A nice blog post with great pictures of the Ringling Museum. For those who have not been to the Ringling it is a fantastic art museum. Once in financial trouble, now with a new director and the partnership with Florida State University the museum is making big plans for the future. Not to be missed if your visiting the west coast.
The father of the “readymade”, Duchamp’s work still challenges us to see the truth of art. Duchamp’s influence is so total that at this point walking through any modern art fair you will see, ready-mades, Kinetic works, conceptual pieces; all movements and ideas that Duchamp shepherded into the art world. If there is just one artist to study, just one biography that will fascinate, frustrate and inspire, I would suggest Duchamp. His life was an intellectual journey for truth.
My love of chess is thanks to Marcel Duchamp. By 1918 or so Duchamp had for the most part moved away from art and concentrated on studying chess. That intrigued me and prompted me to purchase my first book on chess. Chess has been something I have kept up with and always have a few games ongoing.
I have embedded a YouTube of archival footage of Marcel Duchamp describing his work. If you have the time, watch the other videos that are suggested when the video finishes. Also I have linked to a previous blog post I did with wonderful links to websites devoted to Marcel Duchamp. Enjoy! GL
The Foosaner Foundation has announced that it will donate $1 million to Florida Tech to be used to support the Brevard Art Museum, which the university now runs.
The museum will be renamed the Foosaner Art Museum. In a prepared press release, Negroni-Hendrick, who lives in Cocoa, stated: "You don't have to be wealthy to help others...If you are fortunate enough to be able to afford to make financial gifts of any amount, you should feel good about doing so. But if not, we are all blessed with time and talents that we can share with others." "It's a win win for the university and the community," said Carla Funk, the newly named Director of Museums for Florida Tech.
Press Release; In collaboration with a new generation of artists, ABSOLUT VODKA is introducing ABSOLUT BLANK, a global creative movement, in which ABSOLUT appears as a catalyst for contemporary leading-edge creativity.
ABSOLUT has always challenged conventions through creative collaborations with artists such as Andy Warhol, Keith Haring, Damien Hirst, and more recently Ellen von Unwerth and Spike Jonze. ABSOLUT BLANK is a daring new chapter for ABSOLUT. “In ABSOLUT BLANK, ABSOLUT has boldly made its iconic bottle into a blank canvas to inspire artists throughout the world to collaborate and fill it with creativity. We brought together creative collaborators from a variety of disciplines and watched the journey from pure white canvas to exceptional pieces of art. The result depicts how artists and creativity are inspired through ABSOLUT,” says Mark Hamilton, Global Marketing Director at The Absolut Company.
The recent cover artist of "New American Paintings" publication No. 94 southern edition, Marcus Jansen, is one of the only 18 selected artists to contribute to the ABSOLUT campaign with a uniquely painted abstract work of art. Much of which, depcits his typical style of "urban expressionism" and that can be seen in most of his his cutting-edge as well as socio-politically charged work. Jansen had a strong year in 2011,the book cover shows his work "Creeping Obstacles in Kansas", including a selection of 40 leading contemporary painters in America today selected by noted Juror and Director of the US Biennial Dan Cameron.
The 18 artists participating in ABSOLUT BLANK represent a variety of creative disciplines from across the globe; from drawing, painting and sculpting to film making and digital art.
“With ABSOLUT BLANK, we want to contribute to a global creative movement. Ultimately, making the world even more vibrant and exceptional. It All Starts With an ABSOLUT BLANK,” Mark Hamilton continues. ABSOLUT BLANK will be launched in several countries and going live in the UK on July 13th, supported by TVC, Print, OOH, Digital and Experiential.
From The Star.com Published On Fri Jul 1 2011 Laura Eggertson
Creative returns on investment: Funding the arts grows the bottom line
Gone is the desperation in the arts community in the 1990s, when “we were all trying to prove the economic multiplier effect” of investing in the sector, says Tricia Baldwin, managing director of the internationally acclaimed Tafelmusik Baroque Orchestra and Chamber Choir.
Now those economic multiplier formulas are well-established. For every $1 the City of Toronto invested, cultural organizations were able to leverage $17.75 in 2009, for example, Foster, Kain and Prentice report in Creative Capital Gains: An Action Plan for Toronto.
Thanks to the groundwork that thinkers like Florida and others laid, in this decade “there’s much more appreciation of the contribution of the arts to society, and not just the economic effect but the effect of creativity,” says Baldwin.
Arts organizations no longer have to justify their existence before getting money formerly viewed as a government handout, she says. They can also cite their overall contribution to society.
Common sense is also dictating that governments support these industries, says Peter Williamson, a partner and executive producer at Breakthrough Entertainment, a film and television production company in Toronto.
”Generally speaking, the governments we’ve had for the last 10 to 15 years have seen the benefits of being able to stimulate employment and economic growth,” Williamson says. Both a provincial and federal film and television tax credit have assisted the growth of the film and television industry in Toronto, he says.
