ArtSake

This January-May, a group of artist-entrepreneurs will hold a series of workshops in Jamaica Plain called Focusing Your Art Career. We’re delighted to welcome one of the workshop leaders, Jessica Burko, to share keen insights into optimizing your online presence as an artist.

Getting More Out of Getting Online by Jessica Burko

So, you make stuff.

You are an artist/designer/craftsperson/artisan. You also have a blog/website/online shop and frequently update your Twitter/Facebook/LinkedIn/Pinterest feed/page/profile/boards. You stay connected with your fellow creative professionals using your MacBook/iPad/smart phone and you feel like you are doing everything right, but the sales/press/shows aren’t increasing like you thought they would by now.

Huh.

It sounds like you are keeping up with the latest greatest technology, but not really utilizing it to its full potential to maximize your full potential. Don’t get lost in an avalanche of meaningless chatter while you engage, just be sure to update regularly, make targeted connections, and create significant dialogue. Closer attention to what you are doing online, in addition to where and when you are doing it, will help you focus and make the most of your time.

Instead of… spending all day tweeting your every move
Try… tweeting consistently but meaningfully by sharing relevant news and links about your work and the work of others in your field.

Instead of… posting photos of your nephew’s birthday party on Facebook
Try… creating a fan page that you update several times a week with new work.

Instead of… blogging about irrelevant topics
Try… publishing articles related to the type of work that you do, or a how-to article with step-by-step photos.

Instead of… friending every unknown who sends you a request
Try… just friending people you know personally, would like to know, or people who are in your field.

Instead of… following everyone who follows you
Try… to follow only those people who tweet items meaningful to you, and make sure to occasionally retweet what they share.

Having a strong online presence can be extremely beneficial to your art, no matter what type of media you explore. The key is to make the most of your time online, and not get distracted by the everything swirling around you. Falling down a rabbit hole is very easy to do with so many connections leading here, there, and everywhere. If you find that you’re spending too much time friending your pals from kindergarten, and not enough time in your studio making your actual artwork, try setting a timer so that you spend only a specified amount of time online, and the rest of your day using your hands for more tangible endeavors.

Generating opportunities takes effort, and marketing what you do to the right audience is more than half the battle. Online networking is an excellent way to increase your visibility, create buzz, gain sales, and expand your circle to lead to any number of exciting new paths. You may be the master of your virtual domain, but there are lots of other ways to market your work and develop your professional muscles while you flex your texting thumbs. There’s a new series of marketing and business workshops for creative entrepreneurs called The Focusing Series.

Developed by Boston artist Anna Koon, this series includes such pertinent topics as, How to Setup and Sell Online, Time Management for Creative People, The Art of Branding and Photo-Documenting Your Art. For a PDF with full details on this series click here.

Jessica Burko is a professional artist, independent curator, and the Executive Director of Boston Handmade. Beyond exhibiting, selling, and promoting her own artwork she has worked as a professional Arts Marketer since 1997 and since 2002 has operated Burko Design offering marketing and PR services to artists and arts organizations to assist them in achieving their professional goals. Burko is located in Boston, MA, has a BFA in Photography from the Rhode Island School of Design, and an MFA in Imaging Arts & Sciences from the Rochester Institute of Technology.

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Throughout her creative life, Christian McEwen‘s (Playwriting Fellow ’11) encounters in art and literature have taught her a deceptively simple lesson: slow down. The writer, who has worked in poetry, prose, film, and theater, recently published a new book, World Enough & Time: On Creativity and Slowing Down (Bauhan Publishing, 2011), about how slowing the pace of life can lead to breakthroughs in learning, wellness, and – perhaps most pertinent to artists – creativity.

We asked Christian if we could share a section of her new book, as well as some of the tactics she suggests for expanding creativity through a more measured mode of living.

A TINY STONE, A FISH
When I spoke with Thomas Clark at his home in Pittenweem, I asked if there were any assignment, any special “homework” he might propose for an apprentice poet of today. His answer startled me.

“I would ask the young poet to choose some simple task, something very ordinary and non-utilitarian, and ask them to repeat it at regular intervals. For example, one might climb a hill, pick up a stone, carry it back down, and then take it back up the hill the following day.”

The task would be pointless in and of itself. But doing it would create what Clark called “a continuum,” a context in which small events could resonate: a counter-story to the larger, public one.

Clark’s response sounded a little crazy to me at first. But the more I considered it, the more I came to see it as a kind of koan, one of those wise, unsettling conundrums from which, with luck and diligence, a certain striking revelation may emerge. “To learn something new,” said the naturalist John Burroughs, “take the path today that you took yesterday.” All professions have need of such devoted practitioners, willing to push past their own boredom, their own comfortable familiarity, in order to arrive at something new. As Proust once said, “The true journey of discovery consists not in seeking new landscapes, but in having fresh eyes.”

One thinks of Goethe, who trained himself to watch leaves as they grew, remembering each stage with such clarity that he could actually “see” their metamorphosis. One thinks of Denise Levertov, in her last years, addressing poem after poem to the peak of Mount Rainier, just visible above the rooftops of Seattle. Above all, perhaps, one thinks of the Swiss zoologist Louis Agassiz, and the extraordinary assignment he once gave a student.

In 1859, when Nathaniel Shaler applied to study at the Harvard laboratories, he was sent to Agassiz for an entrance exam. The first part of this had to do with languages and scientific classification, and Shaler passed with flying colors. He also trounced Agassiz in an impromptu fencing match. The second half of the exam was both simpler and more complicated. If focused on a certain preserved fish.

“I want you to examine this,” said Agassiz, presenting him with a fish in a tin pan. “I’d like you to find out everything you can, without damaging the specimen.”

Obediently, Shaler set to work. He expected Agassiz to return within a couple of hours. But Agassiz did not come back. Not that day, nor even that same week. Shaler kept on patiently, studying the fish, and on the seventh day, Agassiz finally put in an appearance.

“Well?” he asked.

