A peculiar aspect of the fine arts as a profession is that it enjoys the participation and interest of a general public which is necessarily lacking in the knowledge and experience to make decisions for themselves.

Vyacheslav Glasychev: "I'M A PROVOKER AND INVESTIGATOR OF URBAN PROCESSES"

V.Glazychev, a Professor at the Moscow Institute of Architecture (MARCHI), a consultant for the Spatial Development Commission of the Volga Federal District, and the president of the interregional public foundation "Urban Institute", shares his experience in managing the development of city environment by means of innovative cultural projects. V.Glazychev accentuates the importance of combining efforts of different social communities (groups of intellectuals, artists and businessmen) for making a reality of the cultural projects, invented by art managers. The range of the professional activity of the latter ones, from Glazychev's point of view, includes: generating the ideas of changing the city environment (an art manager as an innovator and a script writer), organizing some concrete deeds for fulfilling these ideas (an art manager as a connecting link between city planning administration and autonomous executors), and examining the effects of these deeds (selfreflection).

V. Babkov: TOWN-CONSTITUTIVE CULTURAL PROJECT: CITY AS A STAGE FOR QUALITY OF LIFE

The article focuses on examining the possible contributions of socio-cultural projects to regeneration of cities in postindustrial society, as soon as the latter maintains the view of the culture as one of the main sources of social and economic development of cities and regions and of the qualified management as the only way to success.

The second objective of the article is to reveal some conceptual directions of development of various cultural organizations, promising for both cultural institutions themselves and society as a whole. Contemporary city needs not just theatre, museum, philarmony and the like, but it expects cultural institutions to provide creative initiatives for changing the whole quality of life of urban population.

The author of the article also cherishes the hope that the given information will contribute to the emerging of the new generation of art managers - those ambitious, charismatic leaders, capable to
become initiators, cultivators and realizators of new creative ideas.

Scholars and artists in any field of humanistic inquiry or artistic endeavor are invited to apply for the position of Distinguished Visiting Faculty in the Center for the Arts in Society. Applicants should hold senior rank and have interests corresponding to the Centers theme for the year 2005-2006, The Arts and Urban Revival, a theme broadly conceived to draw a range of applications from scholars and artists interested in ways that the arts--visual art, film, literature, dance, theater, etc.have contributed to the revival of urban centers and urbanized regions. We expect the applicant to have some special need for the resources here in Pittsburgh--the Warhol Museum, the Carnegie Museum of Art, the University of Pittsburgh--or the resources at Carnegie Mellon University--for example, a particular colleague, or a specific department. In addition, we would like you to tell us how you can be of use to us.

We expect the Distinguished Faculty to contribute to the development and the creative life of the Center that links the humanities departments in the College of Humanities and Social Sciences (English, History, Modern Languages, and Philosophy) with the College of Fine Arts (Architecture, Art, Design, Drama, Music). The Center for Arts in Society was created to bring these two colleges closer together. Finally, we would also like you to propose a course that will contribute to a new arts-histories program the Center is developing.

Museums shops all over the world contribute a substantial share to museums budgets, thus helping to defy financial misery of cultural institutions. But they could do even better by en-forcing the perspective of cultural consumers. Facing increasing competition with other cul-tural institutions and leisure facilities, museums will have no choice but to consider the wishes and needs of their visitors more extensively. Our empirical research on that topic started in 2001. On the basis of prior surveys an extensive questionnaire was developed and a series of 110 interviews were carried out.

Carnegie Mellon University announces the establishment of the Master of Entertainment Industry Management (MEIM) degree, a new graduate-level program focusing on management training for the for-profit entertainment sector, and the formation of the Institute for the Management of Creative Enterprises (IMCE) as the academic 'home' for the new MEIM degree and the existing Master of Arts Management (MAM) degree, the Center for Arts Management and Technology (CAMT) and the Pittsburgh Arts and Culture Observatory (ACO).

"The Road from Education to Practice"

The 2004 Annual AAAE Conference was hosted by Southern Methodist University's Arts Administration program at the Westin City Center Hotel in Dallas from April 22-24. More than 50 program directors from North America, Australia, China and the Netherlands participated in this three day meeting...

