East June 09, 2005  

Cutbacks End Columbia’s Arts Journalism Program

By Simi Horwitz
  
“Nothing that happens in a university is necessary,” says Nicholas Lemann, dean of Columbia University’s Graduate School of Journalism. “If Columbia were destroyed in a terrorist attack, life would go on. The real question isn’t ‘Is a particular program necessary?’ but rather ‘How does it add value?’ And the National Arts Journalism Program was valuable in marrying craft and knowledge in a setting that has access to the arts capital, the best arts journalists, and the rest of Columbia University. The NAJP gave arts journalists context, which helped them understand specifics.”

So why after 11 years is the NAJP closing on July 1? That is a complicated question involving funding cutbacks, personalities, and the byzantine world of academic politics. András Szántó, director of the NAJP, did not want to address the particulars of what happened. Others interviewed for this story were relentlessly circumspect. Participants on all sides asserted that they “understood” and “appreciated” the problems faced by those whose actions they clearly disagree with.

But all agreed that the trouble began when the Pew Charitable Trusts, which had contributed millions of dollars to the program, decided two years ago to put its money elsewhere.

“It was a difficult decision,” says Marian Godfrey, director of civic life initiatives at the Pew Charitable Trusts. “We were proud of the program because it made a strong statement about arts journalism. But having run it for close to 10 years — a long time for any foundation to be involved in any one program — and having spent between $10 million and $11 million, we felt we needed to use our scarce resources in other ways.”

Since 1994, the NAJP has hosted an estimated 130 arts journalists — reporters and critics — from across the country. Admission was competitive; writers accepted into the two-semester program as either senior or midcareer fellows used the resources of Columbia University to study theatre, literature, history, and other subjects and were encouraged to view the city as their campus. A goal of the program was to broaden the knowledge and boost the professionalism of its participants. Some senior fellows were already stars in their fields, like Margo Jefferson and Michael Kimmelman of The New York Times and Harvard’s Robert Brustein, theatre critic for The New Republic. But most fellows, especially at the midcareer level, worked at smaller periodicals, though a fair number moved on to more-prestigious publications following their time at the program.

In addition to its fellowships, the NAJP presented an array of conferences addressing the concerns of nonprofit cultural institutions, arts service organizations, and arts funders. Its final gathering, “Measuring the Muse: Arts Research From the Frontlines,” was held on May 5.

While the Pew Charitable Trusts felt that it had to return to its original mission of funding local artists and arts institutions, during the past two years the organization continued to provide the NAJP with money in the hope that the program could locate other resources. And according to ArtsJournal.com editor-in-chief Douglas McLennan, a former NAJP fellow and a member of its advisory board, those resources were indeed found.

“But when the dean made the decision to discontinue the program, there wasn’t enough money in place,” he says. “And by the time we had come up with funds, he had already made his decision. He was concerned with putting money in an ad hoc way into programs that did not have a major endowment. We were able to fund the program through this year with various projects, but it was just a stopgap.”

Lemann does not dispute McLennan’s contention, stressing that the many non-degree-conferring programs housed at Columbia routinely seek out funding mechanisms that fall outside of tuition. “The Pulitzer Prizes, for example, are fully endowed,” he says. “Foundations fund other programs and typically they run for a few years and then they stop. There’s nothing unusual about it.”

What is unusual is that Columbia, under the leadership of President Lee C. Bollinger, is firmly committed to the arts and to arts journalism in particular. In fact, Bollinger has been instrumental in reshaping the Graduate School of Journalism to provide its graduates with more-specialized training beyond the craft of writing a story. Next semester, for example, the school will offer a master’s degree in the arts.

Of all those interviewed for this story, Randall Bourscheidt, president of Alliance for the Arts, a nonprofit arts advocacy group, is the most openly enraged by the demise of the NAJP. “One of the saddest parts of this story is that Columbia University has failed to save a program that has reflected so well on it,” he says. “Its inability to come up with the money is a failure of judgment. This is a tragic loss for American journalism and the arts community, especially in New York, which has benefited from NAJP’s conferences.”

The Larger Picture

Just as the NAJP is shutting its doors, there is a growing realization at some academic institutions that arts journalists face new challenges today and need special training. Both Boston University and NYU now offer concentrations in cultural reporting, and in July Syracuse University will debut the Goldring Arts Journalism Program, a master’s degree program with concentrations in writing about architecture, film, fine arts, music, and theatre.

Johanna Keller, the program’s director, observes, “The level of expectation has changed in terms of how the arts are covered. Editors complain that critics are not trained journalists, while the critics complain that the editors and publishers don’t understand the arts.” And that lack of training and understanding has brought the profession to a crossroads, giving rise to these new programs.