Shaler pointed to all the details he had learned about the fish: its teeth, its jaws, its fins and scales and so on. Agassiz listened carefully. “That’s not right,” he said. And once again he vanished for an entire week.

Shaler returned, disconsolate, to his tin pan. Was Agassiz completely crazy? Perhaps he should have let him win that fencing match? But even while he puzzled over the professor’s methods, Shaler began to recognize how much he was benefiting from them. Each day he was learning more and more about that fish, a hundred times more than had originally seemed possible. And by the time he was accepted at Harvard (after a further two months of disentangling a box of mixed fish bones, and reassembling them into their different species) no one could have said that he was not truly qualified.

Tactics

• Choose any routine activity and allow it to become an end in itself. Pay attention to how this feels.
• Make a list of slow activities: a long train ride, a hand-written letter, gardening, etc. If possible, do at least one such “slow thing” every week.
• Buy a small notebook and carry it about with you at all times. Look and listen, write down what people say.

Christian McEwen, reprinted with permission from
World Enough & Time (Bauhan Publishing, 2011)

Hear an interview with Christian on the radio show Writer’s Life.

Christian McEwen has upcoming readings on November 3, 6:30 PM, with Mark Statman at the Teachers & Writers Collaborative in New York, NY; November 10, 6 PM, at Boswell’s Books in Shelburne Falls; November 13, 4 PM, at Grace Church in Amherst (short reading and presentation); November 17, 7 PM, at Sky Lake Lodge in Rosendale, NY.

Christian also runs workshops on writing, creativity, and “slowing down” (those interested in hosting a future workshop should contact the artist). Upcoming workshops: January 27-29, 2012, Rowe Camp and Conference Center in Rowe, MA; February 25, 2012, 10 AM-3 PM, Genesis Spiritual Life and Conference Center in Westfield, MA; March 1-11, 2012, Zen Mountain Monastery in Mount Tremper, NY.

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Artist Ann Wessman has created an installation born from love – and pain. Tonight, Friday, October 14, from 5:30-7:30 Ann will be at the Kingston Gallery for a reception.

My brother David died of HIV/AIDS in 1996. He had been diagnosed in 1985 and was considered a “long term survivor” among that huge first wave of young gay men infected in the early 80′s.

While he was relatively healthy for eight years, the period from 1993-1996 was fraught with intermittent unbearable suffering. During that time I for some reason keep telling myself, “do not forget this.”

It has been 15 years since David died. I watched him descend into dementia as a result of central nervous system lymphoma, a symptom of AIDS. I also watched my 102 year old grandmother lose her memory in the last year of her long life and I watched my mother succumb to Alzheimer’s disease and a broken heart.

As I witness my own memory faltering, in what I assume is the normal aging process, I have become interested in the idea of memory and how it is maintained, particularly in the digital age of fragmentation, sound bites, etc.

How will we remember in the future, will it look different than it does today?

This exhibition is dedicated to the memory of my brother, David Christopher Peters, 1955-1996, and to all we have lost to AIDS.

- Ann Wessman

Ann Wessman- Memory·Loss
Kingston Gallery through October 30, 2011

Image credit: All images are by Ann Wessman.

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In May 2011, artists Tim Devin and David Taber organized a conference in Cambridge called Play-Jurisms, exploring the complex thicket of copyright, appropriation, and ethics in the work of contemporary artists. We asked the two collaborators to share their observations from that weekend, which approached the idea of creative property from all angles.

How does copyright really work? How can you protect your creations from being stolen? How much of another person’s work can you include in your own before getting into trouble?

We started talking about appropriation last fall. The more we looked into it, the more interested we became – and the more we learned how complex it was. We figured that other creative people in the area would want to know about these things as well, so we organized Play-Jurisms. The conference took place May 21- 22, 2011, at the Democracy Center in Cambridge. All of the sessions were free, and all of the speakers were volunteers.

Two intellectual properties lawyers led things off. Between them, they delivered easy-to-understand explanations of intellectual property law as it relates to creative work, and provided an incredible amount of background information.

Miguel Danielson, principal at Danielson Legal LLC, began by explaining some basics including what copyright is and how it is enforced. He told us that every expression that “shows a modicum of creativity” and is “expressed on a tangible medium” is automatically copyrighted. The phonebook, for example, is not copyrightable. Even though copyright is an automatic right, if you want to make sure you have undisputed standing in court, it is best to register your work with the US Copyright Office, which costs $35.

Danielson also spoke about legal provisions for fair use. Fair use exceptions to copyright law allow for the use of other peoples’ work for educational purposes; commentary; parody (comedy that mocks the original work – but not satire, which makes broader social statements); or “transformative” uses that create a unique work. One important limit to fair use is that the new use cannot have a “negative market impact” on the original work, he said.

In general, he said, case law does not provide a particularly clear guide for how future copyright disputes will turn out.

Danielson’s presentation is available here. The examples he used are worth checking out – including a case that pitted 2 Live Crew against Roy Orbison, and one involving Demi Moore’s body and Leslie Nielsen’s head.

Sheri Mason, who is an associate at Morse Barnes-Brown and Pendleton PC, and is the Director of Legal Services at the Volunteer Lawyers for the Arts, presented next.

Discussing recent trends in copyright law, Mason said the courts have been increasingly tough on people using “fair use” defenses in recent years. In particular, she cited Richard Prince V. Patrick Cariou, in which the court found that Prince’s alterations of Cariou’s photographs were not transformative.

Mason also discussed recent developments in moral rights – rights explicitly offered to visual artists in the United States under the Visual Artists’ Right Act of 1990, and given to other creators to some extent through other laws. Moral rights include the right to be credited and its opposite, the right to publish work anonymously or under a pseudonym. They also include the right to the “integrity” of visual works; that is, the right not to have your work mutilated, distorted, or modified. There are limits to moral rights, however. For example, Mason spoke about a case where landscape design was found to not be copyrightable, and therefore not protected from mutilation.

Mason also discussed Creative Commons – a license that allows others to use your work for free, as long as they agree to certain conditions. (Such conditions could include making the new work available for reuse as well, or not reusing the original work for profit.) Creative Commons works are still copyrighted, but the creator is voluntarily giving up some rights, she said.

