In January, Hector Cantu, editor of Heritage Magazine, invited Art&Seek’s Jerome Weeks to appear in 2nd Tuesdays at Slocum, Heritage Auction’s speaker’s series. The title was ‘A Critic’s Eye View: The Evolution of the Arts and Arts Coverage in Dallas,’ but in the wide-ranging, onstage interview, they talked about Dallas not fitting its stereotype, how the Arts District should function, why arts blogging and social networking represent new versions of an old force, why leaving a neighborhood alone could be the best thing for it and how artists and intellectuals can be attracted to North Texas but may not stay. At the end, audience questions were taken from some of the nearly 100 people who attended. It certainly helped the general “Jerome’s pontificating about high culture” atmosphere that (as can be glimpsed in the background) the room’s decorations included a large-scale image of Alfred E. Neuman in MAD.

We’ve edited the more-than-an-hour-long talk into seven, easily digestible video excerpts (average length: less than nine minutes). The first two are here: #1 is on Dallas demographics and real-estate churn and how these relate to the local arts audience; #2 applies a few lessons about the past and present of cities to the Dallas area, lessons borrowed from Cities in Civilization, Peter Hall’s historical analysis of urban creativity.

The other five segments are:
Outside Approval and the International Managerial Class
Why North Texas Needs College Arts Programs
Digital Word of Mouth
The Arts District: Built for the Future
Audience Questions: The Mourners and the Meyerson Parking Garage.

You can follow those links or you can go to Art&Seek’s YouTube channel. Just plug in “Slocum” into the channel’s search engine, and all seven excerpts will appear.