Secrets of the City

I liked City Pages better when Rex was there.

While we’re on the subject of arts coverage, how much of this sort of stuff do people read? What sort of arts coverage do you look for? What do you wish there was more of, or less of?

At the risk of sounding like an uncultured Neanderthal from the suburbs (which I am), I would say less, max.

As I’m sure you have noted, many of your “arts” posts draw crickets, not comments.

Bless you for trying, but they just don’t seem to draw the interest of this crowd.

Or am I wrong?

They don’t get a lot of comments, but they do get a lot of outbound links. I think the arts are just hard to comment on. That doesn’t mean they shouldn’t be linked to.

How it works is that critics have a voice, and the good ones draw an audience. With limited exceptions, people value the opinions of critics they know, and they read them because they are interested in what they have to say, not because of what they’re talking about so much. I have a list of people I turn to whose opinions I respect and whose writing I admire. A perfect example is Britt Robson. I don’t care a bit about the Timberwolves, but Britt is just so damn good, I read it every time he posts.

Max, the City Pages hate is getting old. You’re starting to sound bitter.

Jeez, called out by anonymous. That always stings.

I say keep the arts stuff, if that is the question. I read it pretty often.

I like reading about architecture best. No clue why. Maybe b/c I can potentiall see the architecture in question. More architecture!!!

I also like to read about theatre and dance, b/c frankly reading about it is about the only dose of theatre and dance that I will get.

Yeah, ol’ Anonymous sure told you!

It’s not verified that the commenter is really Anonymous.

I blame Anonymous.

I thought Anonymous didn’t like the new MNspeak format and was going to go away forever??

MnSpeak is like the mafia. They try to get out, but we keep DRAGGING THEM back IN.

tru, dat!

Hey, 15 comments. A new record for an arts post.

I don’t think Max was hating on City Pages here.

“longtime defining voices of City Pages before they left en masse in the past year or so.”

while “defining voices” may be subjective, the fact that a lot of longtime voices have left en masse is verifiable and, I think, accurate.

In fairness, I have been critical of City Pages exactly once in the past four months on MnSpeak. So obviously my bitterness about the paper is wildly out of control.

Pipe down, hot-head.

Keeping it on point: I read a ton of arts coverage – although my input is certainly biased as I am involved it in as well. I don’t, however, find MNSpeak a very good resource for this coverage. Since I think it is rare that interesting dialog develops on here for an Arts related post, I don’t do much to spur it on, instead I get that kick elsewhere.

I am, however, excited that MinnPost is moving in this direction. And do think you should continue posting Arts related stories, Max. The more the merrier.

I think there has been some kick-ass art discussion here.

“While we’re on the subject of arts coverage, how much of this sort of stuff do people read? What sort of arts coverage do you look for? What do you wish there was more of, or less of?”

So glad you asked. I really long for better visual arts coverage by any local media source. Midway Contemporary, Franklin Art Works and Soo VAC get little credit for the work they show.

Commenters love to hate on contemporary art but I think writers need to know that there is a large audience for articles about the more challenging art being shown in the Twin Cities. That audience is less outspoken than the few who always scream about art they don’t get. Unfortunately this prevents a lot of comments from people who might leave a positive comment or ask a more in-depth question, sparking a discussion. I think this is directly related to the lack thoughtful writing about it more challenging art. Good writing can create a good audience.

As for the hating on City Pages comment – it gets old by Tuesday. Every Wednesday it gets new again. I mean c’mon, if you’re going to market to the 11-21 year old male market or whatever demographic they are now shooting for, you’re going to get a lot of criticism from, say, older male readers and, uh, female readers of all ages.

BTW, the rich text editor mangles spaces between paragraphs. Maybe I’m doing something wrong?

It also denied my use of italics on Max’s quote. Might want to look into that?

Since I’m making another post, I should add another comment to the topic – articles about art crawls and images of cray pas drawings of the Gold Medal Flour sign is not relly interesting to me. I want to see someone tackle a Midway Show or say, the William Lamson show now currently up at Franklin Art Works. I don’t need a loving article about any of it, just an article validating the presence of art beyond the walls of the Tilsner building.

Hi pendulum,

Are your spaces displaying how you want them to display now?

(I just changed a few settings about what was and wasn’t allowed for HTML in comments)

“I think writers need to know that there is a large audience for articles about the more challenging art being shown in the Twin Cities.”

Hm. If this is true, I’ve never seen this “large audience” (large being a relative term, of course). Maybe they’ve been remarkably silent, and therefore undetectable?

As to the old sawhorse that there’s no good arts writing in town, well, I suppose that’s relative too. I’ve been writing about FAW, SooVAC, Midway, et al, for going on 12 years, and while it’s been fun it certainly hasn’t given me a fan-base so large that I can retire my day job.

That the writing’s appeared, by market necessity, on various and sundry publications doesn’t mean the writing isn’t getting done. In fact, Pend., a long rumination about Midway was just published a few days ago on the arts section of SoTC. Did you read it? Have you been checking in, lending your support of such writing? Why not seek it out before you decide it doesn’t exist?

Meanwhile, as for MinnPost, kudos to them for their coverage. The more the merrier. Don’t know how long their business model will remain tenable, but I applaud them for trying.