Visual arts

Danny Newman, who died last year (2007) at the age of eighty-eight, was a major post- World War II patron of the arts, but his contributions were not personal checks. Rather, they lay in helping arts companies—theaters, orchestras, dance groups, operas—build strong, committed audiences, providing the sound financial basis they needed to survive and flourish. His major tool was the promotion of subscriptions, a wide-ranging effort embodied in his book Subscribe Now! Building Arts Audiences through Dynamic Subscription Promotion.

2005, 363 pages. Published by Rutgers University Press, 100 Joyce Kilmer Avenue, Piscataway, NJ, 08854, (800) 848-6224, www.rutgerspress.rutgers.edu

2007, 103 pages. University of New South Wales Press Ltd, Sydney, Australia www.unswpress.com.au (publisher); Sherman Contemporary Art Foundation, Paddington NSW (sponsor). Available through Hopkins Fulfillment Services, University of Washington Press, (800) 537-5487

2008, 328 pages. Published by University of California Press

Crossing Borders and Boundaries was the theme of the GFE Conference in 2007, and shortly after the GFE and GIA conferences and the Arts and Education Weekend, I left for a trip to Asia including visits to Thailand, Cambodia, and Hong Kong. The GFE conference underscored the fact that one of the most important skills needed now is to be globally literate, which is pretty much being neglected in schools at the moment.

According to some, "the word twain has its origin in the Old English twegen, meaning two. The phrase never the twain shall meet was used by Rudyard Kipling, in his Barrack-room ballads, 1892: 'Oh, East is East, and West is West, and never the twain shall meet.'" Kipling uses a colonial lens to bemoan the lack of commonality and accord between the British and the indigenous East Indian. Until my recent trip to New Mexico I often felt that same lack of accord between arts funders and education funders.

There are few moments in life when you get to experience a series of "firsts." That thought occurred to me in the Albuquerque airport as a first-time visitor to New Mexico, as well as a first-time attendee to both the GFE and GIA conferences.

Accountability vs. Trust

2007, 113 pages. Leveraging Investments in Creativity, 450 West 37th St., Suite 502, NY, NY 10018, (646) 731-3275, www.lincnet.net