But the universities are not alone. The National Endowment for the Arts has launched a program for arts critics, who will gather for 10-day to two-week workshops at Duke University, UCLA, and Columbia to address the future of arts criticism in the belief that at many newspapers, the role of the arts critic is either being eliminated or filled by freelance writers. According to Douglas Sonntag, the NEA’s director of national initiatives, “The quality and quantity of criticism is declining.”

NAJP director András Szántó agrees, at least in part. For arts journalism, he says, “it’s the best of times and the worst of times. It’s the worst of times in the uncertainty, anxiety, insecurity, and dislocation facing arts journalists in institutions that are being staffed by outsourced freelancers with pay scales that are comparable to artists. Within news organizations, they’re trying to keep up with an arts world that is being marginalized.

“It is the best of times,” he contends, “in that the universe of arts coverage is expanding in radio, magazines, on the Internet. Self-publishing is unprecedented,” and new technology offers arts writers a host of new venues for their work.

“There are more voices and more points of entry,” he says. “That is a hopeful sign, even if that means there’s also more stupidity. The rising level of arts participation and the increasingly educated and wealthy population are also good signs. But in today’s pluralistic arts world, it’s more confusing and the critic’s role is transforming. The greatest cultural irony of our time is that the diversity and accessibility are enormous. On the other hand, the sense of mission and excitement are no longer there. When the art generates the excitement, the criticism will follow.”

There is still much to explore in the evolving world of arts journalism, he suggests, making the NAJP’s shuttering a particularly numbing blow.

The New Designer Label
By Norman Lebrecht / June 8, 2005
  

If you were starting a business in 2005 which of these would seem the best bet – farming in Zimbabwe, making manual typewriters, or setting up a classical record label? Myself, I’d catch a flight to Harare, but I could be wrong since, amid the ruins of former classical glories there are some pickings to be had and a pair of likely lads with form as long a Bruckner concert are about to try their luck with a designer label.

The partners are wide-eyed survivors of classical wipeout. Chris Craker, a clarinettist in London orchestras, moved into record production then, in 1998, with 400 recordings to his credit, he started a smart label, Black Box, with venture capital from two Tory Lords, Young and Chadlington. Black Box’s unique selling point was living composers ö not a rapid revenue source. After three tough years, Craker sold out to Iron Maiden-owned Sanctuary and took a pause for reflection.

That’s when he met Paul Moseley, 14 years a marketing v-p at Decca where he spent most of his days in corporate meetings pondering the meaning of decline. Moseley had Russell Watson, Hayley Westenra and Bond on his books but he stuck his neck out on occasion for classical projects, earning the respect of artists. Now, like so many others, he was an independent consultant to a disappearing industry.

Together, the pair took a look at the landscape and saw nothing but wasted assets. The key to success in the record business is the name check. If the customer has heard of the artist on the cover he is halfway towards buying the disc, or so the theory goes. Yet here were dozens of big names in their prime unable to get on record. Craker and Moseley decided that if the project was right, they would mortgage their houses to back quality classics.

That’s the notion behind Onyx, a boutique label that launched last week with four discs by well-loved performers. The bubbling American soprano Barbara Bonney sings English and US art songs, accompanied by Malcolm Martineau, Bryn Terfel’s regular sidekick. The august Borodin Quartet, background players at Stalin’s funeral, deliver a 60th anniversary recital with co-founder Valentin Berlinsky still on cello. Both CDs feel like they have a purpose.

The other two releases, though, are a class apart. Viktoria Mullova is a virtuoso violinist who has never quite found the following her talent deserves. One of the last border-flitters from the old Soviet Union, she had a child with Claudio Abbado and another with an orchestral player before settling in Fulham with the eclectic cellist Matthew Barley. On Philips, she recorded most of the great concertos but never sold a bundle. Four years ago, she tried a crossover album with Matthew. Then she took a year off playing to rethink where she was heading. Now she’s back and going for gut.

On Onyx, the once-austere Mullova attacks Vivaldi, bow-hair flying, with the period-instrument Italian band, Il Giardino Armonico. Forget academic authenticity. All Mullova did to meet the band was restring her precious Strad with medieval cat gut instead of modern metal, tone it down a tad to baroque standard (A=415) and borrow an antique-shop bow. The resultant sound is so raw it verges on the bucolic, yet phrasing and articulation are immaculate and the confrontational atompshere is nuclear. This is Vivaldi no holds barred.

