Reflections on Aesthetic Perspectives – Attributes of Excellence in Arts for Change
Americans for the Arts published a set of aesthetic criteria in 2017 that align with social justice initiatives. These criteria were published in a guidebook entitled Aesthetic Perspectives: Attributes of Excellence in Arts for Change. These criteria have been taken up by the California Arts Council, as well, I assume, by other funding agencies, educational institutions, and arts organizations. There are 11 criteria and they are intended to provide a qualitative metric for the presence of and commitment to values such as equity and inclusion, as well as suggesting ways that art can stimulate constructive societal change. As stated in the guidebook,
In considering Arts for Change work, we embrace multiple attributes that expand the common view of aesthetics. In doing so, we hope to achieve two complementary aims:
- To emphasize the integral role of the aesthetic in civically and socially engaged art; and
- To offer a set of criteria that supports a full understanding of Arts for Change work as art.
The point is not to perfunctorily demonstrate all 11 attributes in a body of work. Rather, the attributes provide a framework for the recognition and appreciation of art that contributes to a more balanced, equitable society.
The 11 aesthetic attributes are:
Commitment - Creative processes and products embody conviction to the cause espoused through the work.
Risk-taking - The creative work assumes risk by subverting dominant norms, values, narratives, standards, or aesthetics.
Communal Meaning - The creative work facilitates collective meaning that transcends individual perspective and experience.
Openness - The creative work deepens impact by remaining open, fluid, transparent, subject to influence, and able to hold contradiction.
Disruption - Art challenges what is by exposing what has been hidden, posing new ways of being, and modeling new forms of action.
Resourcefulness - Imaginative use of available resources drives artistic innovation and demonstrates responsible social and environmental practice.
Cultural Integrity - The creative work demonstrates integrity and ethical use of material with specific cultural origins and context.
Coherence - Strong ideas expressed with clarity advance both artistic and social purposes.
Emotional Experience - Arts for Change facilitates a productive movement between “heart space” — the emotional experience that art evokes — and the “head space” of civic or social issues.
Stickiness - The creative work achieves sustained resonance, impact, or value.
Sensory Experience - Vivid sensations deepen the experience of the creative work and heighten the power of its messages and the potential for change1.
The following paragraphs present some reflections on these 11 aesthetic attributes, in terms of my artist statement, artistic practices, long-term aspirations, and community impact2.
Artist Statement
Composer, performer, poet, technologist, and educator working at the intersection of art & spirituality. Application of coherence and sensory experience to inspire the birth of new communities founded on mutual respect, tolerance, and a spirit of compassionate play. Recipient of grants and awards at the regional, state, and local levels. Educator and artistic leader for over four decades. Seeking to expand reach and transform society from within.
Artistic Practice
My accomplishments include grants and professional awards, winning at the regional, state, and local levels. My compositional projects have appeared in a number of art spaces and other alternative venues, as well as at major universities and festivals, reaching receptive and aesthetically diverse audiences. I have had the honor of working with first-class performers, thus lending prestige to my career.
I grew up in a family of musicians, writers and speakers. My first solo vocal performance was at the age of 10. In high school I began to sense the social and political necessity for positive change through art, what we would now call disruption. I am a vocalist who has incorporated conducting, composition, audio production, poetic composition, and painting into my creative work. My creative focus now is coherence, i.e., the presentation of works – performed and literary – that address social justice and environmental issues within an integrated aesthetic/spiritual framework.
My artistic projects over the years have consistently evolved to cross disciplinary lines, challenge mainstream expectations, engage new technologies, embrace the common humanity that we all share, and in these ways to demonstrate openness. Three original projects trace this creative evolution: an interdisciplinary project with a modern dance company, which I entitled Curves of Things Through Time, an electronic music/choral/multimedia presentation of biblical texts with cosmic themes, performed in a planetarium, and a vocal ensemble performance entitled breathe · intone · inspire, staged as a flow sequence, and performed to ‘’sober and quiet’’ the minds of performers and audience alike, thus rendering them susceptible to the values of healing, universal spirituality, and global transformation.
One consistent challenge that I have faced in previous projects is that I seek performers and collaborators from marginalized communities. The absence of this representation affects our overall sense of wholeness, but also minimizes valuable cultural influences. Another challenge to my mission and vision has been that risk-taking, especially when it applies in simultaneous multiple dimensions to spirituality, social change, and the aesthetics of experimentalism, requires a lot of audience development and, especially, audience education. Finally, our production of breathe · intone · inspire demonstrated to me that these projects need staff, such as a rehearsal accompanist, a recordist and videographer, and a stage manager. We would achieve an exponential growth in reach with the assistance of an audience development/communications specialist.
The composition and performance of breathe · intone · inspire was the beginning of a new direction in my creative work that allows my artistic innovation and commitment to societal improvement to be shaped and magnified through its focus on sensory experience. This has stimulated the conception of many new projects for the future.
Long Term Aspirations
I seek to build audiences that are well-informed spiritually and that act upon their spiritual growth and knowledge to embrace diversity, positive change, and community solidarity. I use the term “spirituality” in a sense that is beyond any particular spiritual system or religion. Regardless of how we are trained spiritually – or by whom – I assert that there are a small number of attributes of ‘’spiritual health’’ that pertain to us all. We can cultivate these attributes in ways that avoid the buzz words and trappings that often limit spiritual communality. Art is a good medium for this because it is often non-verbal, and where it is verbal, it opens up new ways of saying familiar things, as well offering familiar ways of saying new things.
breathe · intone · inspire and The Book of Paying Attention – my two most recent major works – together represent a firm and solid articulation of my spiritual/artistic/social vision. And yet, I have learned from my audiences that this vision has only begun to unfold. There are many concepts and initiatives addressed by these two works that are only partially developed. I hope to elaborate their important themes in new directions. For example, I have begun a project that will be an encomium to the special qualities and unique roles of women. In a world of escalating misogyny, I would like to raise an affirming blaze of openness and lucid recognition, buttressed with commitment. Future projects may address other marginalization issues.
Audience/Community Impact
I seek to engage a diverse – a universal – community. In 1983 I was a substitute music teacher in the inner city schools of Cincinnati. I witnessed firsthand many disturbing effects of marginalization and it awakened, for the first time, a deep sense of compassion and an aspiration for social justice. That aspiration burns within me today. It is not enough for marginalized communities to express their grievances, however urgently, nor for institutions to reformulate rules of inclusivity; privileged groups must also work on themselves from within. This is a project which we can implement together!
I would like to propose a complementary dynamic to the social justice program. While initiatives such as bias training and the rectification of historical narratives are necessary, they are not socially sufficient in that they do not begin to acknowledge or leverage the innate power and radiance that we all possess. This is what art does best! I want to build communities – through art – that are based on the celebration of unity-in-diversity. As I wrote in The Book of Paying Attention:
Our best hope,
our only hope,
in fact,
lies in the
birth of new
communities founded
on mutual respect,
tolerance, and
a spirit of
compassionate play.
\(\triangleleft\) Essays