Articoli taggati con ‘arts management’
Managing change and intimacy in the present
Heraclitus is often cited as the source of the quote, “The only constant in life is change.” This seems to ring true now, more than ever, as advances in technology rapidly change our cultures: the ways we communicate and express ourselves, the availability of information and resources, and even how we spend our time each day. Of course, change is not new and we are not the first to experience it. As Michele Trimarchi illustrates in “Staging the Change?” our ancestors’ lives were radically altered with technological advances in farming, machinery and communications systems. How people react to and manage these changes can define their identity, both in the present and their place in history, over time. Artists and arts consumers run the gamut in their response to change: many chase the avant-garde while others, like J.S. Bach, pursue perfection of one form long after their contemporaries have moved on to newer modes.
Do the arts dream of society? The secret war of languages
Whenever I think, speak or write about the arts the crucial knot of my analysis is knowledge. Of course emotion is important, as well as some intellectual pride, but knowledge gives the flavour to the whole system. It is well rooted in the dramatic urgency that leads single creative artists to craft their works: if they were able to display their sentiments and views in an ordinary way – through plain spoken language, for example – they would not need any kind of expressive substitution, and their discourse should not need to rely upon powerful semantic channels able to convey it to its potential (even not desired) recipients. Knowledge is also important in the growth of creative tendencies, artistic and cultural groups, and all the social clusters advocating the rise and the consolidation of views, styles, techniques and all the methodological tools that can define creative waves. This normally occurs as a response to an insufficient conventional knowledge, in any case to push the threshold of language ahead. Whether it is only innovation (along the path) or revolution (against the path itself) its language wants to show, not without some surprise or even some repugnance, that the world needs new words, new concepts, possibly new truths.
Contemporary art fairs as new forms of cultural consumption and urban experience
Contemporary art fairs are commercial exhibitions where art dealers meet up over the course of several days at a specific event. Nowadays they are held around the world, offering attendees the opportunity to experience in just a few days what otherwise would only be possible by travelling all over the world. This study has selected some key aspects of the contemporary art fairs expansion, focusing on their historical background and on contemporary globalization aspects of the art system. While exploring the art fairs territory, the contemporary art system often finds common grounds with attitudes observed in more-encompassing cultural and creative industries. Art fairs, as many other cultural industry events, such as music and cinema festivals or fashion weeks, share the “show – spectacle” notion in the public culture. Within this context, some analogies can be made as regards the common networking necessities of these industries, but it is also worth highlighting the emergence of art fairs effectiveness in enhancing the contemporary arts and the consumption of creative products.
