Comments on: Culture Under Pressure from the Global Economy

By: Creative Class » Blog Archive » Coming Together to Ease the Pressure - Creative Class

Sat, 29 Aug 2009 10:27:15 +0000

[...] KefentseSat Aug 29th 2009 at 5:25am EDTComing Together to Ease the Pressure In one of my most recent posts, I wrote about the international graffiti and urban arts festival Under Pressure, and about the [...]

By: Michael Wells

Michael Wells — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 01:59:45 +0000

Even more amazing, the Times obit links to YouTube of Iz the Wiz painting MTA cars and other graffiti community links.

Where are the borders?

By: Michael Wells

Michael Wells — Mon, 29 Jun 2009 19:52:28 +0000

Iz the Wiz got a 1/2 page obit in today’s NY Times. Very respectful, wonder what they wrote about him in the ’80’s?

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/29/arts/design/29martin.html?_r=1&ref=obituaries

By: Kwende Kefentse

Kwende Kefentse — Wed, 24 Jun 2009 23:46:06 +0000

Thanks so much Michael. Your observations are always really well measured and make me think a lot about whatever it is you put your pen (fingers?) to. Makes me wish that I was the “creative observations” guy sometimes! I’m glad that I can help open the door to the culture for you though – Hiphop can act as a great foil for investigating a lot of issues.

I think we share the same hunch – that we will see more regional differences re-emerging as cultural currency slides away from global metrics and re-embeds itself into the local. It will be interesting to see the way the global and the local feed back into each other now that things have changed so drastically. I’m hoping that we will see broader appreciation of local iterations of culture, but without the bandwagon hopping effect that has been so pervasive in the globalized culture environment. It would be nice if it was cool to like what others were doing, while still doing one’s own thing essentially.

One of the organizers of House of PainT read the blog and got up with me, explaining a bit about how they were funded. They mentioned that their position on corporate funding isn’t for any lack of asking, but that they’re less affected because they haven’t come to expect it as yet. What stuck out to me is that while they do get a little bit of corporate support, they have a very low reliance upon it, and the support that they do get is mostly of the “in kind” variety keeping them less impacted by these recessionary times. Interesting strategy.

And yes Fin; It bears saying again – IZ THE WIZ, RIP!!!!

By: Michael Wells

Michael Wells — Tue, 23 Jun 2009 00:37:04 +0000

I think one of the changes in the economic restructuring will be more successful local models, based on indigenous community support rather than national/global influences. The smaller festivals, venues and businesses will suffer, but the ones who have built a strong community base will survive and hopefully thrive. One result may be that we see more local or regional differences re-emerge as local becomes more important.

We were driving down a trendy shopping street last night and my wife said “what’s going to go into all of those empty storefronts?” As with malls and shrinking cities, neighborhoods will change as shopping habits change and perhaps become more local.

By the way, I love your posts. They give me a look into arenas I wouldn’t otherwise appreciate, like graffiti art and hip-hop.