What is North by North?

reddy May 24, 2013 21 Comments

Can someone tell me what North by North is?

About a month ago, it seemed to be everywhere.  I’m not really a participant in the arts other than as an occasional attendee, but I think I understood what they were doing.  It was like an umbrella organization for Homegrown, the Dylan Festival, and other stuff, right?  That seemed cool and I thought it made a lot of sense, though I confess I was surprised that everyone in these organizations agreed to let go their independence and be under that umbrella.  I also was surprised because it seemed like the organization was run by some people I had never heard of.

Now, North by North is nowhere.  Is it gone?  What was it?  When I ask my friends in the arts about it, they just change the topic.

So strange that it was everywhere, and now it’s nowhere.

Can anyone help me understand?  I like Duluth, I like the arts in Duluth, and on the surface this seemed like a good thing.  Does it still exist?  Where did it come from, and where did it go?


Art, Events

21 Comments

Paul Lundgren

about 11 years ago 

I was starting to think we'd get all the way through May without this subject coming up.

TimK

about 11 years ago 

Go to Google and type "NXN Duluth" and the first 9 hits are relevant.

Claire

about 11 years ago 

Life happens.

Paul Lundgren

about 11 years ago 

I was reluctant to delve into this at first, but since the Facebook page actually describes it pretty clearly and succinctly, I'll paste that text here.


North x North is a promotional effort to feature the incredible events that occur throughout Duluth and Superior, from the end of April through early June 2013, and is a project of Twin Ports Arts Align.

The North x North promotes and features the Homegrown Music Festival, followed by the Twin Ports Gallery Group's Visual Arts Week, Theater and Performance during NxN, North Country Dylan Celebration-Duluth Dylan Fest, and ending with the Duluth Superior Film Festival.

North x North is not an event, partner, or organization that produces any of the featured events, and takes no credit for their creation, production or execution.

It is a collaboration of our musicians, actors, writers, welders, painters, poets, sculptors, publishers and countless other artists. This celebration serves to remind us how lucky we are to live in a place with more creative talent per capita than is quite fair. With 188 bands, 20 galleries, and 10 theaters and venues participating, the scope of the month-long festival is almost unheard of for a community of our size. And if you know anything about the Twin Ports music and arts scene, you know that this is only a taste of what it offers year-round.


There are conflicting opinions out there about whether the overarching concept of North by North strengthens the parts that make it up or dilutes the message and makes each event more confusing. I recommend not thinking about it much or you'll miss too much good art.

[email protected]

about 11 years ago 

I tend to think about NXN the way I think about Milwaukee's old tourism slogan:  "a great place by a Great Lake."  It draws upon an awesome feature of the town for publicity purposes, without really enhancing or detracting or changing what it is drawing upon. Asking what "NxN" is almost like asking what the "it" is when we say that "Coke is It."

-Berv

about 11 years ago 

I still don't get it. More explanation please.

[email protected]

about 11 years ago 

There is tons online.

Twin Ports Arts Community Welcomes North x North

More specific question please?

reddy

about 11 years ago 

Okay, here's a more specific question.

Before Homegrown, the entire month was being promoted as an Arts Month sponsored by and organized under the title of North by North. Just look at some of those articles. I think there were even like some hotels sponsoring it, probably as a tourist marketing thing.

But then, I don't think the Homegrown program even mentioned North by North. If North by North was organizing Homegrown, wouldn't the Homegrown program mention that?  

And around that time, I saw those blue flyers with the description Mr. Lundgren pulled from Facebook. However, that description seemed to completely contradict that North by North was the umbrella organization.

And, after Homegrown, I don't think I've heard or seen anything referencing North by North. Supposedly there was "Theater Week," or something, but ... I don't remember seeing anything during that week. And in the Dylan Week events I went to I don't think I saw anything about North by North. Shouldn't they have at least mentioned it?

What changed?  

