Mission

We envisage a society that actively engages the arts as a constructive influence and vehicle to contribute to the identification and communication of shared interests and values, while embracing a diverse and pluralistic world.

We look for ways to stimulate capacities of the arts in their multiple forms and combinations through research; thought and teaching; capturing their constructive qualities through dialogue; and innovative performance, exhibition and communication, within and between communities.

Scope and Agenda

These endeavors are founded on the conviction that the arts influence individuals, groups and communities in deliberate and inadvertent ways. Artistic expression is a universal and naturally arising fact of human life. Its content, uses and influences are of a changing character over time and between societies.

The arts do not shape events – the arts shape man – man shapes events. The influences of the arts are seen on individuals and in societies through:

• Improved learning, development and the fostering of creativity and innovation;
• experiencing diversity and its enriching potential for advancing tolerance and pluralism;
• shared experience of the arts as a search for beauty, expression of emotion and reflection of our common pursuit of a meaningful and satisfying life as well as collective community response; and
• communication of values that influence policy, social choices, and, potentially, cohesiveness.

Through these dynamics, the arts can, if purposefully employed, help to contribute to:

• a constructive national identity and pride;
• addressing cross-cultural and social differences through dialogue, impactful symbolism and shared experience; instead of confrontation and conflict. Arts can influence societies through recognition of enrichment of community diversity and creativity;
• reconciliation of contemporary or historically-rooted hostilities through shared memory and the revealing of common fundamental goals;
• balance between individualism and community in the performance of the arts; of free expression; and social responsibility, in service of a healthy community; and
• the use of the arts and iconic institutions, exhibitions and performances to draw attention to select social issues for constructive policy response.

At the same time, attention should be given to historic facts and contemporary risks of the arts fueling anti-social views, divisiveness and conflict. History reveals a capacity of the arts to reflect society and the temper of its time. We do well to remain alert to the arts, and vigilent to avoid a belief in an ethno-cultural and nationalistic superiority, or the promotion of anti-social sentiments.

There is much of importance to be explored about the constructive potential as well as the risks of exploitative use of the arts. This suggests a significant agenda:

• the characteristics and capacities of the arts to improve education, development and community; and bridge divides, through recognition of the shared interests in the arts as well as serving as a non-conflictual reason for collaboration and contact;
• the implications of adaptation of the arts to the changing conditions;
• the range of visions for managing co-existence amidst cultural differences, from nativist separation, to multi-culturalism, to assimilation;
• their societal interpretation or use of arts as an instrument of national identity and constructive pride compatible with, if not supportive of, pluralism; avoiding it being made to serve as an instrument of nationalistic separation and even sentiment of superiority;
• the resulting consequences for social cohesion - local, domestic and international - of the different dynamics of the arts in different communities; and
• consideration of societal and geopolitical challenges and risks to which the arts might draw attention to community conditions and assist with constructive solutions.

Current Programs:

• The Foundation is collaborating in the development of a curriculum and program with the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra Academy with artists, political and business leaders, researchers and scholars.
• A conference will be held at the Mozarteum in Salzburg, Austria on August 11, 2023 – Emotional Rescue! The Impact of Music in Society which will examine the best evidence of the impact and potential of music in:
  • General education and child development
  • Medical therapies
  • Acculturation of migrant populations
  • Public opinion, policy and practice
• On February 28, 2024, the Foundation will participate in a program at Carnegie Hall’s exploration of one of the most complex and consequential chapters in modern human history: ‘Fall of the Weimar Republic: Dancing on the Precipice’. The Foundation’s symposium will be complementary to Carnegie Hall’s music program and consider the socio-economic, political and constitutional accompaniments to varied, new music and art styles of ‘Anything Goes’ society following World War I. The program will examine how we should respond to some similarities in the characteristics today, including in the U.S., to a history that saw brutal dictatorship replace democracy. How will we ‘build back better’ in both Ukraine and the surrounding region to ensure a successful recovery without rewarding the perpetrators in the post-conflict period?

These current initiatives follow from the activities of the Foundation’s initial programming on the role of arts in society. In 2014, the Chumir Foundation commissioned research and gathered speakers for a symposium: ‘The Arts of Vienna - A Proud History, A Painful Past - Vienna’s History and Legacy of the Past 150 Years’. This program was presented in New York City, Toronto and Calgary examining the intersection of arts, politics and war in Vienna over the past 150 years. The program explored human creativity in “fin-de-siècle” Vienna; the roots of societal breakdown between two world wars; the progression of discrimination and atrocities; the ethical steps taken in recent periods towards remembrance and reconciliation; the lessons of history for contemporary conditions; and the appropriate ethical responses to observed global risks.