Pillars of a creative community

Six ways to make a place hospitable to artists

And maintenance is the sensible side of love,
Which knows what time and weather are doing
To my brickwork; insulates my faulty wiring;
Laughs at my dryrotten jokes; remembers
My need for gloss and grouting; which keeps
My suspect edifice upright in air,
As Atlas did the sky.
–U.A. Fanthorpe, from “Atlas”

If you were scanning your community for evidence of a thriving arts ecology, what would you look for exactly? The number, size, and activity of arts organizations? The breadth, depth, and enthusiasm of arts audiences? Or the lived experience of the artists who call that community home?

While you might say “all of the above,” the reality is that most of our public discourse and policy focuses on the first two measures (organizations and audiences). We only rarely interrogate the third (artists). But if we wanted to interrogate, how would we?

Just over 20 years ago, the Urban Institute offered a framework of “six major dimensions of a place that make it hospitable or inhospitable to artists” (Jackson et al 2003). These six dimensions still offer a useful and fruitful view on any community’s support systems for artists, and a path to bolstering them or filling in the blanks:

• Validation: The ascription of value to what artists do.

• Demand/Markets: Society’s appetite for artists and what they do, and the markets that translate this appetite into financial compensation.

• Material Supports: Access to the financial and physical resources artists need for their work: employment, insurance and similar benefits, awards, space, equipment, and materials.

• Training and Professional Development: Conventional and lifelong learning opportunities.

• Communities and Networks: Inward connections to other artists and people in the cultural sector; outward connections to people not primarily in the cultural sector.

• Information: Data sources about artists and for artists.

While there are many ways of defining an “artist” (see “What’s an Artist?” in the ArtsManaged Field Guide), this project intentionally focused on active professionals, including “adults who have received training in an artistic discipline/tradition, define themselves professionally as artists, and attempt to derive income from work in which they use their expert artistic vocational skills in visual, literary, performing, and media arts.”

It’s also worth noting that the lead author of the study is now the Chair of the National Endowment for the Arts.

So, if you’re working to understand and improve the support structures for artists in your community, you might start with a survey of these six dimensions. What’s available? What’s robust? What’s hidden? What’s missing? And if you only have limited time and money (as we all do), pick one dimension and make it a little better.

Andrew

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Photo by Jesse Collins on Unsplash

Sources

• “Creativity Connects: Trends and Conditions Affecting U.S. Artists.” Center for Cultural Innovation, September 2016.

• Jackson, Maria Rosario, Florence Kabwasa-Green, Daniel Swenson, Joaquin Herranz, Jr., Kadija Ferryman, Caron Atlas, Eric Wallner, and Carole Rosenstein. “Investing in Creativity: A Study of the Support Structures for U.S. Artists.” Urban Institute, 2003.

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From the ArtsManaged Field Guide

Function of the Week: Program & Production​
Program & Production involves developing, assembling, presenting, and preserving coherent services or experiences.

Framework of the Week: ​What? So What? Now What?
What? So What? Now What? offers a lightly structured process for reflective inquiry or difficult discussions. It encourages participants to first define/describe an idea, issue, or incident (What?), then connect it to relevant context or consequence (So What?), and finally consider options for future action (Now What?).

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