wankery and elitism that often accompanies such projects. Vancouverites can see both shows, starting today, at
The next day I had dinner with TJ at the Magnolia Bakery, and interviewed him about his life and work. He’s incredibly well read, and a monologist by trade, so he makes for an excellent conversation partner. I may eventually publish some audio snippets from our chat, but the noisy restaurant plus my crappy little voice recorder makes for a pretty shoddy recording. In the meantime I’ll transcribe some bits as time permits.
TJ is the Übermensch of Fringe performers. Over the past decade, he’s written and performed in 10 autobiographical, solo shows, and been involved in some capacity in 12 others. He’ll be in Vancouver this week (as will Charles), and it will be his 82nd fringe festival. He figures he’s performed over 700 shows. His work has also been published. A few years ago he became so popular that he stopped promoting his shows with fliers, posters and so forth.
Though he has occasional gigs and projects in the ‘off-season’, the Fringe Festival circuit is his main source of work and income. It’s a marathon of 10 to 12 festivals from May through September.
TJ’s latest show, ‘Totem Figures’, is a slight departure from his previous work. While it still relies on TJ’s particular fusion of stand-up and theatre, it’s more directly autobiographical and personal than other shows. Here’s the blurb:
Totem Figures is a ninety minute monologue about personal mythology. About the idea that we’re all the main character in our own epic adventure. About having one’s own personal Mt. Rushmore. TJ extrapolates this concept, and exemplifies it with his own mythology. His life story, inner and outer. Including many things he’s never talked about in all of his previous monologuing.
And here’s the first set of excerpts from our conversation over chicken and mushrooms in black bean sauce. Looking at them now, they feel a little random, but I guess they reflect the wide-ranging nature of our chat:
On Identifying Totem Figures
DB: I was thinking about what you said, in your show, about the people who most other people don’t like.
TJ: That really tells you something. You’re not just into it because you want to fit in.
DB: That’s right, because I’ve got Bob Dylan on the list…What is the metric? What is the minimum contribution to your life to get someone on your album cover?
TJ: It’s entirely up to you. The ten-year yard stick is the short way to figure out whether you can trust it as a totem or not. A lot of people are into Bob Dylan for a year or two or three when everybody else is. But if it outlasts that. Or, if you can think of some personal involvement. If you’ve specifically learned some Bob Dylan songs that aren’t the ones that everybody learns. Another thing is something you respond to emotionally. So that it’s a movie that always makes you cry, or if it’s an album that you put on when you’ve had a really bad day.
Read more…
3 Comments »
August 22nd, 2008, 7 Comments »
James emailed and asked why I hadn’t written about the Conservative government’s recent cuts to cultural programs. In truth, I kind of missed that whole debacle. Plus, it looks like they’ve been sufficiently raked over the coals for that one.
It’s an odd move, because up to now it seems to me that the Harper government has been relatively benign on cultural funding. I certainly remember deeper cuts from other Conservative governments. And their cuts only amounted to less than CAN $50 million. Was saving that money really worth all the grief they’ve suffered in the media? Or maybe it’s meant to be a gesture to their base?
Section 120 is a Joke
I have, however, been meaning to criticize the Harper government’s planned Bill C-10. That link goes to the CBC’s rather critical analysis of the proposed legislation. If ever you wanted an example of the CBC’s liberal bias, there it is. Here’s a summary of the problematic section of the Bill:
The issue that concerns Canada’s film and television community is Section 120, which would allow the Heritage Minister (currently Josée Verner) to withdraw tax credits from productions determined to be “contrary to public policy.”
The minister would create a set of guidelines for film and television producers. The guidelines have not yet been established but would cover violence, hatred and sexual content in film and TV productions, or anything else the minister believes should not be financed by Canadian taxpayers. Committees within the heritage and justice departments would be charged with vetting productions and implementing the guidelines.
In essence, the legislation gives the federal government carte blanche to bypass existing vetting mechanisms to deny funding to cultural works of which it disapproves. On top of infringing on free speech (even this conservative agrees with that), it will have a chilling effect on the kinds of movies which get made in Canada. Would The Boys of St. Vincent or Eastern Promises have been made in a Bill C-10 world? It’s worth mentioning that the Liberals had similar plans to restrict arts funding. It was a lousy idea then, and it’s a lousy idea now.
Poised, Disciplined and On Message
But don’t listen to me on this. Listen to the excellent interview (MP3) that Sarah Polley gave on CBC a couple of months back. If you’re ever going to advocate in the media for a cause, this interview is essential listening. Ms. Polley is incredibly poised and disciplined, articulates her position clearly and remains on-message. She never needlessly attacks the Harper government, nor does she sound like some hippie artist who’s making porn on the taxpayer’s dollar. She makes an impassioned but rationale and professional defense of her stance.
I so often see advocates of environmental and social causes on the news, and they waste their sound bite on lame, slightly nutty critcriques of whoever they’re railing against. Plus they’re frequently dressed shabbily and look frumpy. That sounds trivial, but in a world governed by televisual aesthetics, it’s not. I don’t care if you’re just back from a week of protest and bongo drumming in Clayoquot Sound. Shave, comb your hair and put on a suit before you go on TV.
On a related note, I was amused by this quote from a story about a new Canadian-content pornography channel on satellite TV:
“I think as Canadians there is a bit of a tiredness in seeing all American stuff,” Shaun Donnelly, president of Real Productions, said during an interview on Friday.
