Category Archives: collaboration

Let’s work together on digital

On August 31, from 1 to 2:30 pm Eastern (10 to 11:30 am Pacific), our next online convening to discuss current digital projects and those in development takes place. Let us know you are joining in: What’s Your Digital Project? – Part 2

Through the Digital Innovation Council for the Performing Arts, CAPACOA has shared  draft plans for Phase 2 of the Digital Innovation Council for the Performing Arts. These are a  series of potential digital projects identified over the course of Phase 1, Digitizing the Performing Arts: An Assessment of Opportunities, Issues and Challenges.

We know several people/organizations are looking at data strategies, especially semantic web and semantic web automation to enhance live event discoverability, business back-end platform improvements and perhaps revolutions, and more.

Participants in these conversations are moving to digital actions; sorting out what they want to do next and how to collaborate with a profound spirit of generosity. We all figure funding for the truly worthy breakthrough digital projects will follow. For some a key avenue for public funds will be through their eligibility for the Canada Council for the Arts’ Digital Strategy Fund, that will become available in the fall of 2017. Others may need to follow a tech start up model. It is a brave new world we are beginning to inhabit and get our bearings.

Join the conversation, listen in, meet potential collaborators: What’s Your Digital Project? – Part 2

Published! Digitizing the Performing Arts: An Assessment of Opportunities, Issues and Challenges

The thrill of release! Yes, we published today our latest national report – already billed as landmark 😉 – titled  Digitizing the Performing Arts: An Assessment of Opportunities, Issues and Challenges. It is also available in French:  La numérisation des arts du spectacle : Évaluation des possibilités, des enjeux et des défis.

I hope that this assessment provides a springboard for new conversations and digital capacity in the presenting field.

The question at the core of this work is who will be the digital intermediaries for the performing arts; and whether the presenting field can carve out a digital space that supports and benefits the entire performing arts eco-system. Doing so, I think, would require both a transfer and an expansion of the arts presenting expertise we see on the theatre platform to new digital platforms.

Presenters historically have been the dominant platform where performing arts and audiences connect. The theatre, stage or the festival site literally act as a platform. With that, this report seeks to begin to answer – or at least inform – big questions:

  • Can live arts presenters re-invent distribution of performing arts at digital scale?
  • How will Canadian artistic talent be nurtured and supported to grow viable careers and earn fair compensation in the digital realm?
  • How can we, and should we, as a free, vibrant society assure a broad diversity of voices that reflect all of Canada is heard in digital spaces as well as live performance spaces?
  • What is the future of live Canadian theatre, dance, music and other performing arts as digital technologies and capacities of data networks continue to advance?

This report by CAPACOA and Strategic Moves is the culmination of several years of conversations that emanated from our study on The Value of Presenting: A Study of Performing Arts Presentation in Canada. We are grateful for an initial round of financial support from Canadian Heritage to undertake this assessment.

On a personal note, I so appreciate and enjoy working with my colleague-client, Frédéric Julien, Director of Research and Development at CAPACOA. He is a tireless advocate in the arts; and equal parts smart, rigorous in his thinking and affable. Thank you, Frédéric, for your work and your collaboration!

Digital Innovation in Performing Arts Presentation

On Monday March 13, CAPACOA and Strategic Moves will facilitate an interactive web conversation on Digital Innovation in Performing Arts Presentation. Everyone is welcome to participate (10 am Pacific/1 pm Eastern).

My colleague, Frederic Julien at CAPACOA just  published a post with very high level summaries of recent events and reports from the perspective of the performing arts: http://capacoa.ca/en/news/field/1517-digital-conversation-intensifies.
You can also watch this video to get a good idea about some of the context that drives this conversation in the performing arts today. https://vimeo.com/channels/capacoa/119598467
Or simply flip through the Powerpoint version here: http://www.strategicmoves.ca/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/Breaking-the-Fifth-Wall_Final.pptx

New study on the arts in rural communities examines three regions in Canada

“The specific characteristics of the performing arts eco-system matter to whether they can fuel vibrant rural communities.” With this hypothesis in mind, I have been investigating whether there are common criteria or success indicators for building a sustainable, rural arts community. This exploratory research draws on existing literature about arts in rural communities as well as my work with organizations in rural communities from coast to coast to coast. In this initial phase of the study I focus on three communities: Haliburton County, Ontario; Temiskaming Shores, Ontario; and Wells, BC.

