On Creative Administration (EP.78)

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Updated

October 24, 2024

Season 6 of the WSS podcast here!

In our inaugural episode of the season, host Tim Cynova is joined by Katy Dammers, Indira Goodwine-Josias, and Christy Bolingbroke as they explore reimagining of value-centered workplaces through Creative Administration. In organizations dedicated to creative expression and innovation, why is it that so many have workplace practices and policies that are dusty?

The spirited discussion dives into the challenges and opportunities within the creative sector to rethink “traditional” approaches, asking when it might be better to reinvent the wheel or even asking if a wheel is what’s needed. The conversation underscores the critical balance between stability and creative experimentation, reflecting on how new approaches can support long-term change and longevity in the arts.

Episode Highlights

• 02:15 Meet the Guests

• 05:44 Diving into Creative Administration

• 09:20 Balancing Structure and Improvisation

• 17:26 Challenging Conventional Wisdom

• 20:46 Navigating Institutional Change

• 24:26 Reevaluating Policy: Balancing Ethics and Values

• 25:09 Navigating Crisis with Established Policies

• 25:51 Incremental Change in Nonprofit Organizations

• 26:37 Creativity and Experimentation During COVID

• 26:58 The Snapback to Pre-COVID Norms

• 27:38 Fear of Change and Embracing New Solutions

• 28:44 Creative Administration and Sustainability

• 29:49 The Role of Artists in Institutional Change

• 34:11 Balancing Administrative and Artistic Growth

Resources Mentioned in the Episode:

• Check out the new book Artists On Creative Administration: A Workbook from the National Center for Choreography.

• Christy Bolingbroke’s Masters Thesis, Designing a 21st Century Dance Ecology: Questioning Current Practices and Embracing Curatorial Interventions

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Bios

Christy Bolingbroke is the Founding Executive/Artistic Director for the National Center for Choreography at The University of Akron (NCCAkron). She is responsible for setting the curatorial vision and sustainable business model to foster research and development in dance. Previously, she served as the Deputy Director for Advancement at ODC in San Francisco, overseeing curation and performance programming as well as marketing and development organization-wide. A key aspect of her position included managing a unique three-year artist-in-residence program for dance artists, guiding and advising them in all aspects of creative development and administration. Prior to ODC, she was the Director of Marketing at the Mark Morris Dance Group in Brooklyn, NY. She earned a B.A. in Dance from the University of California, Los Angeles; an M.A. in Performance Curation from Wesleyan University; and is a graduate of the Arts Management Fellowship program at the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts. She currently serves on the Akron Civic Commons Core Team; as a consulting advisor for the Bloomberg Philanthropies Arts Innovation Management initiative; and on the New England Foundation for the Arts National Dance Project Advisory Panel. In 2017, DANCE Magazine named Bolingbroke among the national list of most influential people in dance today.

Indira Goodwine-Josias was born and raised in Queens, NY, and believes in the power of art to educate, inspire, and advance change. With a dual background in dance and arts administration, she is currently the Senior Program Director for Dance at the New England Foundation for the Arts (NEFA) where she directs NEFA’s National Dance Project and major dance initiatives in New England. Previously, she served as the Managing Director of Camille A. Brown & Dancers (CABD) where she shepherded the organization through the attainment of 501(c)(3) nonprofit status, established the organization’s founding Board of Directors, increased the institutional and individual fundraising efforts, and provided oversight of the development, implementation, and continued growth of CABD’s dance engagement program, “EVERY BODY MOVE.” Prior to her leadership role with CABD, Indira held various positions at Harlem Stage that deepened community partnerships and enhanced the organization’s annual dance program, “E-Moves.” A 2016 New York Community Trust Fellow, American Express Leadership Academy Alumna, and Dance/USA DILT Program Alumna, Indira is widely recognized for her entrepreneurial and artist-centered spirit. She currently serves on the Board of Trustees for Dance/USA, the Advisory Committee for The Black Genius Foundation, Grantmakers in the Arts’ Individual Artist Committee, and is a member of Women of Color in the Arts (WOCA). Her contributions to the dance field also include serving as a programmatic thought partner, grant panelist, and conference speaker. Indira holds a BFA in Dance Performance from Florida State University and an MA in Performing Arts Administration from New York University.

