I came across and article from Slate I was reading way back when I started my move-Art Mobs. The author, Clive Thompson explores the power mobs have had recently, especially in relation to the arts.
While many artists draw influences from many sources, the common wisdom is that art created by committee, rather than by a unified single vision (albeit sometimes shared by 2-3 collaborators) is usually crap. Thompson's article shows that in some cases, that isn't necessarily so.
Witness Wikipedia, an online encyclopedia written by grace of contributions of the masses, which in three years has exceeded the size of the venerable Encyclopedia Brittanica. (It has nearly triple the number of articles and double the number of words)
Thompson also cites the generally successful mob creation of letters via voting whether a pixel should be white or black. On the other hand, when faced with less concrete concepts like creating a face or a goat, by voting pixels black or white, the mob had a hard time creating anything that resembled..well..anything.
Likewise, the person who intitiated Wikipedia has tried to get mobs to write textbooks. Some projects are doing okay, but most are not because of the lack of a unified vision and voice.
These are really intriguing experiments and results. But the application for the arts manager can be fairly simple in some respects. You can solicit all the feedback about programming a season you want from as many sources as you want, but in the end, one central vision must make the determination regarding what will appear on stage. If you try to please everyone or as many people as possible, you end up with an utter mess.
Andrew Taylor said something similar in his Simple Truth 1 posting and a follow up when he says of a presenter who put out a call for programming ideas that would work in his performance space.
"Given the simple truth that audiences buy expectation rather than performances, and given that consumers can't really say what they want until they have it, and often not even after that, Law is looking in the wrong place for inspiration."
Okay, by now folks are probably tired of me evoking what I learned at the WAA conference in every entry. However, I forgot this one last bit until I sorted through my papers last week. I had attended a forum on cancellations sponsored by NAPAMA (North American Performing Arts Managers and Presenters) on cancellations.
I hadn't known cancellations was such a hot topic until I attended this forum. NAPAMA has a whole section in their code of ethics devoted to avoiding cancellations and attempting to preserve a good will relationship between agent and presenter if a cancellation has to occur.
There are a number of reasons why cancellations occur according to Patty Milch who lead the discussion,--Force Majeure, tours or funding fall through, directors of presenting organizations change and the next person doesn't honor the contract, less experienced presenting organizations think it is acceptable for them to cancel.
It was actually these last two points that caused the most discussion and relation of anecdotes. Apparently amateur presenters don't know if they ask for a contract, they have essentially orally said they have every intent of presenting this person, save some minor alterations to allow the presenter to accomodate the performer.
According to some stories, people are asking for contracts so they can pass them around a committee table and contract 2 of the twenty they asked for. The agent on the other hand is already preparing an artist's itinerary and working out routing with other presenters based on the issuance of that contract.
These instances turn out badly for all involved because the agent stands to lose face and money, but he will enforce the contract. The presenter gets a bad rep and has the agent/manager glaring and threatening him with legal action.
The other instance is again due to inexperienced people who believe that the decisions of predecessors doesn't bind the organization if the leadership simply changes. If only it were that simple, eh?
The point of the forum was to discuss how the rancor could be avoided and how a better operating environment might be created. Not surprisingly, we didn't really get past the discussion of the problem and no one really had any suggestions for a solution.
So yesterday I attended a grants workshop held by the State Foundation on Culture and the Arts. It was an interesting experience on many fronts. For one thing, they are on a biennium grant schedule which means you apply this year for money for the next two years. Now for a laid back place like Hawaii, it seems strange that you have to get so organized you know what you are going to do for the next two years!
I can't but think that they are essentially encouraging people to lie their butts off. Arts organizations make things up for annual grant writing, but it pretty much goes without saying a two year cycle essentially encourages people to try to fund their wildest dreams.
Now all this could be moot because of the (big surprise) arts funding problems in the state. When the arts foundation submitted their proposed budget in April/May, all their funds were frozen and remain so. There was a big uproar and the governor allocated money from health and human services earmarked for drug prevention for the arts foundation. (One of the criteria now for getting money is serving at risk youth)
Back in June or so I read a report that said Hawaii had the most per capita spending on the arts. (Which isn't a heck of a lot given that there are only 1.2 million people living here, but still, a good proportion.) Ah how quickly they fall.