Why was North by North presented as bringing all these things together, and then all of a sudden, from when the "month" was supposed to start (with Homegrown) it wasn't even mentioned in the Homegrown program, or in anything within the programs that followed?

Do you see why that makes an outside observer say, hey, what's going on here?  What happened here?  I'm confused!

Some of you insiders, tell me what happened.

adam

about 11 years ago 

North by North has absolutely nothing to do with the Homegrown Music Festival.

[personal rant]

To be perfectly clear, North by North is not organizing shit.

North by North is an effort to make local arts organizations do the work of the Duluth Visitor Convention Bureau / Visit Duluth — an organization that receives plenty of city tax dollars to do exactly what NxN is purporting to do, but instead focuses nearly exclusively on putting bodies in the rooms of hotel owners.

An umbrella that no one asked to be a part of, North by North "brings" nothing together, and consumes limited resources that the same organizations it claims to serve are competing for (money, time, attention — how much did that NxN logo development and brochure printing cost, folks? And where did that money come from?? Ask questions).

You haven't heard anything more about North by North in May because it was a spectacularly last-minute unorganized failure that used up money and time for no result other than glad-handing, press releasing, and utterly confusing the community as to who is doing what with arts organizations / events that already exist. (Think of the late 1990s phrase: web portal.)

Initially called "May is Arts Month" (what was wrong with that?), North by North is a terrible, terrible name that makes the entire community look like a bunch of uncreative rubes only capable of copying others. (Oops.)

Always be leery when, after The Little Red Hen has finished baking the bread, people show up offering to help eat the bread, throwing the word "we" around all willy-nilly.

What a waste of time and energy that could have been so much better spent directly working to improve the organizations that are doing the work in May.

[/personal rant]

moosetracks

about 11 years ago 

+1 adam

in.dog.neato

about 11 years ago 

Do you DuSu?

annefluke

about 11 years ago 

1. Everything I wanted to know about NxN but forgot to ask, because it disappeared so quickly. (I'm not out and about every night of the week, but I don't exactly have my head in the sand, either.) Thanks for inquiring, reddy.

2. Adam, I share your sentiments/frustrations re: Visit Duluth. I've learned to bypass them and work through other channels when it comes to promoting "attractions" outside their purview. 

3. If you don't know what in.dog.neato is referring to, you can read about "The DuSu Brand Promise" and "The DuSu Acid Test" on the long-defunct DuSu website.

Ramos

about 11 years ago 

Vibrancy is a sort of performance that artists or musicians are supposed to put on, either directly or indirectly, for the corporate class.


Thomas Frank

annefluke

about 11 years ago 

Tom Frank and I were fellow DJs at WHPK c. 1990, back before he was famous. I think having a radio show was part of his personal makeover strategy (preppy Midwestern conservative to left-leaning cultural critic/public intellectual).

numbat

about 11 years ago 

This is so Duluthy...

-Berv

about 11 years ago 

Still not getting it.  Is it supposed to be a ripoff of Hitchcock's North by Northwest?

in.dog.neato

about 11 years ago 

Just seemed like unneeded and confusing bureaucracy.

It would have been much better if the people who were involved with this fiasco would actually...oh, I dunno...get involved with the events this NXN thing was trying to promote, like volunteering for Homegrown or something like that...their time would have been put to much better use.

The whole idea of North by North "presenting" event that has been running on its own for better than a decade is kind of a slap in the face to the people who actually do the work.

CLeTa

about 11 years ago 

+1 in.dog.neato

in.dog.neato

about 11 years ago 

But maybe that (actually pitching in, helping out and getting dirty) would have left little time for glad handing, press conferencing and photo oping.

I just hope they don't break their arms patting themselves on the back for the great job they didn't do.

jessige

about 11 years ago 

The part I don't get is this: who started this initiative?  Sorry if I'm missing something.  I see the participating orgs and whatever, but whose baby is this?

adam

about 11 years ago 

I smell a rebranded, DuSu-esque, bullshit "online community" coming...

No, really.

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