Then there is the Pascal Roge project. Roge, 54, is so niche he vanishes between the cracks in floorboards. Styling himself ‘Ambassadeur de la musique francaise,’ he plays nothing else, and like no other pianist alive or dead. He used to record for Decca until they declared him unmarketable. Now he is recording the complete works of Debussy for Onyx, starting with the Preludes, which he plays with a touch so distinctive and a mischief so mechant that when he gets to the God Save the Queen parody in the Samuel Pickwick variation I laughed out loud on three separate hearings. This is a record that sets new benchmarks in French music.

So, can the Onyx method work? By conventional wisdom, not a snowball’s hope in Miami. The majors have a stranglehold on distribution, packing stores with hybrid trash, while the independent classical sector is in worse doldrums than usual with elite Hyperion facing a million-pound bill for a copyright case it unwisely contested to an unnecessary and probably inexorable conclusion; Hyperion will survive, but with deep cuts.

Any new entrant to the market must find a corner amid a rabble of own-label vanity imprints from famous orchestras, composers and concert halls, before facing the apathy of a public that does not fully realise what it lost when mainstream classical recording rolled over and died.

Yet, for all these morbid auguries, things are looking up for Onyx. In the months that he and Moseley were nagging their bank managers, Craker was being headhunted for a different job. Sony Classical was about to merge with BMG and a new boss, Gilbert Hetherwick, wanted Craker to run the UK office. Regime change had overturned Sony Classical. There was to be no more crossover ö it cost too much and earned too little. First casualty is the showy violinist Vanessa-Mae who signed for Sony Classical moments before it collapsed and is now being consigned to one of the group’s lesser pop labels, where she rightly belongs.

Sony-BMG held its first management meeting in Berlin last week. It aims to maintain a moderate classical output in which Craker will contribute ideas and local productions. But could he keep his own label? There was a pause in the process as corporate brains mulled this esoteric conundrum. In the end, Onyx got the best of both worlds.

It is an independent label, run by Craker and Moseley from their dining-room tables, but it will also have major-label distribution and access to proper budgets. If a disc takes off on Onyx, there could be a follow-up on BMG Sony but the project will have the attentiveness and integrity of a craft object.

This, it seems to me, is a pretty good deal. The corps get class artists without the headache of a long-term contract while the creatives get a voice in A&R. It’s an odd arrangement, but it could be a model for some good music making on a very modest scale.

Nelson Mandela sues former lawyer over sale of prints
The statesman says unauthorised works are being sold in his name at exorbitant prices

LONDON. Nelson Mandela is suing his former lawyer over a bitter dispute involving the sale of art prints. The revered South African statesman claims that he has been betrayed by Ismail Ayob, who represented him in the 1970s when he was imprisoned by the Apartheid regime on Robben Island. For many years Mr Ayob remained one of Mr Mandela’s closest confidants.

Until recently, it would have come as a surprise to learn that the South African statesman had turned his hand to art, but Mr Ayob encouraged Mr Mandela to agree to the production of lithographic prints based on his “artworks”. The idea was to raise funds for homeless children and AIDS victims.

Mr Mandela’s side now claims that unauthorised prints are being marketed which bear false signatures. It is argued that these sales are worth millions of dollars. Mr Mandela’s prints typically sold for over $10,000 each until last month.

Now that the case has gone to court, it seems that Mr Mandela’s role as an artist may well have led to the final legal battle in his long political career. As the 86-year-old anti-Apartheid leader explained in papers filed with the Johannesburg high court on 10 May, “having regard to my age, I want to ensure that my affairs are in order”.

The lawyer leading the case for Mr Mandela is George Bizos. He told The Art Newspaper: “Mr Mandela feels strongly about the issues and wants to protect his name, protect the public, and protect the reputation of his philanthropic organisations.” Mr Bizos says that “none” of the money due to the Nelson Mandela Children’s Fund and the Nelson Mandela Foundation has yet been paid.

Activist-turned-artist

The story begins in 2001, when it was suggested to Mr Mandela that he should produce simple works of art which could be turned into lithographic prints to raise funds for charity.

The deal was arranged by Mr Mandela’s then lawyer, Mr Ayob, and papers were signed transferring intellectual property rights to Tinancier, a company controlled by Mr Ayob. Two other companies were also involved in marketing the prints.

Mr Mandela explained to the court: “Ayob has acted in a mala fide manner, leading me to believe that he would comply with my wishes and requests, while pursuing a separate and secret agenda”. He argues “the agreement is invalid because it is so vague and ambiguous as to be all but incoherent”. The former South African president says he was unaware of the legal implications of what he was signing.