[...]
Arts funding and the overall economy
• In the GTA, there are an estimated 8500 arts and culture organizations. They employ 150,000 people and generate $9 billion for the region’s gross domestic product. • $1 in City of Toronto funding generates $5.15 from other levels of government; $5.48 from the private sector; and $7.12 in earned revenues from ticket sales, program fees, venue rentals, and bar and gift shop sales. • 2.9 million visitors reported cultural activity as the reason they came to Toronto in 2009. • The Toronto International Film Festival generated $131.7 million worth of GDP in Toronto in 2008-09, created 2,365 jobs and generated $1.8 million in municipal taxes. • As a whole, Ontario’s cultural sector contributes more than $19.7 billion to the province’s GDP, or 4.2 per cent. • The cultural sector employs 252,000 people directly in Ontario.
The evidence is overwhelming at this point. You want a recovery? You want jobs and increased tax revenue? Increase Arts Funding! GL
Public Art Sculpture located at the Fort Lauderdale Airport
Public art on your dime Should you still be paying for it? Sun Sentinel by Brittany Wallman 12:45 p.m. EDT, July 11, 2011 Behind a secure door, up an elevator, down a hallway, behind a partition and inside some crates is a piece of public art. The colorful glass sculpture inside, called "Linaje,'' cost taxpayers $25,000 and was planned for "high visibility.'' So far, it's only getting exposure as a symbol of troubles in Broward County's Art in Public Places program. Exasperated Broward officials, most of them supporters of public art, nevertheless said it's time to tighten up a program that has allowed the glass sculpture to lie unseen long after it was paid for and created, and that shifts tens of thousands of taxpayer dollars to art when painful cuts have been made elsewhere. Commissioners also want a say in what art gets built, where. "I look at my own life,'' Broward's John Rodstrom said. "I have collected art in the past and I haven't bought a piece in a while. I don't have the disposable income. I think a lot of America feels that way right now.'' Some taxpayers don't want government taking their money and buying art with it, especially art they think is ugly. Read the rest of the article here
Public Art Sculpture outside the Fort Lauderdale Convention Center
A big debate has risen in South Florida over public art funding. In times of financial strain art funding is seen by many as a luxury that must be cut. By others it is a convenient excuse for cutting the Government out of something they don’t think it should be involved in. And still others are upset by what they perceive as money wasted on unappealing art.
The article I have posted talks about some possible remedies, none of which seem like good ideas. One idea is to put every art project expected to cost over $100,000 to a full public vote. That reminds me of the Eiffel Tower story I once heard. 5 years after the 1889 Worlds Fair had ended in Paris a poll was taken to see what support there was for keeping the Eiffel Tower up. 90% of Parisians voted to take it down. Now it's over a hundred years later and you would be hard pressed to find anyone in Paris willing to loose their most iconic structure. It would be hard to imagine an art project anywhere that everyone agreed about, especially when it is first proposed.
Another problem is that most do not realize that no additional funds are raised, no additional taxes are levied to pay for the art. The budget for public art comes as a percentage of the total cost to build the public building. The percentage is usually 1% to 2% up to a certain amount. The selection process is very thorough and is set up to make sure that local artists and art suppliers benefit from the new construction just as local construction firms, plumbers, painters and electricians do. Our artists serve an important role in our community; they should be included in projects that use public monies just like any other industry. And when a vital arts community flourishes so does the rest of the community.
South Florida is a tourist destination, it is our main industry. Cultural tourism is a growing and important part of that industry. Again I go back to the Eiffel Tower as an example; more than 200,000,000 people have visited the tower since its construction including 6,719,200 in 2006 alone. Not bad for a public art project. Or closer to home you can look at the new Dali Museum in St. Pete. Many were against the project and fought hard to stop its public funding. Now just 6 months after its opening in January the museum received its 200,000 visitor and has been named by USA Today as one of the “top 20 places you have to go before you die.” That translates to hotel room reservations, restaurants, gift shops, cabs, and all the other purchases that tourists make. And the dollars that the new “Cultural Tourists” spend are staggering. A recent study shows that two cultural tourists spend more on average than a family of 5 does on vacation. For the state of Florida, for every dollar spent on art, it gets back 4 dollars in economic growth.
Most importantly art shows us who we are and where we have been. The absence of art will only show future generations our failings.
“This world in which we live needs beauty in order not to sink into despair. Beauty, like truth, brings joy to the human heart, and is that precious fruit which resists the erosion of time, which unites generations and enables them to be one in admiration.” Pope John Paul VI 1965.
There have always been tough times and there has always been public art. If every other generation of Americans could find the funds necessary to support the arts shouldn't we? GL
I am a member of the State of Florida’s Council on Arts & Culture. Supporter of Public Funding for the Arts. Advocate for the Visual Arts. Award winning gallerist with over 20 years experience. Please contact me with all your art needs.
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