Making Change: Teaching Artists and their Role in Shaping a Better World By Eric Booth, published June 2023 Introduction and Chapter 1 Introduction IN THE ROHINGYA REFUGEE CAMP in Bangladesh, tensions were running high between Bangladeshis and Rohingya refugees. The Artolution program brought in teaching artists who led a project in the joint creation, […]
COP to the Truth of the Arts and Climate By Eric Booth, Founder of the International Teaching Artist Collaborative COP26 has increased attention to the Code Red climate crisis. At least for the moment, and maybe long enough to create significant political movement. I’ve been investigating the ways that the arts and artists have responded […]
The First Leadership Lab for the Field of Teaching Artistry, 2016-2019 Part of the Teaching Artist Development Labs at Lincoln Center Education By Eric Booth, September 2021 The Leadership Lab, developed within Lincoln Center Education (LCE), was the culminating stage of LCE’s Teaching Artist Development Labs. As a result of changing circumstances, the Labs have […]
“Defund the Police” — and The Arts By Eric Booth, June 2020 Defund the police. When translated from slogan to policy, this means reallocating those public funds given to law enforcement industries so that we can more effectively achieve public safety for all people in America—especially for Black people who have been brutalized for centuries. […]
Teaching Artists and the Pandemic Crisis By Eric Booth, May 17, 2020 Teaching artistry in the time of pandemic. I write this at the beginning of the second chapter, mid-May 2020. In chapter one, teaching artists were heroic in keeping work going in digital form when most of our in-person work was suddenly shut […]
The Very Open Rehearsal [From Eric Booth’s 2009 book The Music Teaching Artist’s Bible, Oxford University Press] Interactive performances succeed to the degree that teaching artistry moves onto the stage and into concert traditions. And probably the boldest kind of interactive performance is the Very Open Rehearsal. Take a deep breath…you can do this. “A […]
Advocacy: For and By Teaching Artists By Eric Booth, 2017 Teaching artists are proudly passionate and eloquent about their work. But…are we good advocates for teaching artistry? The empirical evidence doesn’t suggest that we are. Teaching artistry remains under-funded and largely unrecognized even as it is heavily relied upon by large sectors of the arts […]
Those who can, do; those who can’t, teach—according to George Bernard Shaw, who also wrote that he never learned anything from a teacher, he taught himself everything—so maybe GBS had a little ax to grind. He got it quite wrong—the truth is that those who can do two things well, at the same time, […]
The Fundamentals of Teaching Artistry, 2019 – as used in the Lincoln Center Eduction Teaching Artist Development Labs These six inclinations, understandings and habits of action of artists form the Six Fundamentals of Teaching Artistry. Activating artistry – the number one job of a teaching artist is to activate the artistry of others; this […]
Getting the Right Metaphor for the Field of Teaching Artistry By Eric Booth To help the field of teaching artistry grow, I have long sought an analogous profession as a comparative example, to clarify our identity and potential. Teaching artistry is a hybrid, and as a field it is disconnected, overlooked, undersupported—yet powerful. I still […]