Mr Mandela’s personal assistant, Zelda la Grange, commented on the nature of his earlier relationship with his lawyer. “Generally, Mr Ayob would give a short explanation to Mr Mandela about the documents for which he sought his signature. Mr Ayob would say: ‘Chief, this is about this or the other project’. Because of the trust Mr Mandela had in relation to his attorney’s integrity, he would sign documents presented to him by Mr Ayob without difficulty.”

By December 2003 Mr Mandela had become concerned that the limited-edition prints were being sold on a large scale and he therefore withdrew his endorsement, refusing to sign further examples.

Mr Ayob and his business associate, publisher Ross Calder, are now accused of handling “mechanically and photographically reproduced innumerable copies which are being sold at exorbitant prices”. So far up to Rands 40 million ($6 million) is said to be “not accounted” for.

Mr Mandela argues that the “unlawful and illegal activities” surrounding the sale of his lithographs “deceive and mislead unsuspecting members of the public to spend substantial amounts of money on artworks and merchandise in the mistaken belief that I have been involved in their creation”.

The South African statesman is therefore asking the court to rescind the contract and for Mr and Mrs Ayob to be removed from their positions in the Nelson Mandela Trust, the NRM Family Trust and the Mandela Trust. He also wants audited financial statements of the money that went into the trusts and companies that sold the prints. In addition, he wants Mr Ayob and publisher Mr Calder to halt further marketing efforts.

Rebuttal

Those accused by Mr Mandela have not yet made a formal response, but Mr Ayob dismisses the charges against him as “vague and unspecific”. He has also said that “at no stage have I benefited or done anything improper”. Mr Calder, the publisher, has promised to “defend everything in court”. He added, “They’ve told their story, but soon it will be my time”. Formal responses were expected late last month.

Meanwhile galleries marketing the prints, which were not involved in their production, are now having to consider whether to continue to sell them. The Natal-based Mark Gallery, one of seven around the world licensed to sell the prints, withdrew them from sale last month.

A similar decision was taken in London by Belgravia Gallery director Anna Hunter, who is one of the main European distributors. On 9 May the prints were still hanging in the Albemarle Street gallery, at prices of up to £12,500, but by the end of that week, Ms Hunter told us that they had been withdrawn, “until the legal situation is resolved”. Martin Bailey

[BOX]

Tutored by the granddaughter of Apartheid prime minister

Mandela’s first prints in 2001 were The struggle series, a set of lithographs depicting manacled and clenched hands. These were simple line drawings. Although presumably based on Mr Mandela’s ideas, he almost certainly had professional assistance. They were followed by Impressions of Mandela, a pair of works depicting his handprints (the second print was changed slightly to make the image of the African continent appear in the centre of his palm).

In 2003-04 there were two sets of colour lithographs with scenes from the prison where he was incarcerated, each with five images: My Robben Island I and My Robben Island II. A further set of prints which also involved the work of other artists was called The unity series. It was released in January this year at the World Economic Forum at Davos, Switzerland. Mr Mandela says he had no involvement with The unity series—and its release was a major factor behind the current law case.

Print runs were supposed to be limited and Mandela’s celebrity status means that prices were high. For instance, My Robben Island I was an edition of 500 (plus 50 artist’s proofs), and until last month it was being sold by the South African publisher at £49,000, or £75,000 for proofs.

Even before the latest legal row, questions had been raised about the extent of Mr Mandela’s involvement in the art. Belgravia Gallery director Anna Hunter responds that the Robben Island lithographs were made with the help of photographs taken by a professional under Mr Mandela’s supervision. Mr Mandela then drew simple images based on, but not traced from, the photographs. He is said to have coloured each of the seven separations on tracing paper. Production of the lithographs was done under Professor Stephen Inggs at the Michaelis School of Fine Art at the University of Cape Town.

The South African publisher admits that Mr Mandela was “tutored” by Varenka Paschke, the granddaughter of Apartheid Prime Minister P.W. Botha, who ultimately released Mr Mandela from prison in 1990. An examination of the prints suggests a professional hand at work: the colouring is bold and freely applied. Most amateur artists would have done the job more neatly, by adding the colour right up to the edges of the black outlines, although this would have been less effective.

It is difficult to believe that the aged and extremely busy statesman would really have been able to master a new skill when he was well into his eighties. But in lending his name to the prints, Mr Mandela was following a long artistic tradition of relying on a studio—this began in the 14th century and is carried on today by artists such as Damien Hirst. M.B.

  
   Friday, 10 June 2005

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