I recently saw this TED talk by Kelly D. Parker, a marketing professional who calls herself a storytelling strategist.  Her talk was on the power of storytelling and there were a number of points in her presentation which sounded very familiar. For instance: You know, I believe the worst story of all is the one that is told too soon. And truly, this is a very common mistake that aspiring storytellers make. We launch into a story and don’t know the first thing about who we’re talking to. Before you’re qualified to tell anything, you must deeply understand your audience’s problem and pursu ..read more

I know I have been citing Seth Godin a lot lately, but he has had a lot of posts that seemed relevant lately. One of his recent ones addresses how marketing is expected to do a lot of the lifting for a company.  In his post, he suggests that it is because no one has clearly defined the boundaries of what marketing is supposed to be doing. This is just an excerpt of the full list of roles he identifies: That’s the first part of the confusion. It’s a group of people who can’t decide what the thing they do is supposed to be. Is it: Advertising Publicity […] Making the logo pretty […] Mainta ..read more

Over the course of the years, I have written on the practice of chopping up reviewer quotes and fitting things back together to make it sound like the critic enjoyed the show. It is called contextomy, by the way. Thanks to Rainer Glaap who sent me another great example written by reviewer and columnist David Benedict for The Stage. Benedict cites one example where Ben Brantley, former critic for the New York Times and Jesse Green, the person who replaced Brantley, were both recently had reviews of a show quoted even though Brantley left the paper over three years ago. Beneath the words “True ..read more

Seth Godin had posted on the 150th anniversary of Impressionism which is benchmarked from the April 15, 1874 art exhibition organized by a number of artists whose work had been refused by the prestigious Salon de Paris.  The original show by the “Refused,” as Godin terms them, included 31 artists, among them were Claude Monet, Pierre-Auguste Renoir, Edgar Degas, Camille Pissarro, Alfred Sisley, Berthe Morisot and Paul Cézanne. Godin notes that first exhibition was a failure, not even attracting 1% of the Salon show and garnering largely negative reviews. One of the most positive things t ..read more

Yesterday, the Western Arts Federation (WESTAF) sponsored a webinar on accessibility lead by Betty Siegel, Director Office of Accessibility and VSA at The Kennedy Center. Siegel was absolutely fantastic. Her presentation was dynamic, full of relatable examples, and humor. One example she gave as the best sources of information about the history of accessibility was Comedy Central’s Drunk History episode on Judy Heumann’s early advocacy for disability rights. She frequently claimed the Drunk History series was a primary source of information for her. While she did talk about legal and human dig ..read more

Around the start of the year, the group Crappy Funding Practices was created on LinkedIn. Vu Le who writes the Nonprofit AF blog had started calling out the problematic practices of funders on Twitter a few years ago, but with the help of some volunteers, they decided to expand the scope of their activities and started to solicit submissions of bad practices non-profit staff have run up against. A lot of what they call out are things like onerous reporting requirements or twenty page applications requiring world changing results in return for $5000 grant or prohibitions on fundraising for a qu ..read more

h/t Artsjournal.com for linking to a really valuable article on Observer about considering creating a limited liability corporation (LLC) if you are an artist.  I recently created a post on ArtsHacker summarizing some of the ways in which an LLC protects artist’s personal assets in the case of lawsuits and in some cases, divorce proceedings. This excerpt from Observer article summarizes how an artist would operate after forming an LLC: ….but most artists operating as one-man shops set up limited liability companies, according to Powers, where the LLC is the employer and the artist is tec ..read more

I’m not really a big fan of improv, but I was intrigued by the concept of a show called The Worst Cafe in the World, which has transferred from Belfast to Off-Broadway this month. The show is described as: The show actually gives audience members a menu of theatrical moments to choose from, and based on their selections, the cast will piece together the show. Menu items include an inspiring monologue, an improvisation calling for audience involvement and a digital experience focusing on the power of technology. According to a press release, ticket holders should also expect different nightly ..read more

Seth Godin often posts on the theme of generosity.  Looking back at my past posts, I quickly came up with a handful I made about his discussion of the links between generosity, creativity, and leadership. He recently made another post on the theme of fear being self-centered and generosity allowing you to overcome fear. Jumping in the water to save a struggling swimmer stops us from worrying about how we look in our suit or whether the water is cold. And if you’re worried about the customer instead of your quota, making a sales call is easier too. The key scene at the climax of the Wizar ..read more

I recently caught this story about an anthropologist at the University of South Florida (USF) who studied the impact of algae blooms in the Gulf of Mexico and was concerned no one would read her reports which indicated consequences for the tourism industry.  She was concerned no one would read the study and wondered if there was a way to raise awareness. (I am going to say a more accessible title than “Non-linear impacts of harmful algae blooms on the coastal tourism economy” might have helped. However, the story aligns with the recent trend of my posts about the intersection of art and s ..read more