Intermezzo

by Peter Burwasser

The economy sucks. The next 12 months or so will be a nerve-wracking struggle. But take this to the bank: We will get through this, and at the other side of the trough, there will be an energetic upswing in the economy, and for those who have been careful, who are working, and who have not lost too much, it will be happy days again.

But of course, not everybody falls into the fortunate category of having the means to batten the hatches and weather the storm. That is where this crisis will take victims. The situation for nonprofits is especially bleak. Many, perhaps most, such organizations tend to run deficit budgets, even if they are always balanced on paper. This may necessitate dipping into endowments to pay the bills, but those sources are getting clobbered by the market right now. At the very moment when an emergency fund needs to be tapped into, the nest egg looks like a shriveled pea. To put it plainly, 2009 looks to be a life-or-death season for a shockingly large swath of our cultural infrastructure. Some groups may be able to cut back and limp along until better times, others might go into hibernation for the ugly stretch, but many others may have to fold up the tent. This is not alarmism, but brute reality.

And it piles on. This is the time of year when annual fundraising campaigns send out donation solicitations, but an awful lot of previously generous folks are tossing those letters in the trash. They do so without much guilt; after all, times are tough, belts have to be tightened. So here is my admittedly counter-intuitive plea, dear readers: Get out your checkbooks. There has never been a more important time to be a generous patron to the arts. Give up one dinner out and send the money instead to your favorite chamber music series or theater company. Become a member of a museum. Go to the neighborhood art gallery and buy something. This is the moment; when we get to the other side of this mess, and we will, it would be good to have a cultural scene that is as vibrant and vital as the one we have going into it. Happy holidays, and pass it along.

(p_burwasser@citypaper.net)