Katy Dammers (she/her) is the Deputy Director and Chief Curator, Performing Arts at REDCAT, CalArts’ center for the visual and performing arts in Los Angeles. Her curatorial practice presents, organizes, and contextualizes contemporary practice in performance commissions, exhibitions, festivals, site-specific installations, and publications. She has held past leadership positions at The Kitchen, FringeArts, and Jacob’s Pillow. Dammers has also worked as a creative administrator, and worked with choreographers Rashaun Mitchell + Silas Riener as General Manager from 2014-2022, in addition to organizing projects with Jennifer Monson, Donna Uchizono, and Tere O’Connor. A writing fellow at the National Center for Choreography Akron, her essays have been published in The Brooklyn Rail, Motor Dance Journal, and MOLD as well as edited volumes by University of Akron Press and Princeton University Press. Dammers was a member of the Inland Academy and holds degrees from Goldsmiths College and Princeton University.

Tim Cynova, SPHR (he/him) is the Principal of WSS HR LABS, an HR and org design consultancy helping to reimagine workplaces where everyone can thrive. He is a certified Senior Professional in Human Resources (SPHR) and a trained mediator, and has served on the faculty of Minneapolis College of Art & Design, the Banff Centre for Arts & Creativity (Banff, Canada) and The New School (New York City) teaching courses in People-Centric Organizational Design, and Strategic HR. In 2021, he concluded a 12-year tenure leading Fractured Atlas, a $30M, entirely virtual non-profit technology company and the largest association of independent artists in the U.S., where he served in both the Chief Operating Officer and Co-CEO roles (part of a four-person, shared, non-hierarchical leadership team), and was deeply involved in its work to become an anti-racist, anti-oppressive organization since they made that commitment in 2013. Earlier in his career, Tim was the Executive Director of The Parsons Dance Company and of High 5 Tickets to the Arts in New York City, had a memorable stint with the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra, was a one-time classical trombonist, musicologist, and for five years in his youth he delivered newspapers for the Evansville, Indiana Courier-Press. Learn more on LinkedIn.

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Transcript

Tim Cynova:

Hi, I am Tim Cynova and welcome to Work Shouldn't Suck, a podcast about, well, that. Frequent listeners of the podcast know that we spend a lot of space here discussing in many ways how to craft the values-aligned workplaces we want from the workplaces we have, whether that be reimagining power and decision-making leadership models to decolonizing the employee handbook in company bylaws to reconceiving of quote, unquote, "performance management structures" or centering candidate care in our hiring processes.

Frequent listeners will also know that one of my frustrations in the work of designing and co-creating value-centered workplaces, particularly when those workplaces are in the creative sector, a sector I grew up in and around and I've had the privilege during my career are working with and for a number of amazing ones, a frustration is that many of these organizations produce some incredibly creative and innovative work for the stage, screen, galleries, public spaces, you name it, some are considered world-class institutions, the pinnacle of their craft, but behind the scenes their operations are about as dusty as it comes. Most are filled with incredibly creative people, artists, innovators, and for a myriad reasons they check their creativity at the door and operate the organization like a book from 1982 says they should. Their workplace policies, practices initiatives are more or less a copy-paste from another organization. And as many of these organizations have fewer than 500 employees, many fewer than 10 employees, it's ironic that they're using things designed for the military and multinational organizations.

As we start season six of the podcast, we're dedicating the first few episodes to exploring this question of creative administration and unpacking it in a few different ways, from embodying shared leadership to startups and scaling to today's conversation on creative administration, where I'm joined by three people who have given this question of re-imagination a good deal of thought and exploration and I'm excited to hear where this conversation takes us. Our esteemed guests today include Katy Dammers, Indira Goodwine-Josias, and a Work Shouldn't Suck fan favorite, Christy Bollingbroke. Lots to explore. So let's get going. Christy, Indira and Katy, welcome to the podcast.

Christy Bolingbroke:

Thanks, Tim. I didn't know I was a fan favorite and I didn't even campaign for it. That's exciting.

Tim Cynova:

As a way of grounding us in the conversation, might I invite you each to introduce yourself and the work you do these days?

Christy Bolingbroke:

Christy here. I have been a longtime fan of the podcast and even your earlier work when we used to record conversations as an Unconference. But yes, Christy Bollingbroke, I use she/her pronouns. In my current work, I'm the Executive Artistic Director at the National Center for Choreography, one of two such centers in the country, here in Akron, Ohio. And my visual description, I am a pale white woman, pretty tall, reddish-brown hair, wearing a pink shirt with a myriad of keys all over it and I'm standing in front of a wall of post-it notes in a myriad of colors.

Katy Dammers:

Hi, I'm Katy Dammers. Thanks so much for having us on this podcast, Tim, and Christy for crafting such great moments for intersection and networking and relationship amidst the field. I use she/her pronouns. For my visual description I'll note that I am a white woman with blue eyes and pale skin with long wavy-brown hair and wearing a colorful top with a lot of different patterns all at the same time.