Next, we heard from James O’Keefe, the founder of the Massachusetts Pirate Party, a newly formed political party that pushes for copyright-reform and open government.

O’Keefe spoke about how copyright had evolved, and why the way it is now isn’t necessarily the best thing for us. He began by telling us how copyright had been created in Europe to protect religious and political interests, then business interests, rather than individual creators’ rights. He then talked about extensions of copyright that we’ve seen since the early 20th Century in the U.S. – from 14 years to life-of-the-author plus 70 years – pushed for by corporations, particularly one seeking to protect a particular large-eared cartoon character.

O’Keefe made the important point that culture is what has come before, and for culture to move on, we must build on that past. As copyright bars more and more uses of previously created material, it bars what forms culture can take. (Here’s O’Keefe’s presentation.)

We finished up the first day by watching Craig Baldwin’s documentary Sonic Outlaws. This film explores the legal issues around Negativland‘s parody of U2 and Casey Casem. It also included a number of interviews and short vignettes about other copyright-questioning artists such as John Oswald and the Barbie Liberation Organization.

The next day started with Don Schaefer, an artist and artists’ rights advocate. He is part of the Massachusetts Artists Leaders Coalition and is the founder of Pro-Imaging, an international group aimed at promoting artists’ rights.

Schaefer argued in favor of copyright, saying that while its current iteration is a “bad performance,” protection is necessary to ensure that creative people are reimbursed for their time and effort. “We live in a predatory culture,” he said. “There’s no reason for us to be predatory towards each other.”

Schaefer recommended that people collaborate, instead of appropriating from each other; besides being a legal alternative to appropriation, collaboration helps build community, and can lead to further creative opportunities.

After Schaefer, we had a panel discussion about appropriation. On the panel were Danny Mekonnen, Dirk Adams, and Alana Kumbier.

Mekonnen, founder of the Debo Band, a local Ethiopian group, discussed the ethics of cultural appropriation. Mekonnen, himself an Ethiopian-American, spoke of appropriation as being a potentially meaningful exchange and bridge between cultures. During his career, he has worked with a number of Ethiopian musicians here and in Ethiopia. His group has covered their songs, and given them credit. Part of the importance of his work, he said, involves giving recognition and credit to older artists; he also believes in educating his audience about Ethiopian culture.

In his opinion, talk about appropriation as all-or-nothing isn’t right – the reality is more nuanced. Borrowing is fine, but hiding where you borrowed it from is problematic. (Mekonnen explores this idea further in this article.)

Dirk Adams spoke next. Adams is a performance and sound artist, and is also half of the multimedia group Gang Clan Mafia. He said we live in a pervasive information culture, where media has become part of our language. Since this is our culture, it doesn’t make sense to not refer to that culture in creative work. He uses snippets of pop culture to tell stories and create sensations through his work, which he wouldn’t be able to do without appropriating those snippets.

The third panelist was queer burlesque performer and zine-maker Alana Kumbier. Kumbier told us about a zine she edited called “Because the Boss belongs to us” and a cabaret show she’d put together called “Queers Do the Boss.” During the cabaret event, performers did imaginative interpretations of Bruce Springsteen songs. The zine told stories about Springsteen’s influence in the writers’ lives. Kumbier viewed the event (and book) as commentary and social satire, and therefore completely defensible. She said being able to freely discuss and interpret the work of iconic cultural figures who have influenced us is important for self-expression and self-understanding.

The panel raised a number of interesting issues. For instance, do the ethics of appropriation change if the performer is or isn’t making money? Second, there are two ways to reimburse the original creator – through a change of money, and through attribution, which helps get the original creators’ name and work out to a larger audience? In recent history, being reimbursed with money has been the primary goal – but is money really more important than attribution?

After the panel, we had a workshop by Heather McCann and Alana Kumbier. McCann and Kumbier are both librarians, and are part of Boston Radical Reference, a group of librarians who offer their help for free to cultural and left-leaning groups. For Play-Jurisms, they had created an online reference guide listing sites that had legal, free sound, video, and images that creatives can use.

After a short break, we had some free food, and then saw two performances. The first was by Gang Clan Mafia, who performed their new piece, created for the event, called “Gang Clan Mafia Sing Happy Birthday to You, Pac Man.” The piece involved sampled and sequenced sound snipped, as well as video and performance actions.

Factory Seconds, a Somerville-based brass band, closed out the weekend. Dressed in their teal-and-black colors, they played fun and imaginative interpretations of familiar tunes.

- David Taber and Tim Devin

Tim Devin is a Somerville-based artist. His projects have involved community, public space, books, zines, maps, walking tours, and giving things away for free. Tim is a member of the Rise Industries art group, and is on the board of the Somerville Arts Council.

David Taber lives in Somerville, plays low-brass for the Factory Seconds, occasionally writes zines, and thinks much about politics, culture, how to write fiction. Full time, he is a reporter at a newspaper in Boston.

All images courtesy of Tim Devin and David Taber.

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Recently, Peter Snoad (Playwriting Fellow ’09) had a highly successful run of his new play… nearly 1,000 miles from here. We’ve invited Peter to guest blog about the experience, as well as the trials and tribulations of bringing a new play to the stage, be it here in Massachusetts or elsewhere on the map.

A Time of ‘Crisis’
“So when is it going to be done here?”

That’s a question I’m often asked by friends and neighbors in Boston when a play of mine is being produced out of town. Most recently it was my new comedy, Identity Crisis, which had its first staged reading by the New Provincetown Players at Provincetown Theatre last year, and received a workshop production in January at Centre Stage in Greenville, South Carolina.

