Secret Diary of an Arts Administrator
This month our secret arts administrator gets ready for the cultural behemoth that St. Patricks Day in Ireland
Heady days here at our arts centre HQ as we gear up for the pride and fervour of St. Patrick’s Day and shake off those post-Christmas blues! Last month, I mentioned that we had a number of interns working with us and yes, they are still here, beavering away in their own rural fashion. We almost had a major incident the other day, one of the girls began to spit and splutter all of a sudden, making a series of bizarre noises and jerky movements. I got such a shock, I almost spilt my coffee all over the keyboard and was on the verge of asking someone to call a doctor when I was reliably informed that the intern was in fact speaking Irish! How quaint. Once I realised this, I must admit that it took me some time to stifle my laughter, being able to speak such a useless language is one thing, but speaking it in public? My God, how embarrassing. However, I do understand that the poor girl must find it difficult adjusting to life here in the big smoke so I waited until her conversation was practically finished before admonishing her. Thankfully no one important was in the office at the time.
Speaking of people coming to the office though, we did have the most delightful visit from a friend of our directors; this individual is a big wheel in the arts internationally and someone I simply have to get to know! The range and breadth of his knowledge and experience is simply frightening, and its not just confined to art and all that. For example, I spent most of the previous two weeks buying plants for the office in order to facilitate more efficient work (especially for the interns as I thought such a gesture may make them feel more at home). I finally decided on some tulips and our visitor admired them greatly when he arrived, instantly pinpointing them as Orchid Sprangiforae. Indeed, we spent the morning in the garden admiring and pruning, our visitor exclaiming: ‘What a beautiful plant! Such leaves! They remind me of a French woman’s buttocks.’
Our arts centre was planning to work in tandem with a number of local arts groups over the last few months and it was my job to decide on their artistic merit. Of course, this was no problem as my taste is usually impeccable (in fact, this has often been remarked on by my colleagues!) but of course then one has to inform the relevant applicants as to whether they were successful or not! Now for the successful ones, this was fine as I knew most of them beforehand anyway so just sent them a text but the for unsuccessful people…well, this was horrendous! I had people crying down the phone, pleading with me, begging me to change my mind. It was bordering on the pathetic at times and I have honestly lost count of the amount of times that I have had to hang up on people. And it’s not just phone calls either, e-mails too, although I can usually turn this to my favour as I tend to e-mail the particularly juicy e-mails around the office so we all can have a much needed laugh.
So as you can see, I am completely up the walls at the moment! It’s such an exciting time to be working in the arts. With so many people losing their jobs at the moment, I sincerely hope that they will turn to the arts for solace. There is nothing better than spending a day in a gallery or an evening at the opera as it will immediately wash your troubles away, leaving us all free to the beauty of life and the splendour of modern day Ireland. Until next month!
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