I think I'm coming here from a lot of places, so I'll give a couple of ways to describe who I am. I'm an arts administrator and curator and deputy director, and have also been a producer and a writer and a thinker and a person who accompanies artists in any number of ways. Right now I'm talking to you from Los Angeles where I'm the Deputy Director and Chief Curator of Performing Arts at REDCAT, which is the Downtown Center for Cal Arts. But I imagine today we'll also talk about my long history working directly with choreographers, notably Rashaun Mitchell and Silas Riener, who've had a number of residencies and intersecting points of support from the National Center of Choreography, and where I was once a creative writing lab resident. Really glad to be in dialogue with y'all.

Indira Goodwine-Josias:

Greetings everyone, this is Indira Goodwine-Josias speaking. I use she/her pronouns and I am a Black woman who today, while you cannot see me I will acknowledge have long box braids, wearing my blue and black frame glasses with a black dress. Currently I serve as the Senior Program Director for Dance at the New England Foundation for the Arts where I direct NEFA's National Dance Project, known to many affectionately as NDP. And I also direct major dance initiatives in New England. Prior to that I was the Managing Director for Camille A. Brown and Dancers, which I'm sure may also be a part of this conversation as we talk about leadership and administrative trajectories. So I'm looking forward to the dialogue. Thanks for having me.

Tim Cynova:

One of the things that brought us together today was the publication of NCCAkron's new anthology, Artists on Creative Administration. Christy and I were talking about the book and talking about different ways that this shows up in various organizations, however you define organizations, large, small, whatever and wherever you might be in the organizations. And I'm curious, you've all worked for relatively small organizations and relatively large organizations, you've held, quote, unquote, "official" leadership roles, and those less so I guess if we're talking hierarchically speaking. To sketch the scene for everyone as we think about organizations, as we think about leadership at this moment in time and in particular creative leadership in creative administration, how do you frame this for yourself when approaching your work?

Christy Bolingbroke:

This is an extension of the Creative Admin Research Program at NCCAkron with lead support from the Mellon Foundation, but is by no means only about the CAR Program as we refer to it. Just because we have published a book. It is to highlight those stories, but it is not by any means exhaustive. I think that creative administration is happening everywhere. What really resonated for us to have this discussion, Tim, though, was one of the basic premises in CAR is the reality that we have a fairly nascent field in the performing arts and arts administration. The NEA itself was created in the 1960s, and so nonprofit administration was evolving along the same time that a lot of our single choreographer companies back in the 20th century were first coming onto the scene. So they were making these things up as they went along to try and fit into nonprofit models, which is a tax distinction, not an operating model.

So in CAR we ask ourselves what are the 20th century practices, the working knowledge that's been developed that we then may need to grow out of and developed a 21st century way of thinking? And that dichotomy in conventional dance companies to the idea that you have a single artistic director and a single executive director and they are supposed to be doing this sort of co-leadership but as we know has gotten super messy and wasn't always smooth sailing.

And now you have more artists than ever, when the New England Foundation for the Arts 2016 report Moving Dance Forward came out, the count was 80% of the dance field was working on an independent or project basis. I would hazard a guess after and coming through COVID, it's even higher now. That you might not even have a full-time staff person. So what is that co-leadership, what dance between administrative and artistic partners inside of that? So I might offer that as an invitation, because I particularly hold a lot of what I've learned from Katy and Indira and especially how, Indira, I'm going to emphasize to you how you worked with Camille Brown and would love to have you elaborate more now that we're recording it for posterity.

Indira Goodwine-Josias:

Indira speaking. Thank you so much Christy for that warm invitation. I'll start by just acknowledging for me that I am an artist before I am an administrator, before I am a funder. I believe that this is really important because the experiences that I've had as an artist have informed the way that I perform as an administrator, which also keep me grounded as a funder. So part of my creative leadership and administration I would say starts with a warm-up. And, Christy, you know we've had these conversations a lot because of course the warm-up doesn't look the same as it did when I was preparing to perform on stage or in community, but it does require a check-in of self that I must be responsible to and care for in order to do this work that requires much collaboration, deep exploration and even excavation as well as honesty.

So I hold all of those in this space and also for what you shared and re-emphasize back to me, I always share that I did not work for Camille A. Brown in dancers, I worked with Camille A. Brown and Camille A. Brown and Dancers to really uplift and amplify what her vision was. And so I think that's really important as you talk about roles and even responsibilities because those can become fluid depending on what the circumstances are. But the trust that is built between the parties involved remains critical to whatever success you're looking to have. And so I'll end thought there. Katy?

