country
activities

Consultants: Paul Elicker • Jillian Poole

From April 19 through May 13, Jillian Poole, President of The Fund, visited Serbia, Montenegro, Macedonia, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Albania, and Croatia. She was joined by Paul Elicker, Chairman of The Fund, in Macedonia for the remainder of the trip. The Fund’s objective was to explore whether there might be use for The Fund’s services in these Balkan countries.

The Cultural Specialist format was more practical than the Guest Speaker format for presenting best practices in contemporary arts management to audiences who find this entire concept alien. The most difficult sessions were in Tuzla and Zeneca, both in Bosnia-Herzegovina, where arts and culture managers were either greatly outnumbered by those representing NGOs or they apparently expected funding. The most successful guest speaker session was in Zagreb, Croatia, where the audience assembled at the Embassy had arts and culture backgrounds.

The Department of State arranged to have the text of “Managing for Money” translated into both Serbian and Croatian. The texts were distributed in the appropriate seminars.

Belgrade, Serbia, April 19–25

The five day Cultural Specialist seminar began on April 20 in Belgrade. There were twenty-five attendees, including museum directors and managers and representatives from the Ministry of Culture. The Minister of Culture opened the seminar with a speech that included the need for cultural institutions to have a “clear business plan” when they come to the Ministry for support. It soon became clear the institutions were expected to develop these plans on their own. This, then, became one of the goals of the seminar.

Participants were divided into four groups to identify and then report on the principal challenges they believe are presently facing their cultural institutions. These included: developing a national strategy for culture; educating the general public on culture; establishing interconnectedness of cultural institutions and their programs; motivating employees; and developing strategies for fund raising.

By far the most frequently mentioned topic was the need for national strategy for culture. The groups were reluctant to recognize that as cultural leaders they could have a role in creating such a national strategy. Communication on every level appeared to be their greatest challenge, within their institutions, intra-institutionally, with their publics, and with the Ministry.

The second, third, and fourth days of the seminar were spent on managing people, writing a mission statement, joint programming, implementing children's clubs in several museums, public relations, fundraising techniques, strategic planning, and budgeting. The need for national cultural policy was brought up again on the fourth day. By then, the mood seemed to have shifted to a consensus that perhaps it was not a priority since much could be done with the initiative of individual institutions and through joint or cooperative activities.

At the conclusion of the seminar, the Agency for Cultural Development’s secretary general, Dragana Petrovic Radjenovic, asked for comments and elicited some ideas for future cooperation. There was agreement the seminar had:

Mrs. Poole believed the National Museum, the Museum of Applied Art, the Ethnographic Museum Fund and the Museum of Contemporary Art would continue to cooperate and bring to fruition their idea for Children’s Clubs in their museums. Future work for The Fund should include intensive consultations with three senior people from a few selected institutions, such as the National Museum, Ethnographic Museum, the National Museum, and Museum of Applied Art, for a five-day period twice a year.

Podgorica, Montenegro, April 25–27

Twenty-three people from various cities attended a two-day seminar in Podgorica. The attendees were divided into four groups to discuss the major challenges their institutions are currently facing. The consensus was a lack of updated cultural law/strategy; divisions between cultural organization under authority of the Ministry and those controlled by municipal authorities; lack of equipment and facilities; lack of opportunities for staff development; and no flow of information among cultural institutions.

The attendees embarked on a negative discussion of reasons things could not be changed or accomplished. The groups then discussed what they might do to initiate change. Ideas included a children’s education project, gift shops, and CDs. Mrs. Poole interspersed these conversations with talking about total institutional management, building relationships with corporate and individual donors, earning income, and servicing their own publics in order to generate long term support.

The group’s final discussions included developing an administrative organization and an agenda for first a meeting, writing a statement of purpose, and developing ideas for sponsorship. The attendees were reminded to keep the intra-museum organization simple, continue to foster communication, and provide a forum for shared challenges.

Skopje and Ohrid, Macedonia, April 27–30, 2004

In Skopje the Embassy arranged for us to meet with the Minister of Culture who called a meeting attended by Bojan Ivanov, director of the Museum of Macedonia, a representative from Universal Hall (performing arts presentation venue), Zlatko Teodosievski, director of the Art Gallery, and Klime Korobar, director of Museum of the City of Skopje. The Director of the Museum of Contemporary Art had been invited but was unable to attend. All the directors expressed concern about lack of attendance and particularly that people do come for the openings (a wine and hors d’oeuvres party) but do not seem to return. Museums are not considered fun and interesting places to be. The separation of the Ministry of Culture and the Ministry of Education has resulted in teachers not bringing their students to the museums. They expressed concern over how to build programs for audiences with special needs and well as diverse audiences.

We briefly discussed the plan we were considering, namely a regional conference for directors from the whole region, including non-former Yugoslav countries, to be followed up by four-day intensive sessions with the directors and their senior staff (probably 3 total) from four or five selected major institutions in each country. We indicated it would be desirable to have such sessions twice a year for two years to cover the wide range of concerns museum directors worldwide share. Both the Minister and the institutional heads we met with indicated they would be supportive of this idea. They remained enthusiastic, even when we reminded them that it would mean a serious commitment of their time. Olivera Trajkova, head of the Sector for International Affairs, who had also been in the meeting with the Minister, indicated she would forward a letter of support for this project from the Minister.

