Ben Cameron Speaks Out
Dunkirk NY – I got this from Scott’s blog, but rather than link to it, I thought it was worthy of being posted right here. Ben Cameron is the Program Director for the Arts at the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation and former Theatre Communications Group director, and in this talk he speaks about the future of the arts that points the way towards a more de-centralized and participatory model. It’s passionate and, interestingly enough, it uses the same analogy I used concerning the effect that the Protestant Reformation had on “de-Catholicizing” the western Europe mindset of the day.
The Indie Theatre Ghetto
Dunkirk NY – Before I get too far into this post, I am going to let you look at this particular graphic for a bit. Take your time with it.
source: The NY Innovative Theatre Fund Demographic Survey of OOB Practitioners
Notice anything interesting about it? I thought the most interesting aspect of this graphic was the fact that, while 77% of OOB theatre practitioners are white, only 45% of the population of New York City is white. And just as striking are the figures below it: while 27% of NYC’s population is Black/African American, only 5% of OOB theatre people are Black/African American. Although not in this graphic, the numbers for the Hispanic community mirror those of the African American numbers.
Something else from the NY Innovative Theatre Fund survey was interesting to me as well (this data is not, by the way, a part of the published study. I asked for the additional breakdown). It’s the fact that 32% of OOB theatre practitioners come from the tri-state region of NY (24%), NJ (6%) and CT (2%). The data does not give us where in the state those people come from, so we don’t know exactly what their proximity to NYC is, but regardless, what it also means is that 68% of all OOB practitioners originally came from outside the NYC metropolitan region (actually, the percentage is probably higher, because while the data says that 24% of them are from NY state, it does not say how many of those 24% are native to the five boroughs or Westchester/Rockland/Nassau counties). But once they get to New York, they live in the city. 93% live in NY State, while 91% live in one of the five boroughs. In terms of borough breakdown, it’s 52% Manhattan, 30% Brooklyn, 16% Queens, and the rest of the remaining 2% split between the Bronx and Staten Island. Continue Reading »