Katy Dammers:

This is Katy speaking. Thank you, Indira. I love this phrase of the warm-up, and I think it segues pretty seamlessly into some of the relationship dynamics that I talk about in the chapter that I wrote for this book. I too always emphasized when I worked with Rashaun and Silas, that kind of adverb or phrase, that really spoke to the dynamic aspect of the partnership. Especially working with a partnership already, there's a lot of dynamism and tension and back and forth and love between Rashaun and Silas. And as I joined that it already was a triangle, which I would say in a more normative, hetero-patriarchal understanding of our world, the triangle kind of screws with everything and working with a queer company that was really seeking to reconsider time and our relationship to space, we were always in a dynamic flow of maybe I'm leading, maybe they are leading, maybe all three of us together are in a line. And we really thought about that from a choreographic standpoint.

I too trained as a dancer. I would not call myself a creative artist in so far as a choreographer, but I do think the writing that I do is creative and I do think the administration and the curation that I do is creative. And in all of those I have to think about space and how I'm orienting my body in relationship to other bodies. And that awareness, particularly in dance class of like, "Are we in the same line together? Maybe I need to pull back." We're improvising live, "What's the balance between that person's movements and my movements? Where are we energetically within a landscape? What's the topography of that shared plane?" Is something that had to animate our relationship all the time and allowed for us to have I think a very strategic relationship to movement through what can be a really ever evolving and frankly confusing field.

So we were able to modulate pretty quickly, which I think enabled a lot of success and new pathway creation for them. And we could have moments where I was like, "As we talk to this presenter, it's going to be most advantageous actually for Katy to go out and actually maintain maybe 60% of the relationship and offer some space. And then Rashaun and Silas can come in later." Or, "In this particular relationship it's actually really great for Rashaun and Silas to go out front and Katy will handle a lot of things in the back." It was not always so back and forth in that way, I think it's also left and right and up and down. But that awareness of space and relationship really animated my understanding of creative administration specific to working with those artists, but is also true of my work with other people like Jennifer Monson or Rebecca Leger and continues to be the way I think about working in institutions now.

Throughout my career I've always worked in parallel or often intersecting in tandem with both supporting and working with choreographers and having a foot in institutions. Much of that is from a personal sustainability perspective, which I'm sure we'll talk about, but I also think there is some productive synergy between working in and amidst both of those places simultaneously. And now for the first time in my career, I only have one job, which I think says a lot about our field, and it's a job that in and of itself has multiple titles. I'm the deputy director and I'm the chief curator. And I think that parallel and intersecting nature is still happening even within my institution now, and I'm really grateful for my long experience with creators and choreographers because that's informed my leadership style.

Christy Bolingbroke:

So many good verbs from both of you. Dance is about action, so of course that resonates with me. I love that you've brought space in because it is also a choreographic idea. I often will speak with artists here at MCC Akron and say, "Are you creating a work with a specific space in mind or are you creating a work and then compromising it to get it wherever you can get it booked?" And they're like, "Oh, I never thought of that." This idea of space as well as the idea of the administrative warm-up, how do you ground yourself or self-reflect, what comes to mind that I think particularly for many of the artists and administrators working, at least in dance on a project basis today, they don't have even a dedicated physical space.

I know it's less poetic, but that idea of do you need a dedicated physical space? Or now with this ongoing dance, for our listening friends who can't see the beautiful choreography that Katy also demonstrated inside of that, I had this picture of you and Rashaun and Silas inside one of those gyrokinesis zero-gravity balls that is never grounded, right? You're like, "Now this is up and down," and that's also what it feels like in this field sometimes too.

Indira Goodwine-Josias:

Indira speaking. And I would add to that, Katy, something that I heard very clearly that I also lean into is that we also want to recognize the times where structured choreography is important and also creating the space for improv. And that also exists within administration when you allow yourself to lean into that, right? And I think that there is space for both to exist and acknowledging especially some of the structures that we already operate in that work and also others that we know don't work and need to change. But I wanted to highlight that because I felt that very deeply when you mentioned it. I was like, oh yeah, there's some things that are like, no, it's one, two, three, and then there's other things that are different languages, different modalities, different colors. You're bringing in everything you've got. And I think that that's also something to acknowledge as part of true creative administration that exists.

Tim Cynova:

I love this frame that you all are playing with here in this space. And it gets to a tension that I always have felt, this disconnect where all these creative people work inside this organization and check their creativity at the door. They're using the same old playbook like the nonprofit playbook from the '80s without recognizing, without I guess questioning, "Why do we do it this way? Can we do it a different way? Why are we creative in the studio but not when we come into this other space?"

And I love this idea of the tensions between when is structured choreography, we should use that, but maybe when is improv something? Like how do you use these tools? What might be a solved problem, like everyone just does it that way because that's the easiest way to do it versus when do we want to reinvent the wheel? How do we reinvent the wheel? What goes into the wheel? What is a wheel? And toggling between these different modalities is what I really enjoy about what you all bring to this work. It's questioning conventional wisdom asking how can we pull these things together and design a current and future state that fits us and our values and what we want?