In any case, the people leading the workshop essentially said to live this year as if it were the last we were being funded because it probably is.
Okay, I retrieved the last of the notes I made while at the WAA conference. They are short, but sour I am afraid. The conference was doing a session on trends in government funding and had the NEA representative for presenters and a woman from the Western Arts Federation (WESTAF) there as well. Because the conference was in Spokane, they invited the head of the Spokane Arts Council to sit on the panel.
Unfortunately, between the time she was invited and the time the conference occured, the arts council was pretty much reduced to one person. Apparently in deciding where funds should be allocated, the city asked each division to talk about their accomplishments. The divisions with lots of people who could make concrete claims like paving hundreds of miles of road or fixing so many miles of water mains faired well. The arts council got dissolved.
Now this isn't any surprising news if you have been watching the trends around the country this last few years. What was really interesting was the assumptions the head of the arts council had made.
She thought based on the small portion the arts council received in the budget, it would be more trouble than it was worth to dissolve it. Wrong.
She thought the loss of political capital the mayor and city council would face would dissuade them. Nope.
She thought the outcry from businesses and individuals whose partnerships with the arts council intertwined their fates with it would provide an impediment. Didn't really emerge.
Now someone at the conference said that she said the irony of dissolving it as a major arts conference was bringing lots of money to town kept them from destroying it completely. I didn't hear her say that when I was around. Given that the other situations she had mentioned didn't give them pause, I doubt the disappointment of a group that was only in town for a week was a real consideration.
Now the head of the arts council is trying to keep many of the initiatives she started going by farming them out to other organizations. For instance, she hopes another company will take on the responsibility of maintaining the arts calendar which is a major source of arts information for the entire region and not just the city.
I know that that according to the rules of writing I learned in school, this is the place I should insert a summation statement for my entry. But I gotta say, I can't think of anything that doesn't sound trite and stupid.
I forgot some notes I had made for today's entry at work and since I spend far too much time there already, I ain't going back. If you really wanna know what I had to say, come on back tomorrow. Oh, and by the way, this is the 101st entry since I started. Who knew I could talk so much?
I did want to make an observation about a couple guerilla marketing tactics I observed at the conference to which I have made reference this week. The first instance was with "Phoenix's hippest dance troupe" Nebellen. The kids who were part of the troupe accosted me as I exited the resource room to encourage me to see one of their showcases. Technically, they weren't supposed to do that of course. As I moved past them to the cyber cafe to check my email, I noticed they had also changed all the home pages on the computers to go to theirs. Obviously, they weren't supposed to displace the conference home page, but I had to admire their creativity. (Of course, if everyone got into the act, it would have been annoying.)
The other group was The Carpetbag Brigade which had a showcase one evening at Gonzaga University. I really felt for them because they had stiltwalking as part of their current show so apparently couldn't do their show at any of the indoor venues. Unfortunately, they were the only showcase at the university and so the likelihood of people going to an unfamiliar locale in an unfamiliar city in the dark of night probably placed many strikes against them.
They may have sensed this so they staged a portion of their piece in a field across the river from the convention center. They hooked up a guitar and keyboard to a speaker and went to town. The music caught the attention of pretty much everyone in the park and those of us sitting at the tables outside the convention center so they had quite an audience. The piece was visually very interesting, especially given their costuming and full body make up. What was particularly impressive was their skill and body control. They were playing on the side of a hill and doing all sorts of flips and acrobatics while on stilts all of which couldn't have been easy.
I have to say in the interest of full disclosure that I didn't end up seeing either of their showcases because of conflicts with ones I thought I would be more likely to book. One could argue then that their efforts were not successful, but on the other hand, they have earned potentially greater exposure to all those who read this entry. (And as I think about it, the stilt show in particular might be very interesting to do a few years down the road in one of my quads.)
Continuing to talk about my time at the Western Arts Alliance Conference last week. There were a few things that the membership seemed to enjoy. Or at least those who spoke up at the annual meeting did.
The first was how things were scheduled. The Resource Room where all the agents and artist reps were wasn't opened when there were showcases or seminars occuring. When the Resource Room was open, it was only for 3-4 hours at a time.