Because of national holidays, our only seminar in Macedonia was held at the House of Robevci, a museum of archeological artifacts, in Ohrid, a small tourist town on a large lake. Thirty attendees represented a wide range of cultural institutions from the town and the area. Their principal concerns were human resource development (staff training and upgrading, motivation, instilling a sense of owner- ship, etc.), updating space and equipment needs, sustainability (fund raising), marketing, and communication to develop cultural tourism and conservation. Mrs. Poole and Mr. Elicker were able to discuss personnel management and fund raising, but because of time constraints only in superficial ways.

Tirana, Albania, May 3–5, 2004

Three short meetings were held on May 4 with different cultural groups. The morning session was with nine theater managers (national and local) and various musical groups at the American Corner. Discussions centered around various aspects of management and fundraising. The afternoon session that focused on management was held with nine senior leaders of cultural institutions. A discussion with leaders of cultural NGOs was held late in the afternoon. Discouragement and a negative fatalistic mind-set seemed apparent among leaders of most important institutions while those leaders who did seem to have a clear course and initiative belong to such a diverse group of small institutions that finding a common core of interest could be difficult.

On May 5, Mrs. Poole gave a lecture on single artist management at the Academy of Arts to drama students, some of considerable talent, who are no longer guaranteed employment. A wrap-up session with Brian Shott, assistant PAO, and Mirela Cupian, Cultural Affairs assistant, led to the conclusion that while there seemed to be no immediate activity for The Fund in Albania, we will remain open to assist when conditions change.

Bosnia-Herzegovina, May 5–9 2004

A day-long seminar was held on May 6 in the Media Center in Sarajevo for twenty-one cultural leaders. They came from a wide range of organizations, including a writer’s group, theaters and performance venues, an art gallery, an orchestra, and the media center itself. Discussions included taxes as incentives for giving, forming a lobbying organization, getting professional media advice, knowing audiences and building them, obtaining management training, budgeting, and longrange planning and sustainability.

On May 7, Mrs. Poole and Mr. Elicker were met at the American Corner in the Library of Tuzla by an audience of twenty-one who were given the copies of Managing for Money. Attendees were split into groups and asked to decide on the major challenges other than money. There was unanimity in their results: mutual non-understanding throughout the city; low consciousness of culture; an educational system that provides no culture in schools or at home; inefficient cooperation among cultural groups; confusion at Ministerial level which results in no funding or guidance; lack of heating, and poor facilities. When it was suggested that a partial solution to these problems lie in cooperation and organization among the cultural group leaders, it became apparent that attendees expected to receive funding from The Fund. Half the group, finding the sessions of no interest, left. Mrs. Poole and Mr. Elicker suggested various ways of doing low-cost programs but were met with arguments about their impossibility.

For those who remained, there seemed some hope that they might join together and begin to plan such projects as children’s programs. The general attitude of waiting for help with bitterness and resignation is tough to overcome. Mrs. Poole and Mr. Elicker tried to persuade the small group that if they did not begin to address cultural needs with the resources at their disposal, nobody would.

On May 8, Mrs. Poole and Mr. Elicker traveled to Zeneca to meet with a group of twenty-five people from a wide range of institutions. After introductory remarks and explanations, the attendees were divided into five groups. Only the city museum and art gallery, the theatre and a folk dancing group represented arts and culture. Others were from civic action, youth, medical advocacy, teachers, handi-capped, women’s advocacy groups and other NGOs. Discussions focused on goal setting, program implementation techniques, ways of motivating audiences and donors, and funding.

Are Zagreb, Croatia, May 9–13

Mrs. Poole and Mr. Elicker led a seminar for 22 arts leaders that was held at the American Embassy on May 11. The Embassy gave each participant a copy of Managing for Money in Croatian and an English copy of Writing Winning Grants Proposals. The principal concerns of the attendees included audience development, lack of arts education on every level, local, regional and international collaboration, ways to deal with potential, lack of transparency and efficiency in governmental bodies, and developing elevator speeches and mission statements.

On May 12, a presentation was held in Split at the Croatian National Theatre for twenty-six people. The participants expressed concerns about the centralization of administrative power and its inefficiency and their lack of comprehension of funding priorities (the city allocates 10% of its revenues to culture), the fragmentation of the cultural groups and their leaders, and difficulties dealing with potential sponsors. Much of the time was spent talking about fundraising realities, forming partnerships with sponsors, and their own need to take joint action.

Future Work in the Balkans

Paul Elicker and Jillian Poole met with Tarik Jusic and Aida Kalender of the Media Center to discuss a partnership to respond to a State Department RFP emphasizing Muslim populations. We developed a plan for presenting cultural management training for 30 arts managers from Bosnia and Herzegovina plus Albania. The goal was in-depth training in four or five-day segments every six months over an 18- month period with further in-depth training and internships in the U.S. for the most promising attendees who would then assume the role of trainers in their regions. The Center is very familiar with arts leaders in the region and well qualified to identify qualified candidates. They agreed to undertake all arrangements for selection of candidates, arrangement of transportation and housing where necessary, provide facilities, translation, luncheons and etc. necessary for successful seminars. The Fund agreed to develop curriculum covering the full range of necessary management skills for managers from both the performing and visual arts including arts education programs and program planning, provide the trainers for each session (probably two for each session), arrange their travel and housing and pay all their attendant costs. The Fund had enlisted a partner, Arts Midwest, to make arrangements for five seminar attendees to intern in the U.S. at the end of the in-country training. Unfortunately, The Fund was not selected as a finalist on the RFP. This project would be highly desirable if another funder could be located.