“There is always that thrill for something that is local and you get the sense that these are people you can meet at the supermarket.”
It just struck as the most ludicrous quote to offer. We can finally enjoy Newfy accents in our porn? Is that really a priority for Canadians?
7 Comments »
August 14th, 2008, 5 Comments »
The Internet, as you know, changed everything. Well, not everything, but it sure disrupted the way we make and distribute art. Ever since I saw geeks posting encoded files to Usenet, I’ve been curious to watch how the web has turned content creation (an awful, generic term) on its head.
One truth of the web in 2008 is that it is a much flatter playing field for creators. If you made an independent film in 1993, and you didn’t get backing from a studio, you couldn’t imagine how, say, 100,000 people would ever see it. YouTube makes that quite achievable in 2008.
But that flatter playing field isn’t necessarily accompanied by a lot of money-wielding players. And an artist has gotta eat. YouTube and other video sites have revenue sharing programs, but I doubt even 100,000 views would generate much money. I did a few quick searches on this, but couldn’t find any sample numbers.
Email Lists and True Fans
In a lot of cases, the old economic models are shot, or in sharp decline, and we haven’t figured out new ones yet. A recent guest columnist–a musician–on the Telegraph’s blog shed some light on how his band has survived in a post-Napster world:
When we left EMI in 1995, our most recent album had sold over 300,000 units. While we were still contracted for more, EMI decided to drop us. We were no longer commercial.
Today, after the internet boom, that level of sales would get us a deal with any of the major labels. After three more badly-marketed albums with an independent label we were down to 100,000 units.
In 1999 we released our final contracted album for Castle Records and, in anticipation of the way we planned to do business in the future, called it Marillion.com. We had already collected the email addresses of more than 20,000 fans through free CDs, downloads, etc. and by asking these fans to order and pay for the upcoming CD in advance, we were able to finance the writing and recording.
The precious email list reminded me of Kevin Kelly’s excellent essay 1000 True Fans.
Indie Games Come of Age?
The video game industry has, by comparison, remained unhindered by piracy. I’m not sure why this is. I assume that the industry’s explosive growth over the last decade has more than compensated for the revenue lost to pirated games. Plus, of course, I suspect that relatively few console players have the skills or inclination to play pirated games.
In any case, I’ve seen the video game industry as kind of like Hollywood’s studio system. There are a few big publishers, and they buy development studios or license their content. Even a ’small’ development studio would, I think, have dozens of employees.
The revolution in casual gaming, however, enables smaller teams and individuals to earn more attention. There’s a ton of free casual game sites on the web now. I don’t know how much revenue a given game creator sees from advertising, but I do know that their games are constantly copied and posted on new sites with advertising wrapped around them.
Still, I recently read about a success in the relatively new world of casual gaming on the consoles. Jonathan Blow developed a reportedly excellent game called Braid. He released it on XBox Live Arcade, an in-game system where players buy and download (I gather) generally cheap games. Braid had no in-store distribution–you can only get it through your XBox 360. It cost $15 to download the game. Via Silicon Alley Insider, I read Blow’s blog post about his first week of sales:
As I write this, there are 62,242 entries on the main leaderboards. I don’t have official sales numbers for the full week, but I would guess about 55,000 people have bought the game so far.
That works out to $825,000 in the first week. Microsoft takes a cut–possibly 33%–but that’s still terrific revenue for an independent game developer. Wikipedia provides a little information about the development process, but I’m unsure of what the budget for such a game would be, and how many people contributed to it. It’s enough, apparently, so that Blog can build another game without a day job.
I’m not sure, but I guess XBox Live Arcade and its competitors casual gaming portals can (have?) become the iTunes and YouTubes of the gaming industry, enabling the little guys to get greater distribution and, hopefully, revenue. Will indie game developers be as, on average, penniless as documentary film makers, despite their new-found distribution? Or will Johnathan Blow’s experience be repeated a thousand times over?
Clearly there are more questions than answers about the new economics of content. I mostly wrote this post to point to these two developments, and two industries at, seemingly, different stages of their evolution. For anybody interested in the background or context of these shifting tides, check out John Perry Barlow’s The Economy of Ideas and The Next Economy of Ideas.
UPDATE: Speaking of casual games, Andy points to a clever game called Coign of Vantage.
5 Comments »
July 9th, 2008, 2 Comments »
Back in the late nineties, we ran a little theatre company in Vancouver (also Darren’s First Web Design). We needed a coffin for one of the shows (George F. Walker’s excellent “Theatre of the Film Noir”, if I recall correctly) and, in light of our shoestring budget, couldn’t afford to buy one.
A member of the creative team had a day job in a retail store, and the store had a ton of pallets in the basement. He got the excellent idea to ‘borrow’ a few of these pallets, tear them apart and build a half-decent coffin out of the wood. It worked out nicely.
I remembered this little anecdote when I read about making temporary housing out of pallets:
Pallets are great material for this application because they are sturdy, inexpensive and readily available. In most cases in a disaster relief effort many of the pallets will arrive as part of the transpiration of food and materials requiring no additional logistics to procure them. If more are needed I-Beam states that they can be built by hand at a rate of 500-600 pallets per day. One transitional shelter measuring 10′ x 20′ would take 80 pallets to build and cost approximately $500.
After those darn plastic chairs (put to great use by Brian Jungen), pallets feel like one of the most ubiquitous human-made objects on Earth. Plus, other forms of aid usually arrives at disaster areas on pallets, so nothing goes to waste.
2 Comments »