Christy Bolingbroke:

Well, it sparks so much because we've been focusing on the administrative and the artistic and finding space for what do we each bring to that collaboration, when do we take turns leading? And I don't know, Katy and Indira, if you would agree with this, but then now being the head of a organization that's trying to do things differently, I find myself still trying to question conventional wisdom and being reminded to take that time even when I don't have necessarily artists in the room. I'm talking about training new staff and team members, board members who can get into asking some of the same questions or assumptions that provides, or maybe they bring some baggage because they've had some really negative experiences at other nonprofit organizations on their boards or on their team members. And that also becomes a different kind of check-in that you have to say like, "Oh, wait a minute, maybe we really don't like this word or this idea."

We had a development committee for a year here at NCCAkron and a year in, I won't put anyone on the spot or name names, but they were like, "Oh my god, we failed." And I was like, "Why? I didn't give you a development goal. We just wanted to ask what would development look like?" And it came, we figured out like, "Oh, we're not a typical organization, so why do we have a development committee just because conventional wisdom says you're supposed to?" And so we rebranded and we called it a regional development committee, and that was actually much more interesting if we could move beyond the numeric driven fundraising goals that are required of this language that the field has continued to perpetuate. It's still development, but I think similar to using with artists and how we know language is important, how we continue to perpetuate that in our everyday practices is what I find continuously grounding to be leading an organization and trying not to just build it out in the same vision of the 20th century.

Indira Goodwine-Josias:

Indira speaking. I'll lean into a few things here. One, I want to go back to something that was offered by Tim a little earlier. The great question, what is the wheel, right? Who needs the wheel? Who doesn't have access to a wheel? What path can the wheel take? Suggest even leaning into that I think is actually a great question though you were hesitating about it. And also just leaning into the fact that the reality is creativity is not stagnant. It's a process that is active and changing. And I do believe that often within arts organizations, especially when it comes to administration, there's often a focus on the deliverable, and might I add the perfection of that deliverable, that creates an environment where there is little room to try things or even to honor a moment of failure, as you mentioned, Christy, as a seed that still has time to grow or mature versus a stone that can't be moved, can't be altered.

And I do think that that's something to lean into and to recognize as we're considering the conversation. And especially, Christy, what you were offering around the institutional knowledge doesn't mean that that is Bible. And sometimes I think within our organizations, that is sometimes the path that people tend to stay on a little bit longer than we desire, at least certainly now in these times.

Katy Dammers:

Thanks, Indira. And, this is Katy. I just want to animate for folks that we are all nodding, we are all thumbs up thing. I think there's a lot of dynamic uplifting and agreement in this conversation. It's so fun to talk with y'all about this stuff. I will say I'm resonating with a lot that's coming up here. And Tim, when you first raised your question, there was a part of me that was like, "I think we're doing great." And then there are also moments in the field where I'm like, "Oh man, we got to look at this board policy," and like, "Wow, where is our HR in all of this?"

As someone who's relatively new to REDCAT, I've been there just a couple of months now, one of the things I am often thinking about, which goes back to what Indira was saying of sometimes you really need the five, six, seven, eight, and sometimes you really need the space to improv. But also I think before you can have a improv that feels like lead in with care and thoughtful, you also need to have trusting relationships. And I think sometimes that can come from having a clear structure. I am often balancing between evaluating something and thinking, "Not our best. I think we could see some room for improvement and change," but also not coming in and tearing everything down.

I worked at Jacob's Pillow, the incredible dance festival for many years, and Norton Owen, who's the director of archives and preservation there, was always a great reminder to us, especially as I came on to help the festival come through COVID, and come back and that was a period of such incredible change for the entire field, but especially for the Pillow. All of the previous systems that we had done had to be rewritten because every performance was outside for the first time, with physical distancing, with new commitments to accessibility, with site-specific performance for the first time. It was so exciting and it was also in some moments really unnerving for the staff because they were like, "We don't have anything. What is our grounding amidst this?"

So I think I'm often trying to figure out, okay, I don't think policy is bad. I actually think policy as a broad framework can be really supportive, but we need to make sure that it matches our ethics and our values and that it's clear. I actually think policy that's like this hazy potential scary thing is really unhelpful. So I think a lot of what I do is try to re-articulate and re-evaluate policy and think about having many different decision makers in the room, as it feels appropriate, to ensure that that is something that's informed by a lot of different backgrounds and value sets. And then having that as a framework to lean on in times of crisis that would then give you some grounding to push back from or away from to be differently creative.

