Lots of folks have said very kind things in expressing their dismay at my having been laid off from the paper. But I don’t think the outpouring I’ve received has been quite as intense as the feeling in the arts community over the loss of my colleague Jeffrey Day. I saw an e-mail calling for a letter-writing campaign to protest his departure within 24 hours of the news breaking — and unlike me, Jeffrey wasn’t even mentioned in the news story. The arts grapevine just moved that fast. The gist of the message I saw was, we may have hated what he said in some of his reviews, but we’re going to miss the serious attention he gave the arts. Or something along those lines.
Well, Jeffrey’s back — with a blog he unveiled today. I urge you to go check it out. There’s something to be said for taking a little time before launching your blog. Jeffrey’s is certainly more esthetically pleasing than mine. But you’d expect that.
You know, once Robert gets the bugs worked out of his new blog (he actually has a Web guru going to his house to cast spells over it tomorrow, I hear), between that and mine and Jeffrey’s, you’re practically going to have a reconstituted Stet Pepper online. Just add water.
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Brad, I’m glad to see you plugging Jeffrey’s new website. You’re right about the arts community’s reaction to the State’s layoffs in that department…One misconception about what that kind of coverage entailed is that people often think it’s all about reviews of concerts, plays, etc., that have already happened. But in many mid-sized cities that format HAS been somewhat obsolete for awhile now (not a bad thing in my opinion) and the main role of arts writers at those papers has been more in the nature of previews, putting upcoming exhibitions, plays, concerts, etc., in context, and yes, educating the readership.
At the paper Jeffrey was excellent at that, especially in his speciality of the visual arts, where the paper often gave him a lot of space to work with. I for one have learned a lot about the visual arts scene (especially in SC) through his writing and look forward to continuing to do so on his new blog.