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How to think about public art?  Do you just keep doing the same thing?  Big art?  Architectural intimacy?  Site-specific narrative?  Locally responsive?

Just a brief note during my July hiatus to mark the fifth anniversary of this weblog. I launched The Artful Manager on July 14 back in 2003, with the help and guidance of ArtsJournal founder Doug McLennan.

855 posts later, the blog continues to be a great place to think out loud, and a gateway to meeting really interesting people. Thanks to all who read, comment, and respond!

Before I go on my July hiatus, I wanted to lob one more idea into the ether. I've generally been frustrated with public campaigns to promote and support the arts. They either err on the side of utility (the arts improve test scores) or the side of entitlement (support the arts because you should). I've had a campaign bubbling in my head for several months now, and thought it was time to set it free.

June was a brutal month for on-the-road convening. So I'm taking July as a weblog hiatus. I'll be back in August with new thoughts and fresh perspective. Until then, have a great month!

This one time, at band camp (okay, orchestra camp), I got to watch a slightly crazy and wildly gesticulating individual convince a roomful of young musicians that their power and calling was more than just learning to play well. Rather, he persuaded us that we were part of a long arc of human expression that had depth, meaning, purpose, and power. This was over 30 years ago, when I was younger and thinner, and had less of a practical professional patina about me.

Over the two arts conventions I've just marshaled through, one particular comment has been bouncing around in my head more than others. It was said during one of the many AmericaSpeaks caucus sessions in Denver, that gathered groups of 8 to 10 cross-disciplinary participants to talk about larger, common issues of performing arts policy.

The group was bemoaning the disconnect between the professional arts and civic life, evidenced by their tenuous support in city councils, state budgets, and federal policy. And then one participant said this:

I'm just back from another conference, this time hosted by Americans for the Arts. Some 1400 representatives arts organizations, foundations and community funds, arts service organizations, and local, state, regional, and national arts agencies gathered in Philadelphia for the 2008 annual conference.

The National Performing Arts Convention has started to post the results of its final Town Hall meeting over on their convention weblog. These are the categories and strategies presented during the massive final meeting of the convention, and voted on by some 1300 conventioners. The three-day process leading up to this final event included large caucuses of convention conversations -- tables of 8 to 10 participants from different disciplines, clustered in rooms throughout the venue.

Last week's National Performing Arts Convention ended with a massive gathering of about 1300 performing arts professionals, all in one room, to review and select a collective agenda for action to advance the field. The big three bullets were about increasing resonance and value of the performing arts among citizens and communities, reforming and reframing arts education and lifelong learning, and building a more inclusive and diverse voice for the arts and in the arts. Full details of the final strategies selected will likely be posted soon (if they're not, I'll post them here).

One of the fascinating series of discussions at the National Performing Arts Convention have hovered around what constitutes a ''national performing arts community.'' Given the convening of this event by national service organizations for formally organized, primarily nonprofit cultural organizations, the bias in the perspectives is probably obvious: the ''performing arts community'' includes nonprofit and public institutions, artists, audiences, and supporters in artistic disciplines we know.