Tulips Join the Parade

 

 

 

Hope your spring blooms are as lovely as these.

 

 

 

Warmth in the Midwest Finally--No Change in Washington

We are all looking forward to some real spring this weekend.  I will hope to sow a few seeds in the garden.

Meanwhile we watch our republic suffer through more gun and bomb violence. Our ineffectual, cowardly, incoherent, and self-serving legislators do nothing but babble for the TV cameras once again.  The United States Senate, founded as a deliberative body, refuses to deliberate.  Our congress cannot agree on the time of day without someone denouncing the decision as a Republican or Democratic plot to destroy the country.  Shame on all of them!  And of course shame on us for electing people who refuse to participate in the act of governance itself thus making a mockery of our representative system.   

But the daffodils are blooming and the tulips are not far behind.  The very act of spring brings hope for rebirth and new beginnings in even the coldest ground.     

  

Vote tomorrow!

 "Do what you can within reach of your arm . . . because anything you touch is part of a tapestry that reaches far and wide, even unto the highest and mightiest seats of power."

William Rivers Pitt

Tomorrow is Tuesday and local election day here in Monmouth.  I like this quote because it not only comments on the power of the ballot, but also on the importance of each person doing what they can for their community, their state, and their country.  Each small effort is a part of the whole whether it is voting, serving on a volunteer committee, or picking up a piece of trash on the street in front of your house.

There is a thing called "the common good" that we seem to be on the verge of losing when only our own comfort and convenience and mindset becomes preeminent.

So think Spring and do vote.

Measure for Measure at the Goodman

We saw the Goodman Theatre's production of Shakespeare's Measure for Measure last week. It was well done and technically flawless as usual , but I wasn't bowled over and did have some concerns which will come out in my comments below.

Shakespeare’s Measure for Measure  has been a problem play for 400 years and director Robert Falls manages to reinforce that feeling in his current Goodman Theatre production in Chicago.  First of all  Falls falls for the old  “if you don’t have the actors over-design it”  and hope the ever moving scenery will  cover up the cast.   I wish it were not the case but no one in the company, aside from a few of the comics,  seemed  to rise above the  stew-- i.e. nothing in this production is bad but nothing got my blood flowing either.   James Newcomb’s Duke returns to  eavesdrop  and meddle not as a Friar but as a Barry Fitzgeraldish Irish priest.  He is amusing yet has bothersome problems with keeping his accent consistent.   The same could be said of Isabella who pronounces only her name in dialect while sounding straight mid-western the rest of the time.  

The selection of the New York Times Square of the pimp ridden porno polluted 1970’s is a pertinent setting for the play,  but its  gaudy neon signs,  shiny steel  fence cages,  and too neatly positioned piles of garbage come off as too sanitized for anyone who  actually saw those years.  It was never glitzy; it was dirty,  drug ridden,  and wretchedly seamy.  

Notwithstanding things do keep moving.  Falls accelerates the scene transitions by starting entrances in slow motion as the previous scene winds down and then bumping up the lights and the movement to full speed as the next scene begins.  In another nice moment he highlights Angelo’s  lust for Isabella by having her enter in low light stop motion and rush forward to embrace him.  The audience gasps and laughs.  There is a quick blackout and the lights come up again to see them both apart and ready to play the scene as written but with an indelible comment made visually about an undercurrent in both characters.

And then there’s the ending.  Directors often search  for the right visual and movement metaphors to reinforce or clarify the action of a play and I have just noted a successful  example of one such choice.  Yet when directorial search extends into choosing an action that is not even vaguely suggested by the  text, I must draw the line.        

Falls’ decision to have the freed convict Bardardine sneak back during the jazzy final curtain love fest  and stab Isabella  just seems ludicrous rather than meaningful.  Barardine’s short comic appearance as the death row inmate who refuses to cooperate in his execution is milked nicely by actor Joe Foust,  but his short re-appearance in order to be pardoned  by the Duke gives us not one remote shred of reason as to why  barely a minute after his release he would somehow acquire a knife and return to the party and butcher the lady the Duke has just invited to be his wife. 

Shakespeare gives us plenty to think about  in the play.  Power is beguiling and sinister in its reach.  Justice seldom manages to be just and can be arbitrary.   Yet there is a difference between seeming arbitrary and being arbitrary.  While admitting Euripidean  deus ex machina endings are possible,  it remains my thought that this was not what Shakespeare set out to say in this still problematic work.       

 

 

Illinois Creative Economy Initiative

Illinois Creative Economy Initiative

I have been writing about the economic importance of the arts in recent posts and was pleasantly surprised to see Governor Guinn's latest newsletter mentioning the same statistics and launching the following initiative. 