The 14th International Conference of the International Artist Managers Association was held from 15 to 17 April in Genoa. Since this event took place in Italy for the first time ever, the conference has been given as main topic The Mediterranean Perspective in Arts management, focusing on arts managers contributions from Greece, Lebanon, and Sicily. In addition, IAMA management offered breakout sessions on Opera dissemination, Corporate Social Responsibility and Audience development. Italian flair succeeds: most of the about 400 delegates used these days on the rainy Mediterranean coast not only for chatting about Arts management but even more for talking business.

October 28-31: The 12th General Assembly and Conference of EFAH - the European Forum for Arts and Heritage (Lille, France)

Increasing decentralisation and regionalisation in Europe prompts cultural operators and public authorities to consider policy ramifications of a more sophisticated interaction between culture and regions and the role of regions in initiating and supporting international cultural cooperation...

Over the course of three days artistic directors of theatre festivals and other important theatre administrators will gather in Prague to discuss the questions and problems of artistic direction.

The conference theme is "The Road from Education to Practice and continues AAAEs work on content standards and program development for arts administration education, which comprise several approaches to teaching methodology and technology.

Just like everyone, governments and business circles are liable to make decisions by evaluating choices in terms of alternative loss and profit. The game theory is a mathematical approach. The aim is to obtain optimum results from economic activities by taking into account the prevalent competition in the light of the various outputs of contingent strategies that can be implemented. The games played and the number of players is characterized by the amount of total profit and contingent strategies. In two-player games, the success of one competing party implies loss for the other; this is very similar to the negotiations that take place between workers and trade unions. This implies that the game may result with a zero sum. Each move to be made during the game gives rise to a countermove from the competition. In other words, there is unification in the game field among the opponents who are keen on preserving their interests. Competitors who are bound to actualize some sort of competitive action in an era of free competition must be able to at least predict each others activities in terms of the earnings they pursue. This article examines, on the basis of game theory, the series of activities of two truly prominent establishments serving in the field of photography equipment aimed at increasing their market share.

CALL FOR PAPERS FOR A SPECIAL ISSUE OF THE INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF NONPROFIT AND VOLUNTARY SECTOR MARKETING:

CREATIVITY AND THE NONPROFIT MARKETING ORGANISATION

The purpose of the last Special Issue of Culturelink Review (November 2003) is to welcome dialogue and action-oriented ideas from all sectors of society in order to clarify current understanding of cultural diversity, explore the existing and countless other links between cultural diversity, dialogue and development, and deliver better policies targeted at the most appropriate level with creative partnerships.

Arts and culture reflect open society values and influence public attitudes, yet they seldom receive adequate recognition and resources from either governments or society. To counteract the lack of support, the Arts and Culture Program promotes cultural and artistic collaboration throughout the Soros foundations network; fosters structural changes in cultural policy; and helps develop an autonomous and innovative arts sector. The program's primary goal is to stimulate cultural activities while respecting and celebrating differences among countries.

In the latest issue of International Arts Manager, Michael Crabb explores the question of whether performing arts organizations have gone too far in providing customer service. Unquestionably, it is a very high priority among all arts organizations in their efforts to attract larger audiences in a highly competitive field. But is there the danger of going too far? Borrowing from the retail model of building customer loyalty by providing excellent services, the strategy has been to try to develop a committed audience that not only will buy subscriptions but also will become donors. It includes practices that audiences have come to expect, such as accessible parking, comfortable seating and pleasant, courteous, efficient staff...
[in: ACENews, Feb 04]

A report, prepared in 2003 and released to the public for the first time today, shows that Canadian consumers spent Can$ 21.3 billion on cultural goods and services in 2001, an amount that is greater than spending on tobacco, alcohol and games of chances combined. The $21.3 billion in consumer spending is over three times higher than government spending on culture in Canada. The report also shows that consumer spending on live performing arts events is nearly double the spending on live sporting events.

The Arts Marketing Association (UK) has conducted a pilot benchmarking project, funded by Arts Council England, to assess the effectiveness of arts organisations' e-marketing activity.
32 organisations from accross the UK have taken part in the research and the results have been very encouraging as an indicator of the value of e-marketing. One of the key findings is that the potential to generate awareness and visibility through a website is huge.