[Leica] Venice

[pklein at threshinc.com (Peter Klein)]

  There's a better way.  Sometimes they paint the cloth over the 
scaffolding to look like the underlying building.  Look closely at the 
clock tower and section immediately to its right in this picture.  I 
took it in 2001 in Siena's Piazza Del Campo, using an on-topic M4-P and 
35 Summicron:

<http://sonatina.org/italy/camponight.htm>
(crummy scan from a 4x6 print, but you'll get the idea).

I appreciate the need for funding, and I appreciate the companies that 
give it. But in the last 40 years there has been a marked change in what 
the companies demand in return.  In the classical music world, back in 
the 70s, the funders got a discrete announcement at the beginning of a 
radio or TV program, or a mention in the concert program.  Now, they get 
their mission statement read on the air. And in concert programs and 
marqees, they often get their name bigger than the orchestra's, bigger 
than the soloist's, bigger than the composers.  The Artistic Director or 
one of the performers comes out and effuses about how wonderful XYZ 
Widgets, Inc. is, and leads the audience in a round of applause.  
Principal chairs in many symphony orchestras are named after the company 
or wealthy patron who endowed them.

In other words, the donor's "cut" of our attention is increasing. 
Marketing types see arts funding simply as a means to get their message 
to more ears and eyeballs.  Or at best, they view such desecration as a 
"win-win":  'You get your building fixed or your concert put on, and I 
get my message to all these people.'

Unless it can be shown that it actually lowers sales, this practice will 
continue, and it will increase. Sad to see it take root in Europe, 
though--I thought only we Americans were so crass.

As Frank said, "If I were King..."

--Peter