I will present findings from this new study for the first time at the SPARC Symposium taking place in Haliburton from October 27 to 30, 2016.

My work with SPARC goes back to 2014: I presented a keynote at the first SPARC Symposium in April 2014 on “Co-creating a Culture of Place in Rural Communities.” Then SPARC invited me to co-facilitate the SPARC Network Summit in November 2014. In my ongoing consulting practice I also work with small, rural and remote communities to help strengthen local capacities and capabilities.

A key goal of the SPARC 2016 Symposium (a project of the SPARC Network) is to create an environment where people can network: exchange ideas, find opportunities for collaboration, discuss solutions to tricky problems and identify big ideas. Attendees will have an opportunity to meet people engaged in the performing arts from rural communities throughout the province and across the country.

Whether your goals are professional development, learning strategies to attract new audiences, innovative approaches to sustainability, opportunities for information exchange, or developing creative methods for marketing campaigns or mentoring programs, it is SPARC’s belief that this year’s program will facilitate them: http://www.sparcperformingarts.com/sparc-symposium-2016/

See you in Haliburton next month!

Art is fuel: Community engagement in the CRD

The Capital Regional District (CRD) Arts Service is poised to begin a broad-based community engagement and consultation process to identify key implementation strategies designed to achieve the goals of the CRD 2015-18 Strategic Arts Plan.

I am thrilled that the CRD Arts Service has hired Strategic Moves and my project team to undertake this work. I am excited to get to know the communities and people of southern Vancouver Island better.

With the contract signed last week, we are putting everything in place for a round of pre-consultation sessions. On June 23 and 24, we will undertake a series of four sessions with as wide a range of people active in the local arts community and those interested in developing the arts in the CRD as are available. I know it is going to be short notice for some, but it is better than a July or August date when vacation season creates only more challenges. We will use this pre-consultation to introduce the project, our team and to gather initial feedback and input on the community engagement and consultation process itself. In my view, our job is to listen closely to the community as we build together a strong, meaningful and relevant implementation plan.

These pre-consultation sessions represent the beginning of a 6 months long process where those interested in the arts in the CRD will have several opportunities to make their voices heard and their ideas count about their priorities for key implementation activities the CRD should consider adopting over the next 3 years. We’ll reach out and invite the full diversity of artists and arts organization and communities throughout this process.

These last few days my working hours have been consumed with briefings, document reviews, planning more briefings with the Arts Committee of the Arts Service and the newly formed project Steering Committee, and planning these pre-consultation sessions.

As with all large projects with many different stakeholders, I expect deep conversations, vigorous discussions and healthy debate. It is the best way we have to ensure that the results of this process are solid and meaningful to the local arts community and the CRD communities at large.

In a word, as art is fuel, I am stoked.

Inspiration reverberates

Check out Emma Jarrett’s latest blog post on Sustainable Connection inspired by the Northern Exposure conference last month in Wells, BC.

I enjoyed working with her and we had some great conversations about authentic presenting. Her performance coaching practice applies to anyone who gets to work with a microphone, not only musicians.

Taking steps to understand digital potential in the performing arts

CaptureAt the CAPACOA conference in Halifax this past January, attendee feedback suggested that I made a compelling case for Breaking the Fifth Wall: Digitizing the Performing Arts. Indeed, attendees were buzzing with the challenges and opportunities presented. Others who have watched the presentation online have asked me how they can get involved. You can watch my talk here on video. In it, I weave together a case for sector-leadership and sector-ownership in developing a future digital platform. I am most excited about digitization beyond the 2-D screens we have today. In particular, I believe a future-oriented perspective requires us to contemplate live-streaming/streaming 3-D renderings; holographic and or virtual reality convergence in technologies. Things most of us have never seen but enabling technology solutions are advancing rapidly.digitalPost

In this talk I offered a brief context of digital transformation in the last 20 years, an overview of experiments in digital performing arts presentation from around the world, a perspective on what it take to transform the challenging economic model that persists in live performing arts for the presenting field in particular, and a call to action.

At the upcoming CAPACOA national conference in Ottawa from November 25 to 28 I hope to turn that buzz into tangible action: Together with CAPACOA, we invite you talk about the next steps we as a sector want to take to drive this discussion forward and explore opportunities of digital distribution at scale in Canada and beyond. Can we establish a working group to spearhead conversations and build sector leadership on this central issue? Who wants to be and needs to get involved?

I am looking forward to facilitating this conversation on November 26  at 8 am.