A little note from the ex-editor
Most Art Scatter readers know that I work at The Oregonian, right? Editing the writers of the arts staff (and a fine band they are!) insofar as they will let me? I haven’t talked about this much directly, mainly because I didn’t want Art Scatter to be a place where people came to criticize the paper or its arts coverage. That part of things has worked out well! I’m not sure how exactly I would characterize Art Scatter, but it isn’t a newspaper kvetch site, that’s for sure.
I bring all of this up now because my assignment at the paper is changing. Starting soon, though maybe not until the first of the new year, I’ll be writing a column for The Oregonian with a significant online presence on OregonLive. I’m not exactly sure how Art Scatter will fit into this for me, but I’m hoping that the two can work together somehow, and I’m definitely hoping that you, the wisest and best blog readers in the whole dang blogosphere!, will take a peek at my posts on OregonLive from time to time. If I’m clever enough (stop that snickering!), the two should work together (that’s what links are for, after all), with more reported stuff at OregonLive and more, um, speculative and scatter-y stuff over here.
For me, this is a good change, one that I wanted, even though I’ll miss working with the arts writers and editors as closely as I have. That was really great. As I told them, I learned so much from them the past 7 years or so, so much about EVERYTHING, that I’ll never really be able to pay them back. But writing here at Art Scatter has rekindled my interest in writing in general (not to mention writing generally) and I’ll be able to do that full time now. I know. Be careful what you wish for.
But I should be able to explore and write about the cultural life of the city more directly than I have as editor. I’ll be out more, I’ll talk to more of you, and then I’ll try to report back . I’m counting on you to keep me honest, to give me suggestions and tips, to challenge me when I need it, to provide alternate (and better) descriptions and meanings of things that I have tried to figure out. Anyway, I’ll keep you, um, posted on developments with column and blog, and in the meantime, I should be building up lots of material for Art Scatter.
By the way, David Stabler has blogged about this himself, from his point of view meaning altogether too charitably, if you want to take a look.
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While I will miss you Barry as one of the best arts editors in the country, affecting me as a writer needless to say, but also me as a reader and many many others, I’m excited to be able to read more of your writing and will certainly go to Oregonlive.com…you can count on it.
Meanwhile, let us sit upon the ground (sorry Shakespeare) and mourn the loss of newspapers and the accompanying inky fingers.
Comment by Martha Ullman West — November 14, 2008 @ 9:29 am
Here from Seattle via Martha Ullman West’s recommendation — I’m pleased that you mention this:
As space shrinks, there will be more pressure to cut reviews of concerts that don’t repeat. Some papers have that rule, but it assumes people read reviews simply as a consumer tool: should I go or not?
And yet, many of us read reviews in other papers, the New York Times, for example, with no expectation of attending. Reviews are a way of talking about art, keeping the conversation lively, translating the experience of what it felt like, looked like, sounded like, to others.
alongside your other comments here. I cover dance in my town, and have this conversation all the time with editors and colleagues. I believe that one of the things a newspaper (or magazine or website…) does is document the current world, to create the primary source material for historians who come long after we’re gone. The title of Walter Terry’s anthology of dance criticism (he wrote for the NY Herald Tribune for many years) is “I Was There,” and because he was, we can know what it was like too. Whether it ran for weeks, or was a one night stand.
Comment by sandi kurtz — November 17, 2008 @ 10:46 am
Thanks for joining us! Actually, the quote comes from David Stabler’s blog, and I agree: Something is lost in the newspaper when we lose the sequence of numerous, shorter, more immediate reviews. This happened; this is how the reviewer responded; over time, this is how the reviewer started to change as she thought about things and accumulated more experiences; over time, this is how I started to change as I read her accumulated reviews (whether I went to the concert or not). We also lose the sense of participation that comes from following along in the paper and the spur to participate more directly. I hope that blog sites, including David’s, can be useful in mapping the cultural life of the city. The financial part of the equation remains difficult to figure out, though.
Comment by barry — November 17, 2008 @ 2:57 pm
I have mixed feelings about this — the same feelings I have about ArtScatter in general. I treasure your posts here, Barry, but it frustrates me that the kind of thoughtful writing you do here, and the conversations they inspire, have hitherto been denied the readers of the dead tree Oregonian, which is where, once upon a time, they belonged.
Maybe I’m showing my age and assuming that the paper is the ultimate goal to which writers should aspire, or at least that it’s a higher goal than blogging. But almost every time I read one of your mini essays here, I think “Why aren’t we seeing this level of discussion and analysis in the paper?” Isn’t that what newspapers — or at least a good paper’s website (not the execrable O Live) — are supposed to be doing?
So I’m excited to see your voice returning to the paper; I moved here after you became an editor so these ArtScatter posts are my entire experience of your writing. I just hope that your departure from the editorial slot won’t reduce the quality and quantity of arts coverage further. Anyway, good luck in your new role, and please do keep bringing all the news that doesn’t fit in that column to ArtScatter or the O’s website.
Comment by brett — November 18, 2008 @ 12:05 am
Martha and Brett, thank you! I’m still trying to sort out exactly what my column will be “about”, how much of it will be online, either here or at OregonLive, etc. And I’m not sure when it will start, either, maybe after the first of the year because I have quite a bit of vacation time to burn. In the meantime, I’m trying to get around as much as I can. I have Paul Goldberger’s visit to OU’s Portland architecture branch squarely in my sights, for example. And a few more things cooking, too. Which just gets me excited to get going!
Comment by Barry Johnson — November 18, 2008 @ 10:20 am