Greenville? It may not strike a chord with many theatre aficionados in our neck of the woods. But Greenville has been named one of the 100 Best Arts Towns in America. Nestled in the foothills of the Appalachians, and once known as the “textile capital of the world,” the city has remade itself, literally and figuratively, in the last 20 years. It’s now a thriving little cultural mecca, with a renovated and vibrant downtown that sits astride the rambling Reedy River and its scenic waterfalls. Greenville boasts no less than four theatre companies, two large performing arts/events centers that regularly feature national touring companies, a resident symphony orchestra, a light opera, a bevy of artists’ studios and galleries, a dozen or more ethnic restaurants (Persian anyone?), and a minor league baseball team, the Greenville Drive, that’s a Boston Red Sox affiliate. (Greenville has another Boston sports connection: Kevin Garnett of the Celtics is a native of nearby Mauldin. Also born-and-bred in Greenville: Keith Lockhart of the Boston Symphony.)

Centre Stage, with its modern 285-seat theatre, has developed a national reputation for fostering new plays. Since 2002, it has run an annual New Play Festival, attracting hundreds of scripts from playwrights across the country and overseas. The four selected finalists are brought to Greenville on the theatre’s dime and their plays receive a rehearsed staged reading with a local director and actors. The winning play is produced as a workshop production, generally the following season, with the author receiving a percentage of the box office in line with industry standards for a regular production. (In many contests, the production of the play is the prize, so Centre Stage is respectfully generous by comparison. Also, the “workshop” designation leaves open the possibility of the playwright landing the highly prized “world premiere” with a theatre in a larger market.)

Under the leadership of festival chair Brian Haimbach, who teaches theatre at Greenville Technical College, the New Play Festival has developed a growing local following. My first experience of it was in 2006 with my play, Guided Tour, which won the festival that year. The staged reading for Guided Tour attracted 50 people; last October, the audience for Identity Crisis was three times that number. Plus, with funding support from the Dramatists Guild of America, the professional association of those who write or compose for the theatre, Centre Stage now has a playwright-in-residence for the week-long festival. Last year, it was the talented and generous Deborah Breevort (Women of Lockerbie, The Poetry of Pizza). Deborah was on hand at each of the readings to offer her thoughts on the play and to lead audience discussion; later she gave each playwright personal feedback on her/his work. Audience members were given a role in choosing the festival winner by filling out a brief evaluation form after each reading.

Before Identity Crisis was read, I was a tad anxious about what people would make of it. The play is a comedy about race and identity that imagines a growing phenomenon that no one wants to talk about: white people are turning black. Well, as it turned out, my fears were unfounded. The audience – diverse but mostly white and older – laughed a lot, and many were quite effusive in their praise on the evaluation forms.

After Identity Crisis was declared the winner of the festival, we quickly went into gear to plan for the workshop production in January. I was delighted to learn that Peter Saputo, who had directed the reading of Identity Crisis, was willing to direct the full production, too. A veteran actor and director with more than more than 40 years of stage and film experience, Peter had helmed the first production of Guided Tour at Centre Stage in 2007. He did a brilliant job, he’s a consummate collaborator, and I was thrilled that we’d be working together again on Identity Crisis – albeit mostly at long distance via e-mail and phone because I couldn’t take time from my day job to attend rehearsals.

All shows have their moments (or periods) of crisis before everything somehow magically comes together (or not, as the case may be.) But Identity Crisis endured one quite unexpected bump in the road: the weather. Accustomed to the balmy low 50′s this time of year, Greenville got clobbered with a freak snow and ice storm five days before we opened. Cast and crew couldn’t get their cars out. The streets of Greenville were ice-rinks. Two precious days of rehearsal – in production week – were lost.

Thomas Azar (left) as Alan and Jason Farr as Frankie in a scene from the Centre Stage production of IDENTITY CRISIS. (Photo: Wofford Jones)

Still, the show must go on, and it did. We had a stellar cast, a great stage crew, and under Peter Saputo’s skillful and creative direction, Identity Crisis came to life with brio. We had only one published review – the winter storm’s aftermath kept other critics away – but it was positive (“a clever, funny script… a great way to get out of the cold and warm up with some laughs.”) And clearly word-of-mouth helped build the box office: almost 900 people saw the show, and the last of the seven performances was the best attended (190). Not too shabby for a brand new play by an author with next to no name recognition. All in all, it was a very satisfying experience. And once again, the Centre Stage folks excelled with their kind hospitality. They respect playwrights and they treat you right.

So what’s next for Identity Crisis? I’d love to get it done in my hometown, obviously. But it’s tough. Yes, there’s a burgeoning new play culture in Boston, and a number of theatres, large and small, mainstream and fringe, produce at least some new work. By my calculation, these include (in alphabetical order): the Actors Shakespeare Project, American Repertory Theatre, Another Country Productions, Apollinaire Theatre, Boston Actors Theater, Boston Playwrights Theatre, Central Square Theatre, Centastage, Company One, Huntington Theatre, New Repertory Theatre, The Orfeo Group, and Whistler in the Dark. And in recent years, some established companies have made institutional commitments to nurture local playwrights and new work; for example, the Huntington has a Playwriting Fellows program and a “Breaking Ground” reading series. Meanwhile, seasoned and budding playwrights alike continue to have opportunities to hone their craft through long-running writing groups, such as Playwrights’ Platform, and Write On!, sponsored by Centastage.

Still, when it comes to getting an actual production of a full-length play, the odds are long for “emerging” playwrights anywhere. (Funny phrase, that: “emerging” from what? Obscurity? A cocoon? The purgatory of cliché?). This is partly due, of course, to economic pressures – larger professional theatres simply can’t afford to take too many risks. They need to stage the tried and true, plays by a “name” author, or new plays that at least have the imprimatur of a rave New York review, in order to put butts in seats and pay their bills. Smaller companies on shoestring budgets have more freedom to be adventurous. But even those dedicated to producing few plays can be tough nuts to crack. Why? Because so many playwrights are writing plays – albeit of varying quality and stage-readiness – and there are relatively few production opportunities.

These and other perennial challenges of bringing new work from page to stage will doubtless get an airing at the upcoming Boston Theatre Conference 2011 February 27-28 at the Paramount Theatre in Boston. The theme of this year’s conference is “Home Grown” and the breakout sessions include one on “Supporting New Works by Local Writers.”

