Arts + Policy

We’ve got to have art

Our cultural organizations need us because we need them

By Smitty Pignatelli Arts and Culture, Berkshires, coronavirus, Economy 0 Comments Apr 29, 2020

THE IMPACT OF arts and cultural programs on our lives is not easily quantifiable. Whether we are in a museum, concert hall, or any other venue, enjoying art together is much more than a mere source of entertainment. It’s a way for us to collectively experience the human condition. The value that this brings to(...)

How do arts and culture come back?

It won’t be easy, and it will be expensive

By Anita Walker Arts and Culture 0 Comments Apr 28, 2020

SINCE GOV. CHARLIE BAKER’S first emergency order was issued and social distancing was implemented, many local news outlets have provided excellent and thorough coverage of the economic impacts of COVID-19 on cultural organizations in Massachusetts. Our own research at the Mass Cultural Council puts numbers behind the stories: more than $264 million in lost revenue and(...)

Aquarium, zoo, and museums appeal for federal aid

Ask delegation to press for huge bump in funding

By Bruce Mohl COVID-19 0 Comments Apr 14, 2020

TOP OFFICIALS at six of the Boston area’s top cultural attractions said on Tuesday that their survival and the survival of other institutions like them depends on a huge increase in federal aid to the nonprofit sector. In a letter to the Massachusetts congressional delegation, the leaders of the New England Aquarium, the Boston Children’s(...)

Museum of Fine Arts losses at $1.4m and growing

MassMOCA has laid off 122 of its 165-member staff

By Chris Lisinski Arts and Culture 0 Comments Apr 2, 2020

A MASSACHUSETTS ART MUSEUM laid off almost three-quarters of its staff. Another expects to face a budget deficit in the tens of millions of dollars. Leisure destinations that rely on warm-season surges are worried they may not begin to feel recovery until 2021. One after another, members of the state’s arts and tourism sector shared(...)

When the show does not go on

The arts take a huge hit from coronavirus crisis

By Shira Schoenberg arts, coronavirus 0 Comments Mar 16, 2020

JADE SYLVAN, a graduate student at Harvard Divinity School, spent two years writing and producing a musical, “Beloved King,” a queer interpretation of the biblical story of King David. Sylvan was set to debut a semi-staged production last weekend with two sold-out performances at the Oberon, which is part of the Harvard-affiliated American Reperatory Theater(...)

Municipal officials tout film tax credit

With sunset looming, they tout jobs, money, and tourism

By Bruce Mohl Arts and Culture 0 Comments Jan 21, 2020

A GROUP OF MUNICIPAL OFFICIALS on Tuesday stepped up the drumbeat of support for the state’s film tax credit, which is set to expire in three years unless the Legislature intervenes to eliminate the law’s sunset provision. At a State House event, officials from Lawrence, Worcester, Concord, Malden, Salem, and Cape Ann interspersed tales about(...)

Should private colleges open libraries to public?

Local schools have different policies, priorities

By Colman M. Herman Arts and Culture 0 Comments Jan 1, 2020

LOCAL PRIVATE COLLEGES are divided on whether to open or close their libraries to the public. Harvard University, Northeastern University, and Emerson College don’t allow members of the public to use their libraries, but Boston College, Boston University, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and Tufts University have no problem at all with it. The contrasting(...)

Couple turns old mill into sprawling arts complex

The struggle behind the scenes at Holyoke’s Gateway City Arts Center

By Linda Enerson Arts and Culture 0 Comments Dec 31, 2019

VITEK KRUTA, a professional painter, sculptor, and conservator, originally went looking more than a decade ago for a larger studio space in Holyoke. Instead, he and his life partner, Lori Divine-Hudson, stumbled into something very different. They came across two rambling buildings with more than an acre of floor space — the factory and adjacent(...)

Mass. Cultural Council secures gambling funds

Intends to pilot prescription arts programs in Berkshires, Springfield

By Bruce Mohl Arts and Culture, Charlie Baker, Massachusetts Legislature 0 Comments Dec 24, 2019

A correction has been added to this story. THE LONG-DELAYED closeout spending bill that finally passed on December 15 contained a provision funneling 2 percent of the tax revenue from the state’s two resort casinos into a fund that the Massachusetts Cultural Council hopes will support arts institutions as well as low-income people who can’t(...)

Say hello to Nubian Square

Mayor predicts panel will OK new name for Dudley Square

By Andy Metzger Dudley Square, Faneuil Hall, Jersey Street, Nubian Square, Yawkey Way 0 Comments Dec 18, 2019

THERE’S NO BRONZE traitor astride a horse. No statue whatsoever. In fact, it can be a little tricky to suss out who exactly Dudley Square is named after. But this era’s moral reckoning with villains from the past will soon shove aside the timeworn geographic honorific memorializing Thomas Dudley, a colonial functionary who was in(...)