Good, You Have Talent And Imagination...?

OMA - Artist Alliance Quarterly Exchange Patricia Frischer - Good, You Have Talent And Imagination...? is a lecture with critique following on Monday, Nov 5 at 6:30 pm (704 Pier View Way , Oceanside 92054 Larry Vogel 760.435.3720

When lecturing to artist about their marketing plans, I find the most important thing to do first is to manage expectation. Not all artists need to become super stars. Some just want a few sales to build their confidence. Others are passionate about a message that they want to communicate and need an audience. Others are in love with the process of making art and need the challenge of an exhibition to bring out their best. Knowing exactly why you want to show your work is essential so you can rate the experience of marketing and determine what success means individually.  In this presentation, artists were encouraged to think of these goals and not assume that the failure was determined by lack of sales.

There was a full explanation about how to list and use the calendar of the San Diego Visual Arts Network and artists were urged to either have their own websites or join an association that would let them show their work online. It was also demonstrated how to find opportunities like calls to artists on the site.

The last minutes of the lecture were a call for artists to come together and raise their game by curating their own shows at a higher level. Museum level exhibitions have to have not just an excellent level of creativity and technique, they need a theme that is relevant and can be communicated. The show needs the ability to garner sponsorship from within the wider community that might support the museum. It needs to be PR worthy which might mean novel, amusing, unique, and emotional or even showcase recognition of some worthy cause or person. In other words, making good art is just the beginning of a career in the arts.

Holistic Education

Holistic Education: Civic Innovation Challenge for the Innovation Incubator

The US is 26^th in the world in average internet speed. We look out at a powerful ocean but do not harness its energy to be relieved of the need for fossil fuel or convert it to make us fresh water independent. Our infrastructure would be devastated when a large earthquake strikes our region.

The challenge of finding solutions for these problems depends on our creativity and the ability to work as a team and stop political posturing and greed. We do need to develop the ability to really communicate and collaborate.

My civic challenge is how we restructure our educational system in such a way to teach holistically instead of teaching subject by subject. How would the curriculum change, how would the schools physically need to be altered, how would teachers need to communicate in a new way, how would standards need to be responsive to needs instead of an ideal set of criteria?  

San Diego is still like the Wild West, fluid in its development and not as set in its ways as any other large city. That is why it is possible for this to happen here. San Diego could finally take pride in a really remarkable achievement which could be a pilot for a new way of educating in our future.  We could lose the fun and sun only label and take pride in our community on every level.

It appears that many San Diegan have the idea that if we were to become more advanced, we would lose our small town feel and all the cozy comfort that provides. But I see a future where we still have our small communities but we also have the advantage of a true big city. Sophistication does not need to be “either or”. It can be “and”. We don’t need to choose one or the other, but we can be amongst both. For my challenge local and region wide educational bodies would come together. Schools teachers, advisors, administrator, school boards, advocacy group and students and parent would all be impacted.

A small example of a solution would be to devise a way for art studios and science labs to share the same space. Start teaching these subjects together instead of separately. Stop assuming that some people are artists and some are scientist. Both subjects can be learned and learning them together will aid the creative flow.  Working together means solutions to the multitude of large challenges facing us becomes a hopeful activity. 

Do you have a Civic Challenge for innovation? If so, submit it here.