Nationally, the Dramatists Guild – of which I’m a proud member – is holding its first national gathering in its 100-year history: Playwrights in Mind: A National Conversation, June 9-12 at George Mason University in Fairfax, Virginia. The stated purpose of the conference, which will feature nuts-and-bolts workshops, legal and business seminars, and other activities, is to “celebrate our community and ask the questions we need to answer about our careers and our craft in order to go forward in the years ahead.”

The ongoing debate about new plays and new play development was given increased visibility and more focused attention at a recent conference at the American Voices New Play Institute. A project of Arena Stage in Washington, D.C., the Institute is part of a major new Arena initiative to nurture and support playwrights and new American plays. It includes a pioneering online project, the New Play Map, in which theaters around the country can log onto a database and enter production histories for new plays, details about the writers, and other information. Writers can also add their own personal data to the map. The New Play Map is seen as the first step to fully illuminating the infrastructure of new play development in the U.S. That, in turn, it is hoped, will spur new ideas and collaborative opportunities for the cultivation of new plays.

What might the “map” look like locally? Pat Gabridge, a fellow Boston playwright, has done some revealing research on the staging of new plays in our region. Surveying the Boston theater scene, Pat looked at how many world premieres or “fairly new” plays were produced by 10 large and medium-sized theatres in Boston this season. Out of more than 50 productions, he counted 11 world premieres. Six of those were by local writers; of those six, four were not associated with Boston University (which produces only the new work of BU alums.) While he was cautious about drawing conclusions from these numbers, Pat wrote: “Most Boston playwrights aren’t getting chances here at home to fully develop their work, and to learn by seeing how those plays succeed or fail in front of audiences.” You can read more about Pat’s research – he also surveyed new play productions for Massachusetts as a whole, as well as for other New England states – on his blog.

Given these long odds locally, Massachusetts playwrights have to cast their nets far and wide. (One of my short plays had three productions in Australia and one in Singapore last year!). Like other playwrights, I’ll keep doing whatever I can to promote my work: build relationships with other theatre artists; enter contests; query theatres where it seems like a particular play of mine might be a good fit.

While this can be frustratingly time-consuming – every hour you spend sending out query letters and script samples is an hour you’re not writing – it’s a chore that doesn’t have to be lonely. I’m one of more than 600 playwrights who subscribe to the Playwright Binge listserv (started and managed by our own Pat Gabridge, as it happens) that is dedicated to helping each other do what writers are notoriously poor at doing: marketing our work. We share submission opportunities, offer practical advice, applaud each other’s successes, commiserate about poor treatment from producers, and in general provide mutual encouragement and support for getting our work out there into the world and onto stages.

When you’re engaged in an isolated labor of love in which the only certainty is regular rejection, it’s great to have a supportive community.

IDENTITY CRISIS by Peter Snoad will receive a staged reading at 8 PM on Saturday, February 26 at Stageworks/Hudson in Hudson, NY.

Peter Snoad (Playwriting Fellow ’09) writes his stuff in Jamaica Plain. For more information about his work, go to: www.petersnoad.com.

Images: Peter Snoad; poster for GUIDED TOUR, a play by Peter Snoad, performed by Centre Stage; Thomas Azar (left) as Alan and Jason Farr as Frankie in a scene from Centre Stage’s production of Identity Crisis. (Photo: Wofford Jones).

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We’re excited to welcome guest blogger Jenny Milana, of DangerMilana, whose experience in contract negotiations, copyright issues, and other legal matters spans the publishing, theater, music, film and television industries. What’s more, while growing up in California, Jenny worked as an actor, so she knows the field from the creative side, too.

She’s generously agreed to field artists’ questions on legal matters relating to their work. (Incidentally, if you have any arts law questions, send them our way for a future “Ask an Arts Attorney” post.)

Please note: this post is for informational benefit only and should not be used in place of actual legal services. Also, as a state agency, the Massachusetts Cultural Council does not endorse any individual business or service.

So without further ado…

My questions may be a little different than what you may typically hear from artists concerning copyright. At this point I am not concerned about the copyright of my own work but the copyright of published books and illustrations. I love to work with paper and am interested in using books with illustrations as materials for a new project. First, I understand that any work published before 1923 is considered public domain, but if those works are re-published at a later date (ex: Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland originally published in 1865 but the story re-published in 1946), is the 1946 publication considered public domain as well? Can I purchase that 1946 copy to be used in a new work of fine art? Thank you so much for any help!

Signed,
Let It Fly

Dear Let It Fly,
Your question is a bit tricky because it involves the doctrine of fair use. Works in the public domain do not have any copyright protection and can be freely used. However, if those works are re-published at a later date by a new author and they are not identical to the original works, then such work does have copyright protection in the new material. The new material could be a spin on the story’s ending or the illustrations.

The original story itself which is in the public domain can still be used, but the new publication typically has taken the original work and modified it somehow, repackaged it in such a way which gives the new publication copyright protection in those new elements. So in your example about Alice in Wonderland, if the 1946 publication is still copyrighted because it maintained its registration prior to the 1976 copyright law, then you could not take that book and use it in a work of fine art because you are creating a derivative work, a right held exclusively to the copyright owner. A derivative work is a modification, or new use of the original work. You could, however, create a derivative work using the 1865 original.

A few questions. The first has to do with music publishing: what should an indie artist be on the lookout for when trying to license their original music? The second is about gigs: is there a casual way of putting something in writing for a gig which is both legal, casual and easy? Possible uses: dj’ing a wedding, gig at a small club on a tour (making sure gear and staff agreed upon, etc. is there).

Signed,
Indie Songster in Somerville

Dear Indie Songster,
As in most things there is a long answer and a short answer. I’ll try to give you something in between. A musician looking to license their work should be on the lookout for a variety of things. The first and most important thing to watch out for is what rights you are licensing away. You don’t want to end up with your music as the theme song to a pornographic movie if your target market is teens, for example. You don’t want to give exclusive rights, either, otherwise you won’t be able to license your music for other purposes. There are also two kinds of licenses, master license and synch licenses. Most often, a music license needs to contain both. The master license is for the sound recording and a synchronization license is for the music and lyrics, or musical composition. Most licenses require both but some uses may not need both.

