A(nother) Digression:
>I am never forget being shouted at by the Personnel Officer at my then
>college. "You ignored an instruction of a manager"!? she screamed at me,
>like the Queen in Alice... And the tone she put on the word "manager" was
>extraordinary; to adapt St Paul, if I can remember it, at the word manager
>every knee shall bow, somewhere between that and "a handbag!?" - she was
>semi-literate, innumerate and couldn't tell the difference between inclusive
>and exclusive; but she was a manager! It wouldn't be hard to improve on her
>skills; and there are thousands like her
I have a very clear memory of an Administrator. (There's a particular
breed of them, probably it's in the genes, which calls up in me a
visceral sense of repulsion; it seems to be mutual). I was rehearsing a
monologue with an actor, and she was fussing around the theatre in a very
officious manner looking for The Lights. Or something. While we were in
the middle of the performance, all very serious, this woman stalked right
across the middle of the stage, talking very loudly on her mobile phone.
(She was, at a later date, seen at the beach, talking on her mobile
phone, which clearly will have to be surgically removed with the tumours.)
This woman was, note, supposed to be an Arts Administrator. Her
insensitivity and ignorance was staggering, and made quite clear where
artists stood in the Order of Things (she certainly made more money out
of the arts than most artists). Administering things is a useful skill,
for which I have some respect, but it's not that difficult. Here there
seems to be a kind of apotheosis of administrators, which turns art
institutions into organisations for perpetuating the jobs of
administrators. Art is just interchangeable "product", a kind of
necessary inconvenience, and in the most successfully administered arts
organisations isn't made at all.
Best
Alison
Alison Croggon
Editor
Masthead Literary Arts Magazine
PO Box 186
NEWPORT VIC 3015
Masthead online: http://www.masthead.com.au
Home page: http:www.fortunecity.com/victorian/bronte/338
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