The project began in January, 2011, on the day that I overheard a group of teens talking about how useless an art degree was on the Philadelphia Market/Frankford Line. Three sentences into the conversation and my blood was boiling. For the next couple hours, working in a theatre workshop covered in plaster dust while I painted thousands of bones to be smashed on stage with a mallet (Lantern Theater Companys A Skull in Connemara) and then after work, on the futon of a south Philly graphic designer who was equally as angered by the subway talk, I built the concept and logistics of asking everyone I knew to tell me why they make art and putting all their sentiments in book form that would ideally then be placed in organizations what had nothing to do with art. I did not want to preach to the choir, I wanted to convince those who were not already persuaded that artistic endeavors change lives, improve the economy and heal the soul.
In the days that followed, those who had become enamored with the concept of the book continued to spread the word and we picked up some very pivotal encouragement that set the tone for the future of the project. The Artistic Rebuttal Book Project was featured on the Americans for the Arts ARTSblog thanks to a fellow arts advocate up at New York University, Alison Wade. Next, the project got an article placed in the Huffington Posts Art Section written by Philadelphias own Joan Smith, whom I had worked with as her intern two summers before. These two publications assisted the project in terms of validity, scope and mission and almost instantly, we started to form partnerships with quite a few local and out-of-state organizations. What surfaced out of these partnerships were venues for the events we planned to host, multiple presentations about the project and the need for artists to become their own advocates, and enough rebuttals to make three different editions of the book. By June 2011, we had printed an Arts Advocacy/Pennsylvania Edition that we took to our Pennsylvania representatives in DC; a Childrens Edition full of kids from Pennsylvania and North Carolina; and the nation-wide edition that had representation from 19 of our 50 states.
The project is just under a year old and is still feeling its way around the most basic functions of organization-hood. Our short journey so far has been both golden-paved and humbling. It is only because of my time in Drexels Arts Administration Graduate Program and my year as the AAGAs Art Advocacy Director that I have the amazing friends and connections that made any of the Rebuttal Books success possible. Before moving to Philadelphia in 2008 for graduate school, I was a painter who had trouble even communicating the message of my own canvases by introducing this book to the world, I had charged myself with a task that would ask more of me than I had ever asked of myself. I, as a creator, am compelled to create connections between people, resources and talent all the time. I recognize, after working with so many creative minds, that the different disciplines of what are encompassed under the label art generally are at their most exciting when they share information and skills.
- Amy Scheidegger
Creator and Director of the Artistic Rebuttal Book Project