You want to make sure when negotiating rights that subsidiary rights like merchandising are talked about as well so it’s very clear what you are allowing the other party to do and not do with the music. Another thing to be on the lookout for is royalties. The royalties or cost to license the music should take into account every right or use you are granting. Some of these things may not be negotiable, though, when licensing to places such as iTunes. Most often, those contracts are not negotiable.

With regards to your second question, there is definitely a way to put something in writing that keeps thing casual but still protects your interests as best you can. Most parties do things on a handshake, and to involve lawyers and complicated contracts sometimes puts bad tastes in people’s mouths, which strains the relationships. At our firm DangerMilana, our primary goal in reviewing/drafting or negotiating any contract is to talk with the parties as though the contract is more like a collaboration agreement. Everyone’s goal is to continue working together and keep things moving, rather than slow things down going back and forth with negotiations. The contract should also be drafted in as plain English as possible, without all of the legalese. For small gigs like DJing weddings, etc., a contract is of utmost importance as it can be the difference in months of headaches and not getting paid. It also sets the expectations from the beginning.

Those types of contracts should be friendly, basic and no more than two pages at most if at all possible. I would still recommend a lawyer to draft this document, though, because they can maximize protecting your interests in as little wording as possible.

I recently won a publication contest for a book of short stories. I then received a contract to sign. This will be my first published book and so I had no agent and knew no lawyers with specialties in this area. I joined the Author’s Guild for an annual fee of $70 or so, and they reviewed the contract for me and sent me a lengthy response with proposed changes. I was then left more or less on my own to negotiate with the publisher based on their advice. Can you recommend a better way to do this?

Even after I won the prize, I still felt that I was extremely lucky to have found a good publisher for a collection of literary short stories, and although it seems to me the publisher negotiated in good faith, I still felt like I had very little leverage. Should I have acted tough? Should I have gone in swinging? Or should I just be grateful? And let’s say I had hired a lawyer, what should I have expected to pay?

Signed,
Published but perplexed

Dear Published,
First of all, congratulations on winning the publication contest.

Second, unfortunately there are not a lot of better options. The best option is to have a lawyer do the negotiating if possible. That can be difficult though as lawyers can be expensive. One option is to request the attorney to simply negotiate the really important clauses like price or rights. This can cut down on the cost immensely and protect your interests in the area you are most concerned about.

Regarding your second question, I wouldn’t suggest going in swinging or just being grateful either. As I mentioned in another answer, our goal with any contract negotiation is that the parties are going to be working together and likely want to preserve the ability to work together in the future. As to what you could expect to pay, firms charge all different types of rates, some flat, some hourly. To give you a sense, though, our firm’s hourly fee is typically $300. However, we charge a flat fee for certain services such as contract review. For a review of a contract of less than five pages, we have the artist come in to sit and talk about their concerns (which which typically takes a good hour or so). But our flat rate for that ($150) would be significantly lower than our hourly rate. So when you approach a lawyer be sure to clarify what the rate is – and which type of rate it is – for the service you require. Be aware that some services may have a minimum retainer.

At our firm, we try and work with artists, and depending on the project, can offer a pricing level to fit the artist’s situation. Every artist is different, as are their needs. Some lawyers will be a better fit than others, so don’t hesitate to ask around until you find representation that fits your needs.

Jenny Milana, a partner at DangerMilana, specializes in arts, media, and entertainment law.

If you have any questions for a future “Ask an Arts Attorney” post, send them here.

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Jonathan Papernick‘s short story collection There Is No Other has just been published, and Jonathan recently wrote an essay about that crucial step after you publish your book: promoting it with all available resources (mainly you).

Jonathan has generously allowed us to re-post the essay, which originally appeared in Beyond the Margins, a superb blog by writers connected to the writers’ service organization Grub Street.

Within weeks of publication of my first collection of short stories eight years ago, I received a starred review in Publishers Weekly and a full-page rave review in the New York Times. My name was mentioned in the same breath as other successful young, Jewish authors – bestsellers and award winners, names you would immediately recognize. I felt that I was on my way. Only I wasn’t – not really.

Nobody ever told me that the real work begins once a book is finished and that you need to spend a good six months to a year getting out there and promoting your own work, otherwise it risks dying on the vine. By the time my book started disappearing from bookshelves a few months after publication it was too late for me to traction those early positive reviews into sales. In the end, my collection sold fairly well for a first-time author, but the sales numbers were not high enough for the publishing industry to take notice. After many rounds of submissions, I finally gave up on U.S. publishers and instead opted to publish with a small Canadian publisher who expressed great interest in the book.

Now that my second collection of stories is out, I am taking the hard lessons I learned from relying on a disinterested publisher who did next to nothing after the book was orphaned by the acquiring editor, and have set up a war plan, a campaign to follow through to the bitter end.

Not a day has gone by since December when I have not done something to promote the book, whether I was contacting bookstores about carrying my book, or setting up readings in support of the collection.

Six months ago I started gathering names of potential reviewers, people who had shown favor to my writing in the past, as well as names I was able to gather from supportive writer friends, and sources on the internet. I sent personalized e-mails with a description of my collection and blurbs to each potential reviewer and let them know that the book would be coming in May. By making the personal connection with potential reviewers and creating a sense of anticipation, I raised the likelihood that the book would actually be reviewed.

I convinced my publisher to give me fifty review copies and I told him that I would send out review copies on my own, rather than relying on him to do it on my behalf. Sure it cost me for envelopes and postage, but I know that I am my own top priority, whereas any publisher has numerous authors it needs to consider at any given time. In fact, I did try hiring two former students to work under my guidance as publicity associates, but neither of them ultimately felt they were up to the task – I guess they just didn’t think they had enough skin in the game. I grew up listening to independent punk rock bands and I understand the power of a DIY ethos – there is no shame in doing it myself. In the end, I labeled and stamped envelopes myself, made sure to put in a press release and clippings with each review copy and I fired off another e-mail letting reviewers know that my book was on its way.

