The Vision Festival has started

Brass Bang

Tuesday was the opening night of the Vision Festival – the 14th edition, this year at the Abrons Arts Center at Henry Street Settlement. Check out the full program here and be curious: come out, open your eyes, your ears and your heart! It is a yearly blossoming of smart, generous and free expression unlike any other, mixing music, dance and visual arts.

(Yes, full disclosure: I volunteer for the creation of an Innovative Arts Center, an initiative closely linked to this, and I’ll be moderating two panel discussions at the Festival about Arts and Politics).

Still missing in the Obama cabinet…

… or so do over a of hundred of thousand of us think: a Secretary of the Arts.

It’s never happened in the United States, but it would be a welcome change, and the recognition that arts and culture are a vital necessity to the harmonious development of a nation and the pursuit of happiness.

Barack Obama has spoken eloquently, during the campaign, of arts education as an integral and indispensable part of the growth of all human beings. It’s time to take that thinking a step further and recognize that supporting the arts and creation is not a luxury, but an integral and indispensable part making a more perfect union.
If you agree, here’s a petition. Sign it, spread it… and be creative!