Judith Tannenbaum

Many quote these days from the opening of A Tale of Two Cities, that line about the best of times and the worst of times. Others remind us to take advantage of the opportunities always inherent in crisis.

What might be possible for artists and arts in this (grim and hopeful) moment? Arlene Goldbard has written two excellent essays on the history of federally funded arts-work programs and on the possibilities for such programs in this moment.

Congressman George Miller, Chair of the House Committee on Education and Labor announced that he will conduct "a series of hearings this Spring to examine how the arts benefit the nation’s economy and schools—and what can be done to improve support for the arts and music fields." Please write to thank him and to let him know your thoughts on this subject.

And check out the work of the National Campaign to Hire Artists to Work in Schools and Communities Take time to view the great YouTube interview on the site with actor Bill Irwin about his work as a CETA artist for San Francisco's Pickle Family Circus.

New Village Press will publish By Heart: Poetry, Prison, and Two Lives, a two-person memoir Spoon Jackson and I are writing together. We will talk about prison, poetry, education, inequity, beauty, possibility, and what it means to be human. The process of our conversations -- in person at San Quentin, and in letters over the nineteen years since then -- is one Spoon calls diving, and both conversation and diving give shape to By Heart. You can read more about Spoon who is currently at CSP-Sac serving Life without Possibility of Parole.

New Village Press also published Arlene Goldbard's excellent New Creative Community: The Art of Cultural Development. And here's another brand new New Village Press book I strongly recommend: Art and Upheaval: Artists on the World's Frontlines by William Cleveland.

Also, I have one more new book to recommend. Uncommon Community: One Congregation's Work with Prisoners documents and discusses three prison programs begun by a Unitarian congregation in Texas. The work is interesting, the perspective broad and deep.