System error

The Vom: A monthly diatribe, rant, provocation against the conventional wisdom

The nonprofit system of creating live performance sucks, apparently, and everyone is complaining about it these days. I’m not talking about rednecks and Republicans and their concerns about bootstraps and handouts. I’m talking about all of us who are in it and who do it.

As a frequent consultant and constant empathizer to nearly every “department” of the non-profit organization, my head – and my heart – are exploding with all the bitching and the brokenness. Helping shut down Jeune Lune nearly did me in, and it’s no arbitrary choice that my partners and I made this magazine a simple, little for-profit corporation despite the certain lack of profit.

In case you haven’t heard the bitching yet – or would like to know you’re not alone – here’s a sampling from the green rooms and the board rooms around town:

Artists:

Why does the Development Director make five times what I do when I make the work we exist to create? Are we just raising money to perpetuate raising money? Why do the administrators get salaries and health insurance while I age badly with sore muscles, no insurance, and constant insecurity? Why is a Marketing Director, whose entire claim to creativity is the ability to write copy like, “Don’t miss this extravaganza of theater,” telling me what kind of art to make when they should just shut up and do their job of telling Rohan what to write about us and getting people to buy tickets? And are they fucking kidding me that I have to fucking tap dance in someone’s living room for free on my only night off and be grateful for the shitty hors d'oeuvres?

Administrators:

Not one word of thanks when I work more hours than anyone on the least glamorous stuff, and nobody understands how complicated this all is, and do they even know how this place would come crashing down if I finally just walked out and went somewhere I could work half as hard for twice as much money and butt loads more respect from people both inside and outside my organization? And if the Artistic Director calls me “You There” one more time while I’m carrying the damn cooler full of ice into the fundraiser ….

Managing Directors:

I can’t possibly make this budget add up – I mean, we don’t even buy pencils anymore. And, I can’t sleep with all these do-lists in my head and this entire payroll on my perpetually stress-kinked shoulders. And, meanwhile, as it’s all falling apart, I have to spend all my time pampering the artists’ egos and patiently cajoling a clueless board that has nothing to offer but, at best, ideas I have no resource to implement and, at worst, just plain stupid ideas – but can’t be bothered to do any of the hard work themselves anyway or even show up to meetings much less raise any money ever. They don’t even pay their own pledges! Blah, blah, blah, their kids’ tuition, I don’t want to hear it! I get more donations from broke artists than from these whining middle class board members. Everyone keeps saying “streamline” and “efficiency” as though they are introducing brilliant new concepts to me, but I would like someone to show me how to be efficient when artists blow off procedures and budgets because they had some obscure epiphany for the show we simple must do, and we’re forced in to a constant, time-consuming state of “strategic planning” and “reinventing ourselves” and “thinking out of the box” to please every foundation’s latest idea of the next big thing. And, my God, if I have to pretend I’m having fun and really interested while some arrogant, rude donor blathers on about how much better the hors d'oeuvres were at some other fundraiser while I am standing there, dead tired, sweating in this dress and my feet are screaming in these shoes, I might just kill someone with an ice sculpture or an auction clipboard.

Board members:

Wow, how do these people even tie their shoes? They have no idea how the real world works at all. How do you run an organization when you have to spend the money before you have any idea if you’ll be bringing in any money? I could have told them that show wouldn’t sell any tickets anyway, but nobody asked me. I come to these meetings and listen to them drone on and on with status updates and budget shortfalls, and – please – so much drama – they’re so melodramatic - and then two depressing hours later the meeting is over and nobody even asked me for my advice when it was my expertise they said they wanted in the first place. All they ever really want from me is donations. Don’t they know I’m not rich and neither are my friends? And I’m supposed to drag my friends to these lame little parties with horrifying hors d'oeuvres and dorky entertainment and ask my friends to give money which is like the most awkward conversation ever, and I’m not even sure why I’m supporting these people who can’t be bothered to show the slightest interest in my life or to dress in something that isn’t covered in paint or have a clue about balancing a budget. I’m a volunteer, for crying out loud, with a life and problems of my own. And, instead of thanks, all I ever get is this attitude from them that I “just don’t understand” because I’m not creative – like they’ve ever paid enough attention to know whether I’m creative or not, and like they’re weird performance art crap makes them all visionary and special. And – wait a minute! – if these clueless flakes take this place down and the bank starts calling in on the debt, are you telling me I’m financially responsible? No fucking way! I definitely didn’t sign up for that. I thought this was supposed to be fun.

Foundations:

Are we supposed to just keep throwing money at these institutions that never get any better at managing their business, their boards, their egos? When they can’t even be bothered to write a final report telling us what they did with the pile of money we gave them unless we withhold some of it? And don’t they know that we know when they are lying to us and just telling us what they think we want to hear? Like we don’t live in the same community they do and hear the stories about their incompetence, disorganization, in-fighting, politics and improprieties? And how much are we supposed to subsidize an enterprise that seems completely oblivious to its market? Eventually all of these organizations will have 100% unearned revenue. We will have successfully shielded them entirely from any awareness whatsoever of what audiences might even want. And please, please, could you guys at least do a fucking spell check on your proposals and make sure you find and replace the other foundation’s name with ours?

Audiences:

How many damn surveys do I need to fill out, for God’s sake? I’m white and I make $55,000 and I went to college and I’m a heterosexual male. I’m sorry. Jesus. And could you stop with the pathetic curtain speeches? Do your show. I bought a ticket. I showed up. I could have stayed home, ate pizza, and watched an action film, which would be cheaper and easier in so many ways. So please, enough, we all just feel embarrassed for you in these moments, especially when you make some poor board member or shy house manager do it, because they sure aren’t funny or pretty or comfortable on stage at all, are they? And why do you all send me your donation letters on the same day? How am I supposed to choose who to give my tiny donation budget to when they all have the same weird mix of cheerful, incoherent, arrogant, hysterical desperation? Look, I bought a ticket and clapped after the show even though the seats were killing my back. And, I donated my money to feed starving kids. That doesn’t make me a bad person, does it? Seriously, I like your work sometimes, but would you quit trying to pander to me with the really really really shallow holiday shows or impress me with something so esoteric I just want to take a nap? There’s got to be something in the middle that isn’t middling in quality.

But then. . .

Everyone:

It’s all pretty exasperating and exhausting, but just when I think it’s pointless, the lights go down and we are vulnerable together and something sacred happens, just for a moment, and I realize nobody’s life should be without these moments of irrational clarity, unity, connection. Even though they are so difficult to make and so rare to happen.

. . . So we all keep trying.

To hear from much smarter people than me about the failings and fractures in our beleaguered non-profit system for making art, read:

“The Changing Place of the 501c3” by Adrian Ellis for Grantmakers in the Arts Reader

“The Nonprofit Motive” by Matthew Richter in The Stranger

“Former NEA head Bill Ivey has news for the nonprofit arts community: your era is over.” By Deanna Isaacs in the Chicago Reader❦