Because crazy stuff happens and it's helpful in the midst of that potentially anxiety lead-in moment to be like, "Okay, we don't have to reinvent the whole wheel. We don't have to decide what our COVID policy is in this moment." We can look at, "Okay, this is our COVID policy and we're going to follow it." Or, "Actually we need to depart from it a little bit, but at least we have a landscape that's already drawn." So I think I'm often trying to toggle between the two of those things and to incrementally work on them. Because especially as someone new, I don't want to come in and be like, "Great, we're redoing everything." That can be really nerve wracking, not only to my colleagues and the people that I help supervise and support, but frankly to our artists and our audiences. So we are taking an incremental approach to evaluation and change.

Tim Cynova:

What I appreciate about the past four or five years is they've been incredibly disruptive in a lot of ways and there's a lot of uncertainty. Prior to that, there wasn't a lot of upside in trying new things in nonprofit organizations, right? Consider yourself an executive director, you could try something and if it fails, you could lose your job. If you succeed wildly, you could keep your job at the same salary. The systems and structures don't support the thing that we are here to try and do. What I think happened over the past number of years, certainly with COVID, is that people had to try new things, people had to experiment. A lot of places didn't have systems and structures and policies that supported what was happening during COVID. So I think that was an opportunity to bring that creativity into different places that were incredibly dusty and unquestioned.

What I find so challenging is that the snapback that's occurring right now is real and it's strong. It's snapping organizations back to what they were before COVID where we have to all gather, we have to do it this way, and forgetting or pushing aside that we've proven that we can actually do things in a different way that actually fit us better, fit our values, are more engaging, are more accessible, are more inclusive. And yet there's this pullback that I see a lot of organizations wrestling with. How do we keep the things that we've proven we can do and iterate into what's next rather than go back to what was?

Indira Goodwine-Josias:

Christy, you and I often have these conversations, but I want to highlight something that always sticks with me after we talk and even before we talk. Are we asking the same questions out of fear of finding a new answer or solution? Are we asking the same questions out of fear for finding a new answer or solution? And I think that's something to sit with, especially as we're doing our best to transition from what we've experienced within the pandemic. And some things are going to certainly continue to live with us. We've experienced a lot of trauma, we've experienced a lot of grief. It's important to recognize those things as well as some of what we've been able to move forward with and maybe experiment with that you uplifted, Tim. And I will say that I think a lot of organizations got caught up in the moment, in the now, and if we are honest, what feels like instant gratification. So the immediate response to things. And the reality is moments pass.

Movements, however, can provide the strength needed to push forward, and strategies that support a level of sustainability as well as an extension of reach. And so when given the time, creative administration I think offers the opportunity to intentionally merge one's creative process and practices with curatorial and emergent administration or administrative strategies. So it will ultimately create a lot of different paths. That's the reality, but those are also paths for advancement and/or enhancement. And even with all of those paths, there's still a container that's going to allow you to consistently match your mission, whatever that is with action that is within versus within responding to just the moment. And so that's what I'll offer there. I don't know. Christy, Katy?

Christy Bolingbroke:

Yes ma'am. Absolutely. I'm glad you also brought in the F word, fear. I'm reminded what you said earlier about creativity, something about how it's inherently about changing. And maybe that's the real value about embracing creativity in administrative practices because we know that these moments constantly changes the one thing we can count on. Depending on your operating environment, on the scale of your organization, how far removed you are from the community you work with or from the artists might inform how you feel that change. That's where we need to ask different questions instead of just seeking the same answers.

And then the fear piece that came in, I was reminded of a book by Nina Simon, The Art of Relevance, and this had been a collection of blog essays, I think from Museum 2.0 was its original digital iteration. She was at the Santa Cruz Museum at the time and talks about taking exhibits down to the beach. Because it's Santa Cruz, it's beach culture. Why do they want to go into a stuffy building? They had lock ins and they were inviting people to draw on the walls. And I was fortunate I got to hear her speak at a conference some years ago and I asked, I was like, "How did you get your staff, your people who had been at your organization for years to buy into this way of adapting your board?" And her answer was so simple but also a little scary, she said, "Because it was that or close. We were that far in the brink."

So while there's this, are we afraid to find new ways of doing things that you brought up, Indira, but I'm also reminded that our field has a habit that they're not willing to try new things until it's their last resort because there's that fear of closing. And maybe that's the lasting effect of being a leader through COVID is now we've had a taste of that and how do we use it as a tool instead as a barrier from us evolving?

Indira Goodwine-Josias:

Indira speaking. I just want to drop this here since you uplifted it, Christy and it's on the record now, and for some organizations it might be better to close than to remain open.

