Sociology of Art

I guess you are getting somewhere when a social scientist is interested enough in what you are doing to want to study you. We were joined last Friday morning by a sociologist from Eckerd College who also happens to be a potter. Unfortunately for him, he joined us about half way through, so here's what he missed.

We started off talking about the Music of the Harlem Renaissance show at The Studio@620 the previous night. All who attended gave it rave reviews. Thanks to sponsorships from the Florida Humanities Council, The Studio@620 and the Al Downing / Tampa Bay Jazz Association, the event was free to the public. Way to go guys!

Herb Snitzer informed us that seven of his photographs have been hung in the Mayors outer office in City Hall. Also, Herb's show went up Friday at the Museum of Fine Art. Herb gave an informal talk Saturday afternoon on his fifty years in photography. Interestingly enough, he gave it to about 50 people.

We again talked about the idea of getting community art programming on WEDU. We kept coming back to the funding stumbling block. It costs about $250,000 to produce 12 1/2 hour episodes. Maybe the Pinellas Convention and Visitors Bureau would have an interest in underwriting something like that?

And speaking of money, we got a report from the St. Pete City Council. It seems the City Council has not yet decided how to allocate the $500 thousand that it has put back in the budget for arts and social service agencies. One proposal floated by a Council Member is to give all $500 thousand to the homeless. That would be none to the arts and none to any other social service agency. Stay tuned on this one.

See y'all on Friday.