No matter how uncomfortable or not-in-your-nature it may be, it’s critical to get out there and talk to people about your work, as you are your own best resource and promoter. I attended several conferences (AWP, Muse and the Marketplace, Jewish Book Network, Book Expo America) in the months prior to publication meeting other writers, reviewers, agents and editors, putting my name (hopefully) into the zeitgeist so that my name would be familiar next time they encounter it. One influential book blogger did not receive my review copy in the mail the first two times I sent it. I could easily have given up at that point, and I was tempted to out of sheer frustration, but I knew that she was going to be at the Book Expo in New York. I sought her out at the table where she was signing books, introduced myself, and personally placed my book into her bag. She was very appreciative of my persistence, and wrote to me yesterday: “Brilliant collection. Truly amazing.” She plans on pushing my book on her blog in the coming days. (Ed. note: read the interview between Jonathan and said blogger, writer Caroline Leavitt.)

It is important to make sure that you have an attractive, updated website, a blog, a Goodreads profile, a Facebook fan page, a personal Facebook page that you use selectively to promote your work, (I’m not yet sold on Twitter, but I’m not ruling it out either) update your Amazon author page and make sure that your book page on Amazon.com has updated reviews as well as the Search Inside the Book feature and availability on Kindle. Unfortunately, I’ve been asking my publisher since December to make sure that the Search Inside the Book feature and Kindle is ready ASAP, and nearly six months later neither are up on the Amazon site. I’ve actually called Amazon myself and the book’s distributor, but it seems in this case that will and persistence are not enough and I can only hope that it will be taken care of soon.

Many of you might think that Amazon.com is the evil empire, and perhaps it is in some ways, but Amazon is also a writer’s best friend as it is a simple way for readers to buy your books, especially backlist titles that are likely not available in bookstores. I am encouraging my readers to post reviews on Amazon.com and have promised to send out a free copy of my novel to anyone who does so. I think people are more likely to buy (and review) a book that has been reviewed positively by a whole pile of people rather than by one or two of the author’s close relatives.

Your writing – and bank account – might take a hit during the months that you’re a promoting your work, but you need to honor your book and give it a fighting chance. It will certainly be time well spent, as little by little your writing emerges from the shadows. There are ways to continue writing in service of your promotional campaign as well. I strongly suggest writing for blogs, websites, newspapers etc. on any subject that you feel you have the remotest level of competence, and whenever possible, ask that your article/review/essay is linked directly to your website or an online source where your book can be purchased. I have some other promotional ideas in mind for the fall, but I’ll keep them to myself for now as they’re still in the planning stages.

Jonathan will read from There Is No Other on Thursday, July 22 2010, at 6 PM, as part of the Stories Uncorked program at the Marriott Rooftop Garden, near MIT in Cambridge, MA.

Jonathan Papernick is the author of the short story collection The Ascent of Eli Israel, and Who by Fire, Who by Blood. Please encourage your local independent bookstore to order his new collection of short stories There Is No Other. He teaches fiction writing at Emerson College and lives outside Boston with his wife and two sons.

Images: Jonathan Papernick, photo by Gary Alpert; cover art for THERE IS NO OTHER by Jonathan Papernick (Exile Editions, 2010).

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Irina Rozovsky (MCC ’09 Photography Finalist) is in the process of publishing a book of a new project called One to Nothing. Some of the photographs will be on display at the Photographic Resource Center’s exhibition EXPOSURE:The 15th Annual PRC Juried Exhibition. We asked Irina to tell us more about her recent work depicting images of Israel. 

“One to Nothing hints at an existential battle: a confrontation between the individual and the abyss, where “nothing” is much bigger and greater than any single “one” could be.”

“These photographs were made in Israel, a place of historic conflict where it is not always clear who is the victor and the victim.”

“But these images are not political. Instead, Israel here serves as an abstract, mythological background.”

“Depicted is a land charged and tangled by questions that cannot be answered.”

“Echoes of the origins of man murmur in the desert sun, and once in a while, from beneath the weight of dusty struggles wafts a breeze and alleviates the tension.” 

EXPOSURE:The 15th Annual PRC Juried Exhibition
Dates: April 23 – June 20, 2010
Opening reception: Friday, April 23 – 5:30-7:30pm

Image credit: All photographs courtesy of Irina Rozovsky

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Ilana Manolson is a 2008 MCC Painting Fellow. She is currently traveling with other fellow Massachusetts artists to South Africa where they will create work at the Artist Proof Studio. She has graceously offered to share her experiences on ArtSake.

South Africa has become a fascinating place for artists of many diverse backgrounds to create and learn. Along with my printmaking colleagues Jane Goldman and Catherine Kernan, I’m traveling to Johannesburg to spend several weeks working with Artist Proof Studio, a powerful community-based visual arts training program founded by the inimitable Kim Berman.
Kim is a transformative artist-activist who I got to know and admire when she worked as an assistant at Artist’s Proof Collaborative in Cambridge (founded by our group of four fine art printmakers, Mary Sherwood, Jane Goldman, and Catherine Kernan and me, Ilana Manolson). When apartheid broke down in South Africa, Kim sold her belongings, bought a press with the proceeds, had it shipped to South Africa, and moved there herself to found Artist Proof Studio. The studio now trains local artists, often from very challenging backgrounds, providing them with the skills, experience, and qualifications to sustain careers as artists and printmakers.

One of the things that I share with Kim, Jane, Catherine, the Artist Proof students and professional artists, and other printmakers is a sense of wonder, possibility and connection that comes with printmaking. Unlike many other fine art processes, printmaking relies on shared equipment. A group working in the same space, with the same tools and presses, develops into a community, with it’s own creative vitality. We are all so delighted to share in the vitality that Kim has taken from Massachusetts and grown into a unique resource in South Africa.

While in Johannesburg, I’ll be training Artist Proof graduate artists in specialized advanced printmaking techniques, as well as having an exhibition, Connected by Roots, of my new prints and paintings done on Mylar (these pieces are 39″ by 79″). It will be an artistic and personal adventure for us all, with new stimuli and new challenges. I’ll be posting updates from the journey – watch this space!