There were a number of benefits people cited. The first was that the agents only had to stand for 3 hours at a time. Another was that it helped being able to attend the seminars and showcases so they could discuss trends and see what sort of talent was out there. With the break for seminars and showcases, the people who were booking acts felt energized and were ready to talk business again. Also, watching performances provided some inspiration about what they might like to present. The bookers returned with fresh ideas and were prepared to approach people they hadn't thought about presenting before.
The other thing I really appreciated was that there was a code of ethics published about how, where and when an agent could approach a presenter about the acts they represented. Well, actually, a lot of places have that code, I should say rather I appreciated that most people adhered to it.
I was button holed a couple times, but for the most part, agents left business at the resource room door. I ended up having lunch and dinner with a few agents and it was nice not worrying about being pressured to present their clients while my mouth was full.
In fact, the conference sponsored a dine around where someone volunteered to choose a restaurant and organize the logistics of getting a group of folks to dinner. People signed up on sheets when they arrived so the host could get a head count and then off we went. So that night I actually ended up eating with about 5-6 agents and another 5-6 presenters. The conversation was so general that I didn't know any of them were agents except for the host and I only knew he was because the sign up sheet identified him as such.
So just some tips for you conference planners and attenders out there to make your experience a little more pleasant.
Okay as promised, I took notes at the international tax session at the WAA conference. It was actually a hot topic. The session was scheduled for about 1.5 hours but at the end of the time it ended up moving to another room and continuing. (I moved on to a grants session because I had notes on 90% of what I wanted to know.) Then the discussion apparently infiltrated an Arts Presenter's session as well.
The speaker at the session was Stanley E. Majors: Attorney, Fettmann, Tolchin & Majors, P.C.. (CPA and Tax Attorney licensed to practice in DC, MD and VA)
Among the things I learned was:
-Tax treaty is determined by place of residence. A French national residing in Switzerland falls under Swiss treaty.
-Everyone in the payment chain-presenter, agent, manager, etc can act as the collection agent of the 30%. The IRS typically starts at the end of the chain with the last person to handle the money before the artist gets it when researching if the money was collected. Mr. Major's suggestion was to put something in the contract that stipulates who will be the party responsible for withholding. Obviously, many of the presenters' preference would be for the agent or manager to be the responsible one.
Though empowering everyone in the chain to collect the tax looks like the IRS is just increasing the number of people they can blame, Mr. Major assured us that it wasn't the case. Nor is it so they can collect the tax multiple times.
-The Alien has to fill out a certificate 8233 to claim exemption if they feel they are entitled to keeping their 30% The IRS has 10 days to agree with the exemption or not. A presenter can not make a decision to withhold or not unless they file. (For example, if you have someone coming in for 1 day and they are making $1000 to speak and then leaving the country and you know they fall below the exemption threshold, you still can't exempt them unless they file.)
-If you know that a person has falsely filed an exemption, you have to withhold. You don't necessarily have to research their entire tour schedule, but if you know that they are performing in a city south of you one night and a city to the north of you the night after for the same rate they are charging you and it exceeds the exemption amount and they file an exemption, you can't accept it.
-Article 16 or 17 of the tax treaty is where the pertinent info is usually found. (For tax treaties, a good place to start is this IRS webpage. It contains links to more specific information, including the treaties, as you find you need it.
-This restrictive clause in the treaties only applies to performers and athletes. Their managers, lighting people, make up people, etc fall under a more liberal portion of the treaties. Apparently, the US actually wants people to come to the country and do business and the more liberal portions reflect that. The restrictive portions are to prevent people like the Rolling Stones from coming in, making millions of dollars and leaving. Unfortunately, since the Rolling Stones are making millions of dollars, they aren't hurt too much by it, but the smaller folks are.
-Just like US citizens, the alien can get a refund by itemizing their operational expenses on a 1040NR at the end of the year.
-I spoke to Mr. Major specifically about a South African group with incorporation
and Fed. tax number in the US and his opinion was that the taxes didn't need to be withheld since they are 1) obligated to file corporate tax returns every year 2) the IRS can exert enforcement powers if they lie, especially since so much of their income is derived in the US. (Which is probably why they incorporated in the US in the first place--to avoid the bite) Of course, to get him to issue an opinion the IRS would care about, I assume we would have to pay lots of money.
