Art and The Threepenny Opera
Tonight was opening night of "The Threepenny Opera," and for the first time ever, I will not be able to see a single performance of a show I designed for. That makes me sad.
Most of my summer was spent designing 3p publicity. That was not what I had intended, but perfection takes time. While I am proud of the work I have done, I am annoyed with myself for squandering precious time with sawicki. Thank goodness I didn't costume design.
One of the best compliments I received about my work came from outside MITG&SP, however. I tried for years to get the MIT Homepage Team to spotlight a show I've designed for, but they never responded. I even went to the trouble of making a Yeomen-of-the-Guard-themed mock-up homepage two years ago. So, having been ignored numerous times in the past, I decided not to bother for 3p.
For reasons I do not understand, this year was different. The MIT Homepage Team chose 3p to be one of the Editor's Picks at the top of the events calendar this year. While getting an Editor's Pick spot isn't nearly as good as getting a gigantic graphic on the MIT homepage, I think we got a link off the MIT homepage for a day or so. Hopefully that helped ticket sales somewhat.
But back to the compliment. I got an e-mail from Susan Carran, the MIT Web Content Editor. She wrote, "In the future, if you do design work for other productions, we would be happy to also consider them for editor's picks on the calendar." I take that to mean that my graphic design work, independent of what it is for, is good enough to be featured based on artistic merit alone. And that folks, makes my summer. Because if you don't get paid in currency, you need to get paid in respect.