I’m Not Delusional, I’m An Entrepreneur

March 14, 2010 by Dennis Baker 

I am loving the below image by Hugh MacLeod. So much so, I am thinking of buying a copy, unless you want to make an awesome donation. His random thoughts on being an entrepreneur is something all artists should read. Is it delusional to think as an arts entrepreneur that I can create a work/life/art balance that allows me to pursue all my artistic avenues?

I was thinking about this when @JessHutchinson commented that artists are imploding by over-commitment, self-overwhelming, inbalance between life/work/art. This led to a conversation (a reason why Twitter is important) with fellow theaterosphere/2am Theatre people (#2amt) @nickkeenan, @RZrow, @dloehr, and @MaxEPunk. @RZCrow reminded us that, “We need to realize there’s time & sometimes we need to take everything in moderation.” I responded that artists “might be over committed, but this artist has to work three teaching jobs, because the art doesn’t pay.” I think this issue is at the heart of arts entrepreneurship. An entrepreneur looks for finical backing to support their idea, project or product. It is no secret that the arts don’t pay well and funding is difficult, so many artists take on other freelance/part-time work, like becoming teaching artists, because it is a way to use their art to connect with others and its freelance schedule allows artist to also work on their art. Due to this freelance nature many teaching artists work multiple part-time jobs to pay the bills. This, at times, creates teaching artists who are more teachers and less artists. Even though the idea that working a freelance/part-time job creates time and space for creating art, instead sometimes more time is spent going from part-time to part-time job and less time is spent on creating art.

As a teaching artist that works with three different organizations pretty consistently, I spend a range of 13-17 hours teaching a week and commuting 13 hours a week for a total of 26-30 hours a week on “teaching”. I also freelance in web design and SEO, to help pay the bills. I have other special circumstances that do not allow me to do theater at the moment (baby and wife that works three nights a week). Does your schedule allow you to create art or are you about to implode? How are you creating a work/life/art balance? Are you working part-time/freelance or as a full-time employee? To end with Jess’ question, “How do we begin to find true balance?”

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Filed under: Acting, Arts Entrepreneur, Theater/Theatre

MFA Theater Degree Pyramid Scheme

March 7, 2010 by Dennis Baker 

“The discouraging truth is that MFA degrees were created largely to provide-and then satisfy-a prerequisite for obtaining teaching jobs. This in effect rendered the entire system a pyramid scheme.” – Art & Fear by David Bayles and Ted Orland

Replace the term “pyramid scheme” with “ponzi scheme”.

It sounds like the MFA Theater Ponzi Scheme that Mike Daisey was talking about.

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Filed under: Acting, Teaching, Theater/Theatre

Must Read Theater Education Blog Posts

February 10, 2010 by Dennis Baker 

I am a HUGE fan of the newly created website Theatre Arts Curriculum Transformation (TACT). ‘Tis the season where I am receiving emails and questions about my process for applying to MFA acting schools and my experience with the Rutgers MFA acting program.

If you are considering applying to theater schools, or considering what schools to attend, you need to stop everything you are doing and read TACT’s five blog posts about Theater Education written by Tom Loughlin, Professor of Theatre at SUNY Fredonia. Start here with Tom’s experience with MFA programs, and note that unfortunately the mindset in MFA programs have not changed much from 1977.

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Filed under: Educational Theater, Graduate School, Rutgers, Teaching, Theater/Theatre

Truth About Theater Education

January 28, 2010 by Dennis Baker 

I am catching up on the last week of theatrosphere blog posts, and while Scott Walter’s whole blog post is a must read, his comment about what he tells his theater students, is what stuck out to me.

I say: “You are getting a degree at a liberal arts university. I am not offering you ‘pre-professional training’ because, frankly, there IS no profession. I am educating you, not training you. I am offering you a lens to see the world through that, should you decide to try to make a life of artistry (which is different from a CAREER in the arts), then you will have four years of reflection and experiment from which to work. If you want to be buffed up for the so-called profession, you need to go down I-40 to Winston-Salem and the NC School of the Arts.” Now, what are others saying? I conjecture that they are selling the Cinderella Myth, pointing at a couple alums who are working occasionally, and teaching their students that what separates the successful from the unsuccessful is that the successful want it more (which is a huge lie, but that shifts the blame for their failure to the students’ shoulders and absolves the teacher entirely). It is a con game, plain and simple.

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Filed under: Acting, Educational Theater, Graduate School, Teaching, Theater/Theatre

NYCHILA Theater At Its Best

January 22, 2010 by Dennis Baker 

NYCHILA is an acronym coined in the theatrosphere to describe the theater ecosystem in New York, Chicago, and Los Angeles. The insanity that is this video is a good visual demonstration for the need for decentralization of theater.

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Filed under: Acting, Chicago, Los Angeles, New York, Theater/Theatre

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