Katy Dammers:

Katy speaking, thank you for bringing that into the room. I think that is the elephant that people are so anxious to talk about. And I do think that's where the policy and the bureaucracy, I'm doing this movement with my hands where they're crackling in together like they're squeezing and then you hold, this is also a dance metaphor, but it makes me think of the fascia on the bone where if that is calcifying, you are so stuck. You want that to be juicy and moving. We had to do so much unexpected movement amidst COVID and amidst the push for Black lives and amidst the push for trans lives. Also, I want to hold some space, was pretty scary for people and pretty exhausting for people.

And I think now in this moment where many organizations feel like, "Okay, I can exhale maybe a little bit," as they start to inhale for the first time after maybe two or three years, they're realizing they don't have the same resources, they don't have that emotional roller coaster, which for some people provided some additional buy-in from their communities. They don't have the COVID subsidy from the government or from other granting organizations. And their community has gone in different directions. And so I think as we try to inhale and hope that we can go back to what was, because it was uncomfortable to be moving in so many directions and exploring new things, that seat is no longer behind us in some ways.

So I think it's an exciting time in the field and also one where I'm trying to think about sustainability, not only in terms of a financial sense because, yes, that's difficult and an ongoing question for us, but also in terms of our staff. I think so much of what came up for me while I worked on this piece in the book is that it's very difficult to work in this field as an administrator and it's even more difficult to work in this field as an artist. And so I just want to be thoughtful about that positioning. I have a full-time job, I have health insurance. That is a beautiful thing. And for the artists that we want to support, very few of them have that. So I'm also thinking about how amidst all of this change, we can really look at sustainability across the field rather than just in an administrative capacity. Because if our artists can't make work, then who do we have to work with?

Indira Goodwine-Josias:

Indira speaking. And I just want to add to that, and I'm going to put Christy on the spot slightly, but more in a highlighting, star shining moment because I think about your thesis, Designing a 21st Century Dance Ecology, Questioning Current Practices and Embracing Curatorial Interventions. And I'm saying the full title. So for those of you who have not had an opportunity to read it, well go ahead and do so. Something that came up inside of Christy's thesis that I think is alluding to or amplifying what Katy just said is administrative growth should match artistic evolution, right? There's a discussion about that. And of course, while this is admirable, the reality is that the artistic value may be high, the human administrative capacity is often either low, stretched and overworked, and/or under resourced in some way as we think about actual administrators.

And then even as we think organizationally, again, this would be admirable to have, but there often seems to be a disconnect. And I wonder if we need to start paying a little bit more attention to the art that is being shared or that we're even presenting as they could serve as tools to support administrative growth, accountability policies and structures if we take the time to unpack and explore what those artistic expressions are actually offering. Because there's often a connection that can be found and be supportive in the infrastructure of organizations. But it's about having the opportunity to really dig into that and find those nuggets that I think could propel a lot of organizations into the type of organization that they want to be both internally and externally.

Katy Dammers:

This is Katy. I want to pick up on that, Indira. I think you're so right. And offered to this group and anybody who's listening, that this is a tension as a curator that I am sitting within and moving back and forth with all the time. Because I'm so grateful to artists who have done and who do do that as part and parcel of their practice or as a product of our intersection with their practice. I think Emily Johnson is an incredible example of this and her Decolonization Rider, and others who have access writers, and it doesn't always have to be in the form of a writer, but that's just a good example in this moment that to work with Emily, as I have at the Pillow, we had to have clear conversations about, "Okay, we can't just do a one and done." And the Pillow to their credit doesn't do that, but some organizations in our field do.

So to counteract that, Emily requires that people have a land acknowledgement and have a long-term, deep, considered relationship with Indigenous community and have a long-term, deep commitment to presenting Indigenous artists in the seasons to come. So as a curator, there are moments where I work with artists like that and they can be such incredible propellers for broader institutional change, and there's also a tension I sit with where as a curator, where I think, "Gosh, is that something that I or my institution should do before the artist comes?" What is the push-pull? We were talking about this in terms of our work with artists and our work within institutions. And I don't think one or the other is the right way. I don't think the artists always have to push the institution or that the institution has to prepare itself to then work with the artist. I think it's a lot of both and a lot of in between. But I do think that relationship is the propeller for much of the work that we do.

Christy Bolingbroke:

Christy speaking again. I'm caught, Katy, with your observation and statement of that is also an extension of that, "Who's leading? When do I need to step forward or back?" That you described in your working relationship and experience with Rashaun and Silas. And I think that's the muscle set and skill that where the creative comes in, the listening, the constant improvisation. What I also hear that I want to bring us back to, we talked about when is bureaucracy the one, two, three that we need? But then also what about the unstated unwritten policies that are the norms that we're fighting and trying to grow out of as well? And I'm particularly thinking about martyrdom, the idea of the show must go on and what we have to do to work with artists, to continue to show up for artists, to show up for organizations. That is also part of the self check-in I think administrators are going through in this moment. To be able to continue showing up for artists, how do we not burn ourselves out?

