duARTS gives student artists their due

The recent approval of duARTS, by the Student Organization Finance Committee will hopefully usher in a welcome and much needed overhaul of the arts in the Duke community. The body seeks to serve an umbrella organization for all student arts organizations on campus by bringing together undergraduate theater, dance, visual arts, instrumental music, vocal music and publication groups. Their proposed structure include six silos for the six mediums as well as an executive board.

The potential benefits to the student art community are numerous. duARTS can be effective in networking groups in order to create more cohesive event planning. A unified body will make event planning more streamlined for groups and mitigate scheduling conflicts, ensuring that large events do not coincide. Moreover, arts groups will be able to create more collaborative and thematic events over the course of the entire school year. On the audience side, the Duke community will gain from having a single source, the duARTS calendar, for one-stop information on arts programming.

duARTS’ efforts have produced tangible results. Recently, the administration agreed to renovate a new arts space for meetings and rehearsals on Campus Drive. It is heartening to see that the University understands the importance of providing student artists adequate resources to properly work.

However, three major obstacles still prevent Duke from reaching its full artistic potential. The first is space. While Smith Warehouse and the new Campus Drive arts space furnish much needed studio and rehearsal space, they remain very removed from the most populated and trafficked areas, unlikely to attract the regular passersby. duARTS should advocate for more central locations, such as the Bryan Center, to showcase student talent, which is deserving of a true spotlight and more. duARTS could also assume an advisory role as the West Union Building renovations unfold next year. Students especially need a strong collective voice to negotiate strong artistic considerations in the building’s architectural design.

The second issue is the lack of visibility among smaller groups who lack the publicity and buzz of well-known arts groups. For example, the most prominent dance and a cappella groups advertise and recruit heavily during orientation week, establishing their dominance early and permanently. Consequently, freshmen are aware of a handful of singular organizations, but not the greater Duke arts landscape as a whole. duARTS could provide a marketing and networking platform to smaller, more obscure arts groups. This could diversify the student perception of arts offerings on campus, as well as provide smaller groups with more participants and larger audiences.

Furthermore, an umbrella arts organization can have the influence to reach out to artistic communities outside of Duke, in those in Durham, the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and other universities nearby.

There exists much untapped potential for duARTS, but consolidating and streamlining arts organizations is only half the battle. The main impetus to get involved with the arts must come from students. Through more cohesive programming, better advertising on a single and powerful duARTS platform and increased awareness of all arts opportunities on and off campus, Duke can take its art community to the next level. Duke has the talent—now it needs the organizational and structural backing.