Image credit: All works on mylar by Ilana Manolson.

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When we asked Williamstown Film Festival director Steve Lawson about ties to Massachusetts artists for this year’s festival, he mentioned that one of the films in the “All-Shorts” series was by emerging Boston-area filmmaker Charlie Anderson.

Charlie traveled to Williamstown to participate in the festival, and here, he shares his unique film-arts-in-the-Berkshires experience, illustrating by example how to make the most of a gathering of engaged and inventive film artists.

(Re-posted with permission by the artist from Focus, an alumni blog of the Boston University’s Film/TV Department.)

One of my short films, Werewolf Trouble, has had a fortunate run at a dozen film festivals and I’ve been able to attend most of them. I knew the Williamstown Film Festival was different the moment I received my acceptance. Having grown accustomed to carbon copied e-mails, I was mildly shocked when the good news came in the form of a phone call from Executive Director Steve Lawson. When Steve also offered me lodging, I thought he had momentarily confused me with one of WFF’s celebrity guests, like James Ivory or Barry Levinson.

The fun started with a resplendent autumn drive along the Mohawk Trail as I headed west through the Berkshires from Boston. I arrived in Williamstown to find my room waiting and food served at a cocktail party before a screening of La Nave De Los Monstrous (The Ship of Monsters), a campy sci-fi feature accompanied by a live original score by the string quartet, Ethel. The after-party was held in the lobby of  MASS MoCA where I enjoyed a conversation with one of Ethel’s violinists, Mary Rowell. As the party advanced on the wee hours, I wondered if anyone would wake up in time for my screening at 10:00 the next morning.

But the “All-Shorts” session at Images Cinema was packed. Before the movies started I had a pleasant conversation with Tom Fontana, writer/producer of Oz and Homicide, and member of WFF’s board of directors. An eclectic selection of ten movies was shown and the audience ranked their favorites. I crossed my fingers in hopes that Werewolf Trouble would not be screened immediately after Bill Plympton’s weird and hilarious Hot Dog. I’ve been a fan of Plympton’s since his first animated short, Your Face (1988 Oscar contender). WFF surprised me again when I found myself sitting next to Plympton during the Q&A after our screening. Bill was well-spoken and genuine, and he stood in Images’ lobby personalizing drawings of his hero dog for anyone who waited in line.

Director James Ivory (The Remains of the Day, Howards End) was the honored guest at a lunch seminar that afternoon. I won’t forget one of his stories: during a break from filming Mr. and Mrs. Bridge, James took a drive with Paul Newman as an evening snow dusted the streets. Fatigued from the shoot, Ivory fell asleep in the passenger seat during a lull in the conversation about Newman’s character. The star continued cruising and thinking as his director dozed. Eventually James woke to the sound of Newman singing. For a fleeting moment he felt like he was in his own movie – as though he were young Douglas Bridge and Newman his father. We spend so much energy as filmmakers trying to turn dreams into reality that unique anecdotes like this really stand out, when reality becomes the dream and those enigmatic creative forces we are always playing with gently push back like childhood friends.

I met Bill Plympton again at a cocktail party hosted by Bill Wagner, president of Williams College. Delighted to raise a glass with an artist I admire, I mentioned that I’m also a film instructor at Boston University and asked Plympton what advice he would offer students to inspire creativity. “Look at real life,” he said. “That’s where the interesting stuff is happening.” I couldn’t agree more. Joining the conversation was Alycia Delmore, star of Lynn Shelton’s new feature, Humpday. Alycia’s advice was to first imagine something that would never happen in this world, then imagine the world in which it would happen. I’m also fond of Alycia’s comment because so many effects-happy movies get this backwards – or even worse, just skip the first part entirely.

Alycia and I attended the screening of Barry Levinson’s new “film essay,” Poliwood, at The Clark. Levinson (Rain Man, The Natural) answered questions about his treatise on the influence of celebrity culture and television on politics, and accepted an award from WFF: a hand-painted still from the 1998 feature, What Dreams May Come, by celebrated artist Stephen Hannock (also a member of WFF’s board of directors). Delicious Halloween desserts were then served in the Clark Courtyard. The next morning I met Alycia for coffee and we attended a screening of her movie, Humpday. That was another unique experience – sitting in the theater next to an actress I had just met while watching her movie. I was impressed by Alycia’s command of the screen and her insightful comments during the Q&A. Look for Humpday if you like provocative comedies. It’s very well done.

I was a little glum leaving Images Cinema for the last time that weekend – sad to leave off new friendships for the time being and to depart Williamstown after such a wonderful weekend. Then Steve Lawson did it again: he offered to treat the remaining filmmakers to lunch. Was he also feeling a bit heavyhearted to see the lights come up on WFF’s eleventh season? I think so. And I’m sure most will agree that kind of commitment to any endeavor is a rare joy to behold. If you made it this far, I hope you will consider getting involved with the Williamstown Film Festival. There simply aren’t enough quality venues where emerging filmmakers can showcase their work and established artists can bring their passion projects. Even less common are events that hold their audiences and lesser-known guests in the same regard as their superstars. Submit your movie if you have one, make a donation if you are able, or plan on attending next season.

-Charlie Anderson

Images: Williamstown Film Festival photos: © 2009 ROMAN IWASIWKA. Photos top to bottom: Charlie Anderson at the Q&A session.; L to R: Jesse Bernstein, Bill Plympton & Charlie Anderson during Q & A; Bill Plympton, Steve Lawson, Jesse Bernstein, Charlie Anderson; Charlie Anderson, Alycia Delmore at The Clark Art Museum.

You can see more photographs by Roman Iwasiwka at the Cultural Icons exhibition at Brill Gallery in North Adams, MA. The show, a dual exhibition with Sedat Pakay, features Roman’s portraits of such icons as Jeff Beck, Mick Jagger, Michael Jackson, Bob Dylan and Joni Mitchell, and runs through January 2010.

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