That means we have to be more real with our own limitations and capacity, so we don't perpetuate this idea that, "I'm here for the artist and I..." At the same time it is that opportunity to work with artists that fills me up in doing this work. The artists, I agree with you, Indira, looking to them are a way of how I process this crazy world that defies words sometimes and I need to be able to feel it and experience that. Personally, that's where I find myself trying to manage all of the different things. When am I in service to the artists? When am I in service to the field as a whole? When am I also making sure to check in with myself so that I don't overextend myself? It's both the individual, it's the many organizations or operating environments that they're in, and then how and when those many molecules are bouncing against each other in the field as well, there's no one answer.

And at one time, Katy, you could be working on one thing and then that same day Indira has a different perspective and then I have another perspective. I do feel we're all trying to move in the same direction, but this really has for me revealed the intersectionality and complexity of we're not just putting on a show. It's not as simple as, "This is my to-do list, and I just checked all of that off and so it should be done, right?" I don't think what this sector has ever been about, but now more so than ever, in my opinion.

Tim Cynova:

No surprise that this conversation has been amazing and flown by very fast. As we bring the in plane for landing on the conversation today, where do we each want to land it?

Indira Goodwine-Josias:

Indira speaking. I'm just going to first say thank you again, Tim, Katy, Christy. It has been a pleasure to be in conversation with all of you. I'm going to end it with a quote that I have under my signature for work, as well as personally because I think that it applies, and offer it for this conversation and moving forward, and this quote comes from Titos Sompa, who is a Congolese dancer, choreographer and musician. He once shared with me that, "Life is about listening. When we listen to each other, we tell the right stories." And so I think I want to end in that way. Thank you.

Katy Dammers:

This is Katy. Thanks for offering that, Indira. That's lovely. And I'll echo you and saying thank you. Such a joy as always to be in dialogue with y'all, and I hope we'll keep the conversation going. I think working on this book over the last couple of years and being part of the many experiments that Christy has put into the field has been so exciting. And I do feel like there's a wave rising of new administrators, new systems thinking, new anticipations on the horizon. In a little bit of a gesture towards the book again, one thing that the book’s editor Tonya Lockyer asked us to write at the end of each chapter was a creative experiment or a little bit of a workbook. "Here's a test, take it out on the road."

And so I would encourage people, one thing that I am trying to do for myself as I balance the exciting, the big, the visioning and also the emails and the texts and the quick problem solving that is the reality of our daily lives is that in conversation with Ainsley Vanderbruch, who's a great choreographer and a mentor and an accompanier of me and my journey, is that I'm trying something new, she suggested, where I just take 10 minutes at the top of every day to vision. And usually it's truly five minutes of like, "I'm going to set a timer on my phone. What are the big picture ideas that are floating through my head in the shower, in the drive to work?" And get it down on the page. And then, "What are the next five minutes of the reflections?"

I think that ties in well with what Indira said. We need to listen. But I think we also need a little bit of space to integrate and to dialogue and to get it down on the page and sometimes out of the body so that then there's some more space in the body to be resonant with each other. So I'll offer that if that's supportive to others, that's something new that I'm trying. And I'll pass it to Christy.

Christy Bolingbroke:

I love a good exercise and, also to give credit where credits do, I am the editor for the Series in Dance with the University of Akron Press, but we could not have made this book possible with without engaging in hiring Tonya Lockyer as the editor, who really worked with all of the 30 contributing authors that are included inside of this book. I want to land as a continued nod to the book and push back a little bit against the sustainability as an idea of success. Because I feel in this ever quickly changing, that also might be something that we're growing outdated of because it has a sort of inherently precarious yet static idea of, "Okay, what's sustainable?"

And one of the other contributing authors, Raja Feather Kelly, offers some musings on maybe what we're solving for in this field is longevity and how do we continue to be a part of it if that means that for three or four years we have a core company, and then for five or seven years we're installing solo in museums? And continuing to adapt and evolve to follow that series of ongoing change that you referenced, Indira. What I'm holding while continuing to underline, "What does an administrative warm-up look like?" Following today's discussion and harkening my own dance training, I'm really wondering, "What is my administrative center so that those core muscles are engaged to be able to weather the inevitable changes, sometimes coming at whiplash speed and continue to not be thrown as off balance so that I myself can also find longevity in this field?"

Tim Cynova:

Amazing. Christy, Indira, and Katy, thank you so much for such a joyful start to the day, such a thought-provoking start to the day. So many questions to roll around in in future conversations. And thanks so much for being on the podcast.

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