-If a foreign group claims to be a non-profit organization similiar to 501 (c) (3) in the US, you can request that the IRS make a determination if the organization meets the same criteria as a US non-profit.
That is about everything I learned. The one thing I didn't note was whether you treat a group as 1 entity earning 10,000 or 10 people earning 1,000. I am told he covered that in a later session on the same topic so I am inquiring if a colleague took notes specifically on that since that was an area of concern for her.
Well I have returned from Spokane, WA a bit older and wiser for the experience. There was plenty that happened so I will have ample fodder for posting. Unfortunately, the amount of work left undone while I was away may keep me from my posting. We shall see.
Let me first start by saying Spokane is a lovely city is walk around, especially near the convention center which is right on the edge of a park where Expo 1974 occurred. The conference itself was well organized and there were some procedures that had been adopted that went over very well with the membership--but more about that in a later entry.
I ended up learning quite a bit, but I was concerned that wouldn't be so when the conference first started (and not just because of my articles on useless meetings, part 2 here). The keynote speaker was Gunther Schuller who has had a long career as a musician and has certainly shown his love and stamina for his craft (he apparently would play in an orchestra for an opera and then walk into a jazz club to continue playing into the night.) However, in my estimation, he really has no concept about what it takes to run an arts organization.
I was really rather angry at the conference coordinators for picking him and had to resist an outburst at various times during the week when I came in contact with them. (I will avail myself of the feedback forms they provided, however, and probably won't be any more diplomatic than I will be here.)
It was probably the worst example of many of the things I have railed against the arts community over in prior posts.
His whole speech was about how great the good old days were. He didn't say anything I didn't know 20 years ago. He cited the miniscule proportion the NEA budget has to the entire federal budget. He spoke of low listenership and programming of classic music on radio stations and lauded NPR for having the courage to play the music. Pop music and network television are the enemies leading to illiteracy and the destruction of culture. It is a terrible thing, he says that Hootie and the Blowfish get to be on the talk shows and Beethoven is no where to be seen. It was all doom and gloom and really just very old news.
It all may be absolutely true, but nothing he said acknowledged the fact that this was the environment in which arts organizations operate today and then try to offer practical solutions that reflect this fact. His suggested solution was sandwich booking where you put a lesser known show between two popular shows. Again, this is a really old strategy that doesn't reflect how people currently make decisions to buy tickets.
I momentarily thought I might be wrong about this being an old strategy when he started lauding the great success the Boston and Philadelphia symphonies had with this strategy--until he got around to mentioning that he was talking about men who were running the organizations in 1939! His criteria for what constituted good popular music with which to sandwich the new stuff was even more telling when he discounted the value of most of Vivaldi in an aside. In my mind, if someone isn't comfortable or familiar with classical music, that composer's "Four Seasons" is probably a good introduction.
The only suggestion he made that I felt had merit was that the creators of a work (composers/playwrights), the purchasers and presenters, and the performers of works communicate with each other more effectively about how to combat the apathy about the arts. He didn't give any examples other than those I mentioned, but as a general concept it seems to have merit.
On the whole though, I was really annoyed by the talk. I am going to suggest some alternative speakers for next year (Douglas McLennan would have been perfect this year given that he is about a 45 minute flight away from Spokane). In my mind, a keynote speaker should set the stage for discussion throughout the conference--even if it is arguments. The only discussion that came out of this session was akin to churchgoers musing about why sinners didn't see the light and come to church and congratulating one another for taking their children to Sunday school. As much as I may dislike most organized religions, to properly employ this metaphor I have to say--there wasn't any discussion about effectively witnessing and converting the great unwashed. (The problem being that the speaker essentially derided the great unwashed for their entertainment habits.)
As mentioned before, I am off to the WAA conference this week. I am pleased to note that there will be a session on income taxes and international artists. Given my crash course in tax treaties lately, I will be attending that with some interest. Maybe I will find out some new things to pass on to my liasion here at the university.
I went into work today despite the holiday because I will be out of town for a week and really don't want to have my work pile up too much. The vice-chancellor had been taking about starting an arts administration certificate program so I emailed him expressing my interest in contributing to its development.
