ARTS ON EARTH

January 2007

Betsy Goolian, Editor  Michigan Muse

It all started with the Dean’s Book Group.

For some years now, the University of Michigan deans have met regularly to discuss books on a variety of subjects. As it turns out, the gatherings have become both an inspired means for very busy people to find the time to read thought-provoking books—you wouldn’t want to show up in front of this group not having done your homework—and a way to provide an informal environment for connection and discourse among university leaders.

One of the books discussed last year was Thomas L. Friedman’s The World Is Flat: A Brief History of the 21st Century. On the best-seller list for months, the book posits that the globalization of commerce and information technology in recent years has rendered the international trade playing field “flat.” Now, with the digital revolution, when you make that desperate call for technical support, you may be talking to someone in New Jersey—or India.

There was something about The World Is Flat that bothered the performing arts dean in the group. For Christopher Kendall, Friedman’s book echoed a certain cognitive dissonance that had visited him before. And it was not the premise of the book that rekindled this unease. “I realize that Friedman was looking at other facets of globalization, but the conspicuous absence of culture or the arts in Friedman’s envisioned world is troubling. A future without the richness and multiple dimensions the arts and culture provide truly would be a ‘flat’ world.”

Such concerns had resonated for our dean in the past. In the fall of 2003, while still Director of the University of Maryland’s School of Music, Christopher Kendall launched a campus-wide initiative to explore the undeniable importance of cultural communication and the arts in the globally connected and diverse world we inhabit today. “The institutional response to 9/11 was focused almost exclusively on security issues: intelligence, biotechnology, defense. What got lost in that viewpoint were the powerful and complex cultural issues and forces involved.”

Cultures in Counterpoint took as its inspiration a rare period in history, an era in medieval Spain known as al-Andalus, when Jews, Christians, and Muslims co-existed in relative peace, maintaining their own cultures but also adopting the customs, arts, and languages around them. Was this moment of accord among religions and cultures a one-time fluke, counter to human nature and never to be repeated? The project featured a three-day symposium and a semester of music, theatre, and dance drawn from that era and explored the role of the arts and arts education in promoting ways to build and inform intercultural understanding.

When Kendall arrived in Ann Arbor in the fall of 2005 as new Dean of the School of Music, Theatre & Dance, the impetus for creating a forum to explore these themes was rekindled. “Of all institutions of higher education, Michigan was one of the most fertile for undertaking projects of this scope because of the quality across disciplines and also the value that’s placed on exploring complex issues and providing interdisciplinary experiences.”

Thus was born Arts on Earth.

Now working in collaboration with the other arts deans—Bryan Rogers of the School of Art & Design and Doug Kelbaugh of the College of Architecture and Urban Planning—and with support from the Office of the President, the Provost, and VP for Communication, Arts on Earth will launch in January of 2007 and continue for the foreseeable future.

Described as “a university-wide initiative that stimulates, explores, and celebrates the dynamic relationship between people and their arts worldwide,” Arts on Earth has identified at least six key areas of exploration:

Intrinsic Value and the Arts: What are the deeply felt experiences we try to capture when we refer to the “intrinsic value” of the arts?

Science, Technology, and the Arts: What can the sciences tell us about the effect of the arts—both the creation and engagement—on functions of human individuals in different cultures?

Conscience and the Arts: When and how can it be said that the arts can or should function as a ‘voice of conscience’ for a public?

The Socio-Cultural Reach of the Arts: How and when are people able to effect social transformations through their arts?

The Arts and the Environment: What is ‘environmental art’? What are the historical precedents for current interest in the relationship between humans, their arts, and their environment?

Economics and the Arts: How do different cultures and states facilitate and/or restrict access to the arts? How are new technologies and other cultural shifts worldwide affecting conceptions, pricing, and distribution of art?

Visit Arts On Earth for information, calendars and more.