Artists on Creative Administration
By Tonya Lockyer, Editor
“At once visionary and pragmatic–an inspiring read.” —Naomi Jackson, PhD, Author Dance, Human Rights, and Social Justice, Professor, Arizona State University
“A wonderful collection of essays that are in turn provocative, illuminating, moving, and occasionally hilarious.” —Vu Le, NonprofitAF.com
Brilliant artists and arts workers share real-life stories and examples of artistic life, business and activism—full of lessons we can all learn about living a creative life. Featuring the voices of thirty artists and arts workers, Artists on Creative Administration provides first-hand accounts of creative administration in action. The book pairs big topics with actionable tactics, addressing themes like equity, activism, design thinking, leadership, collaboration, family, ethics, and care. Provocative, candid essays and interviews expand our view of what creativity and leadership can be, as each chapter closes with experiments for the reader to try and adapt to their own thinking, work, and life.
Artists on Creative Administration emerged from the National Center for Choreography-Akron’s acclaimed Creative Administration Research program.
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About the Author
Tonya Lockyer, widely praised as "a key cultural changemaker" (Seattle Times), is an award-winning artist and cultural strategist. Her work as a groundbreaking artist, arts leader, and curator has been recognized by the National Endowment for the Arts, Arts International, Princeton University, NPR, the Canada Council, and the City of Seattle. Lockyer was the transformative director of Seattle's Velocity Dance Center (2011-2018), and she has collaborated with some of the most innovative artistic experimentalists of our time. She is an adjunct professor in Arts Leadership (MFA/BA) at Seattle University.
Contributors
Nora Alami, Julia Antonick, Christy Bolingbroke, Banning Boulding, Yanira Castro, Maura Cuffie-Peterson, Katy Dammers, Raja Feather Kelly, Michelle Fletcher, Chelsea Goding-Doty, Miguel Gutierrez, Rosie Herrera, Cherie Hill, Delphine Lai, Tonya Lockyer, Makini, Aaron Mattocks, Jonathan Meyer, Rashaun Mitchell, Hope Mohr, Dominic Moore-Dunson, Cynthia Oliver, Karla Quintero, Antonio Ramos, Silas Riener, amara tabor-smith, Kate Wallich, Marya Whethers, Pioneer Winter, and Miranda Wright.
Praise for Artists on Creative Administration
“This impressive anthology developed and edited by Tonya Lockyer draws on dance’s embodied understanding of dynamic systems to critique traditional approaches to arts administration, and creatively reconceive it as a co-creative practice that assures the sustainability of a life in the arts. At once visionary and pragmatic, the book offers ideas and tools to develop close relationships with communities, develop models of shared leadership, seek new methods of funding, and provide honest insider perspectives on living as a contemporary dance artist. With twenty-nine contributors, it is an inspiring read for those who aim to deepen their own creative administration practices”
—NAOMI M. JACKSON, PhD, author Dance, Human Rights and Social Justice, Professor, Arizona State University
“Not being a dancer or arts administrator, I didn’t know what to expect when opening this book. I left with a much deeper appreciation for what dancers, choreographers, producers, managers and dance-focused nonprofit directors endure to make our world better through dance. This is a wonderful collection of essays that are in turn provocative, illuminating, moving, and occasionally hilarious. It is a timely work that delves into the power and importance of dance and art, while challenging existing beliefs and practices and providing thoughtful solutions.”
— VU LE, NonprofitAF.com
“The voices that give this book life are brimming with tactical wisdom, but the strategic inquiries humming below the surface offer the reader an even more profound pathway to an equitable future. These voices ask fundamental questions about our economy, health care systems, and historical pathologies that wonder out loud why creativity itself isn't more deeply inscribed in our concept of 'infrastructure'. How different would we ALL be if we adapted an artist's sense of possibility into our moral infrastructure as well as our production modalities? This collection gives us a sense of what to do on our journey to a creative horizon, but profoundly, read against the grain, this book gives us a sense of WHY an artist's sense of interdependence and ecology are what the world urgently needs to explore.”
— MARC BAMUTHI JOSEPH, Artist, Cultural strategist, Vice President and Artistic Director of Social Impact at The Kennedy Center
“This straight-talking book is timely and will become a well-worn handbook equally useful for art producers, administrators, artists, students and teachers. Full of resources for immediate practice or further research, the book is structured so you can read the essays in any sequence as your curiosity or needs dictate. Artists on Creative Administration asks us to consider all that surrounds a work of art as an inseparable part of the creative act. It inspires action that could forge new, unusually generative and supportive collaborations, communities and systems.”
— SUSAN MARSHALL, Choreographer, and Director of Dance at Princeton University’s Lewis Center for the Arts
“In an era where traditional approaches are increasingly obsolete, the ideas and approaches contained in the pages of Artists on Creative Administration inspire transformative powers that can help rethink and reshape the world of work. It’s within this spirit of innovation and reimagining that Tonya Lockyer and colleagues present this indispensable playbook for navigating the complexities and challenges of today’s dynamic environment—a world profoundly altered by the global pandemic, which has compelled many to reevaluate the essence, purpose, and practices of our work and workplaces.”
—TIM CYNOVA, Principal, Work Shouldn’t Suck
“A groundbreaking book—significant and highly relevant beyond the arts. It’s also a pleasure to read. The case studies, tools, and experiments are useful for anyone interested in team building, audience development, galvanizing support across multiple constituents, storytelling, user experience, marketing, community-building, and placemaking.”
—JENNIFER EDWARDS, MFA, Creative Strategist, Human Systems Choreographer, Director, Producer
“It’s a joy and a challenge to see all the life stories and iterative work practices that form the contents of Tonya Lockyer’s robust, smart volume of essays from the overlapping fields of art and management. The joy is in seeing the aggregation of so much knowledge from the dance world in one place. The challenge is in paying attention to the ethics, problem-solving, and radical shifts that are embedded on every page. It is thrilling to see the ideas that so many have been working on for so long brought to light and to a wider audience.”
— LIZ LERMAN, MacArthur “Genius Grant” Fellow, and Institute Professor, Herberger Institute for Design and the Arts
“Reading this book will make you understand why the arts are always at the vanguard of social movements.Artists on Creative Administration speaks to, and is of, the contemporary moment, encapsulating the ongoing and ever-present critical challenge experimental artists face in artmaking, community building, and importantly, in reimagining the structures of arts administration. It’s inspiring how this collection of stories, strategies, and experiences emanates from the lives and voices of groundbreaking artists driven to change the landscape of arts-making, decision-making, and arts administration–from the ground up.
Artists on Creative Administration nurtures images of what decolonization might look like—by imagining and implementing economic and organizational structures that mirror the social structures of indigenous communities with collective identities–where the community, and communal sustenance, come first. In AOCA, we see how decisions and ideas can surface from a diverse team of stakeholders, whose programs and projects embrace their specific localities, in a spirit of shared values leading to shared joy.”
— GEORGE EMILIO SANCHEZ, writer, performance artist, advocate for indigenous rights and sovereignty, Performance Director Emergnyc, Professor College of Staten Island/CUNY