Given my *cough* strong feelings about how such a program should be structured, there is a fair chance I could eventually disassociate myself from the program I help develop. Exploring the decisions that go in to developing it, whether I agree with them or not, would be really fascinating for me though so I don't really mind that I could end up muttering curses under my breath one day.
Stay tuned to find out how it all comes out--the tax stuff and the AA certificate program.
So it has been a busy week already. I have had so many meetings that I got that feeling that I ain't getting anything done and considering I have a lot to do before going to the WAA Conference next week, that ain't good.
But I have been learning some new things...
Monday I had a meeting with the head of Human Resources. I am on a committee to hire an assistant for myself. The Human Resource department has to look over the questions we are going to ask and approve of them. This is partially to make sure that we aren't asking any questions connected with the forbidden topics like race, martial status, creed, political affiliation, religion, etc. We didn't have any of those type of questions, but the head of HR wouldn't sign off on them because he didn't feel they would elicit effective answers.
I have to admit, he did have a point. Some of the questions other committee members had submitted dealt with how a person felt about certain situations like meeting new people or their philosophy on customer service. Part of the problem he had was that none of these things were part of the KSAs (knowledge, skills, abilities) of the job description. He encouraged us to rephrase the questions as situationals--what have you done in such a situation or what would you do?
He said that it doesn't matter how people feel about a certain job as much as how they would act in a situation. His point was that people often hate to do certain aspects of their jobs, but they recognize the value of doing it and doing it well so dismissing them for how they feel might result in you discarding a valuable person.
On the other hand, if they mention they ignored a customer's complaint because they were incessant whiners when you ask about their experiences, you know how they feel and how they would act.
I never thought of these issues before. So even though it was rather annoying to have to rewrite the questions and couch them in a manner that would satisfy the head of HR and still serve to get the information about the candidate's personality, I have to admit his way can prove to be more valuable.
Yesterday I attended a meeting of the Performing Arts Presenters of Hawai'i (earlier mention of what they are all about here). We were discussing what our plans were when we attended the Western Arts Alliance Conference in Spokane next week. Not everyone was going so we were making a list of the groups everyone might be interested in presenting so we could check them out and approach agents, etc.
I had been warned to bring an extra suitcase so I could carry presskits and other materials back from the conference. A few weeks after I return, we will all meet again for a marathon review of videos, etc of likely prospects.
Then today I met with a representative of a local hotel chain with whom I am hoping to house most of my visiting performers. I was really reminded of the power of good customer service. I had contacted representatives of a number of chains, but she was the only one that decided that she could better serve me by having me come out and see her properties and treat me to lunch. Of all the others I contacted, only one other has even responded with the information I requested.
The thing is, none of them need my business, especially the woman who took me out. Right now tourism is excellent and there are hardly any rooms to be had on O'ahu. Even though I am bringing a fair bit of business, the hotels can make better use of their time wooing tour operators and travel agents than me. This is especially true because I am asking for kama aina rates (discounts for locals) in order to help me stay on budget.
This woman spoke to me, assessed my needs and then picked the mix of properties of the 20 or so her company manages on my island that would best suit my needs. She stayed away from the really economical places that might prevent jet lagged artists getting off a 5+ hour flight from getting rest and also avoided the ones that were too upscale. My time wasn't wasted looking at the wrong places.
Every hotel we went to, the general manager came out and met me like I was an important account. They showed me around the rooms personally, offered me water and wet towels to refresh myself. The woman showing me around took me out to lunch at their flagship property where my car was valet parked and returned to me swiftly with my A/C and radio set to create a welcoming environment in my own vehicle. Now perhaps they do much more for travel agents, but they could have done far less for me.
I still have to be conscious of price, but if they end up being a few bucks more a night than another quote I get, they will certainly be getting my business. They know that good customer service means good service to everyone and they know that it is the little touches like the way the valet delivers your car that matters. They also probably know that good word of mouth is the best advertising. Not only will I speak well of them on my island, but because they have properties on the other islands, I will be saying great things about them to the other members of the consortium.
It just verifies my feelings about the importance of customer service and underscores how important it will be for me to rectify all the impediments to customer service at my theatre.