"On March 19, Governor Quinn launched the Illinois Creative Economy Initiative as part of his commitment to creating jobs and driving Illinois’ economy forward. The initiative will explore innovative strategies to grow the $2.7 billion creative economy in Illinois, which employs thousands of people and is a key driver of tourism to our state. The Creative Economy Initiative will be led by Ra Joy, who will work to bring all stakeholders together to identify and deploy strategies to boost a variety of arts and strengthen their role in the state’s economy. Joy has served as executive director of the Illinois Arts Alliance since 2007, and has been an advocate, community organizer and coalition builder for various arts causes for more than 15 years. For more information about the Creative Economy Initiative, visit CreativeEconomy.illinois.gov."

 

Make Art Work Meeting in Peoria

We drove to Peoria's new Riverfront Museum yesterday (3-21-13)  to participate in a program called MAKE ART WORK sponsored jointly by Arts Alliance Illinois and ArtsPartners of Central Illinois.  The purpose was to explore how the arts support jobs, generate revenue for governments, attract tourists, and spark human creativity on all levels.  

The keynote speaker was Randy Cohen, Vice President for Research and Policy for Americans for the Arts.    His primary purpose was to highlight a major national economic study on the  contributions of the arts to our national economy.  The three county area around Peoria, IL was a part of this study and to localize his talk he concentrated on the figures from the state of Illinois and the Peoria area. 

If you need a couple of key statistics to insert into a grant application or to offer in a conversation with someone enamored with cutting the so called "frill" areas out of budgets, here are a few items.    Non-profit Arts Organizations  contribute around  20.4  million dollars to the Greater Peoria economy and 2.75 billion dollars to the Illinois economy each year.  In the Peoria area over 14 million dollars of this comes in direct spending by arts and culture organizations in creating events, constructing and maintaining their buildings,  and paying their employees.  Another 6 million comes from ancilliary spending by consumers as they buy fuel or take public transport to get to places, purchase food and beverages,  shop at other commercial retail outlets, or pay for lodging during their stay.

The national study covered over 33,000 arts related businesses in Illinois and also pointed out that those businesses employ almost 80,000 people statewide and  account for 850 full time equivalent jobs in Peoria.  The study also emphasizes that most of the spending by arts agencies and their customers stays local and thus returns tax revenues to states and municipalities.

When cuts to the arts are proposed,  I suggest you stop trying to depend on the emotional arguments about cutting the arts as a cut in the quality of  people's lives and instead argue that cutting the arts cuts needed revenue for your community.   Yes the arts may give you an emotional lift and something to live for, but the real key is that "It makes economic sense to support the Arts!"

The crowd files in at the American Players Theatre in Spring Green, WI last summer.

How can you help?  Tap into any or all of the organizations mentioned at the beginning of this article and give them some support.  I am a proud member of the Art Alliance Illinois and the Americans for the Arts. 

Hiroyuki Fujita Advises Monmouth College Students.

We attended the Whiteman Lecture this morning at Monmouth College. The speaker was Hiroyuki Fujita, a 1992 graduate of the college. 

After graduating from Monmouth Fujita went on to get a PhD in Physics from Case Western Reserve University.  Academia certainly called,  but business won out and he has since become the President and CEO of one of the fastest growing medical technology companies in the USA--Quality Electrodynamics.  

But it was not his vita that caught my eye as much as his speech. He spoke directly to the current student body and his message was clear.  Do not think that you go into business only to make money.  You also have to have a desire to make a difference.  You are not put here to do things to the world; you are here to do positive things for the world.  If you can put that into effect, you will also make enough money.

Asked how he measures his own background and how he looks at potential employees in his company he stated that everyone has ABILITY in something and needs to cultivate it.  Cultivation of that talent always requres EFFORT.  You score anywhere from 0 to 100 in the first two areas and find it wiped out if you do not have the right ATTITUDE because attitude can be scored from -100 to +100.   Bad attitudes impinge on effort and without effort ability can be squandered. 

Another idea he cited was "Always look at the doughnut, not the hole."  Be thankful for what you have. Don't spend valuable time whining or complaining about what you don't have; instead do something to fill the hole.

Simplistic. Sure.  But it seemed like practical advice coming from a foreign student who came to America and made the American Dream come true. . 

Although I never knew Hiro or his future wife when they were students, several of my fellow faculty members did and they were on hand to re-unite with him and to celebrate his accomplishments. All told an impressive day for the efficacy of a liberal arts eduction in providing knowledge and a moral compass to encircle it.    Thank you Hiroyuki.