"America Needs You!" Available from LuLu.com! Free download!

Years in the making! No kidding, this slim volume (48 pages) represents over 15 years work in the arts and activism arena. "America Needs You! Why You Should Become a Creativity Champion" lays out the argument for creativity as a national value. And, if you're reading this - you're a leader! Really. The printed book is only $10.49 (plus shipping). But you can download the text FOR FREE!



"Tom Tresser's America Needs You! Why You Should Become a Creativity Champion is the catalyst this nation needs to stop talking about creative change and start voting for it. There are fifty ideas in these pages that can take an artist who is passionate about changing our society but clueless about how to do that in our governmental systems and turn that artist into a change-agent. I especially admire the way Tom works from and with the strengths of artists rather than urging us to become something we are not to find influential roles inside governance. Read it, live it."
- Eric Booth, national consultant in arts learning and author of "The Everyday Work of Art" and "The Music Teaching Artist's Bible"

"The Gift" - What is Art For? What is "Valuable?"

Writer and poet Lewis Hyde is profiled in the November 16 New York Times Magazine in an article, "What is Art For?" This is a theme Hyde has written and spoken on extensively and most notably, in "The Gift." Hyde was deeply influenced by the research of anthropologists who had studied "gift cultures" where status is accrued by giving stuff away.

"The ideas resonated deeply with Hyde. For nearly a decade he had been struggling to explain — to his family, to nonartist friends, to himself — why he devoted so much of his time and energy to something as nonremunerative as poetry. The literature on gift exchange — tales, for example, of South Sea tribesman circulating shells and necklaces in a slow-moving, broad circle around the Trobriand Islands — gave him the conceptual tool he needed to understand his predicament, which was, he came to believe, the predicament of all artists living “in an age whose values are market values and whose commerce consists almost exclusively in the purchase and sale of commodities.” For centuries people have been speaking of talent and inspiration as gifts; Hyde’s basic argument was that this language must extend to the products of talent and inspiration too. Unlike a commodity, whose value begins to decline the moment it changes hands, an artwork gains in value from the act of being circulated—published, shown, written about, passed from generation to generation — from being, at its core, an offering."
Read the article.

What can this work teach us about the value of what we value? What can artists and creative professionals offer to the public sector to help guide critical policy choices about health care, education, the environment and security?

"Creatives as Civic Leaders" Presentation for Artists Alliance

Tom gave a keynote presentation to the Alliance of Artists Communities annual conference in Seattle on November 15. The topic was "Creatives as Civic Leaders" and drew heavily on audience input and participation. Here is the presentation deck:

"Creatives As Leaders"

View SlideShare presentation or Upload your own.

Should Artists, Arts managers (Any One) Be Fired If They Support An Unpopular Cause?

The artistic director of the California Musical Theater, a major nonprofit producing company here in the state’s capital, resigned on Wednesday in the face of growing outrage over his support for a ballot measure this month that outlawed same-sex marriage in California. Read the whole story in The New York Times.

It would one thing if the theater produced anti-gay work. It would be another thing if the theater discriminated in hiring or selling tickets. But is it anyone's business who the artists or other cultural workers of the theater support or who they give money to? Does this mean that cultural organizations in liberal areas must be extra careful in hiring their artists and administrators? Or, in another context, does this mean that cultural organizations in liberal areas should shy away from hiring folks whose progressive views and political life might anger people in that community?

Power of Song to Help Change Nations

Creative technology Helped Obama Win

From Chris Hughes:

"Over the past 21 months, millions of individuals have used My.BarackObama to organize their local communities on behalf of Barack Obama. The scale and size of this community and its work is unprecedented. Individuals in all 50 states have created more than 35,000 local organizing groups, hosted over 200,000 events, and made millions upon millions of calls to neighbors about this campaign. There can be no question that these local, grassroots organizations played a critical role in Tuesday's victory.

What has made My.BarackObama unique hasn't been the technology itself, but the people who used the online tools to coordinate offline action. My.BarackObama has always been focused on using online tools to make real-world connections between people who are hungry to change our politics in this country.

And the site isn't going anywhere. The online tools in My.BarackObama will live on. Barack Obama supporters will continue to use the tools to collaborate and interact. Our victory on Tuesday night has opened the door to change, but it's up to all of us to seize this opportunity to bring it about.

In the coming days and weeks, there will be a great deal more information about where this community will head. For the moment, let's celebrate this victory and know that the community we've built together is just the beginning."