Long-time EOM readers know how I feel about the Performing Arsht Center. I am no fan. My gripe goes to the beginning of the controversial project: a building for donors and high society instead of an investment in local arts. How would north of $500 million invested in local art programs, including the schools, improved Miami's economy? We'll never know the answer to that question, because the Herald and the Knight Foundation and Miami's elite got its way. (My gripe is also about transit in the entire area, but the plan is for the whole problem to be buried like the tunnel to the Port of Miami, once the insiders figure out how to shift the needed billions to taxpayers.)
The way the center has performed, financially, is predictable and you can't blame a critic for that. To the extent there is good news, it is based on luck (the Lewis family commitment to the Cleveland Orchestra) but mainly on Broadway road shows. For families that can't make it to NYC, that is good news. But road show monoculture doesn't advance the arts in Miami. This isn't cultural snobbery. It is just a fact. Meanwhile, the diversion of investment and attention by big donors away from local performing arts has compounded the difficulties of a nasty economy.
It is impossible to reconcile the rosy picture of local performing arts painted by the Herald, with the monumental struggles of local performing artists. A more critical and informed view -- that doesn't sound incessantly cheerful or accomplished or desperately forward looking (just wait until Genting "improves" the local arts) would serve Miami better than what passes for Herald journalism on the arts. The Lion King and Shrek the Musical are popular draws that help defray the ongoing losses of the Performing Arsht Center but the fact is that local arts groups are so close to cutting to the budgetary bone, they can scarcely afford to be honest in the press about the disappointments.
The companion story to the Performing Arsht Center in the Herald is "Some arts groups struggle, some succeed in South Florida". Its opening line from a newbie: "Ask anyone with cultural cred and they're tell you: the arts have never been hotter in South Florida."
Correction: ask anyone with cultural cred and budget to meet, and they certainly won't contradict the Herald. But it doesn't mean the Herald should just pander to the local Lion Kings and Queens.
3 comments:
Dude, "hoi polloi" means the masses.
Lol. I've been misusing the phrase for a long time! Thnks.
You know merrit steirheim is the one that crammed this down our throats. He said it would cost 300m and when shiver a bill Johnson involved to ultimately fix the problem, they negotiated a fix price which unfortunately was over budget... Once again burgess and his father steirheim screwed us all....
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