Reflection of Ó Bhéal Project

During this trip, I am in group one for the Ó Bhéal projects. That means that I am learning about arts administration through video production and event support. The purpose of our group is to help out at the weekly poetry nights on Mondays at The Long Valley as well as the production of a promotional video for the organization. This group would not have been my first choice but I chose to be in group one because it was the only one that had twenty planned hours of work through which I could petition to have this class be counted as satisfying the Community Engagement requirement at Saint Mary’s. I would have rather been in the group doing the photo essay since photography is my art form. When we signed up for our groups, we did not really know what we would be doing beyond the vague titles given to each group. I did not have a choice, but if I did not have to get Community Engagement and I knew what this group entailed, I would not have chosen it.

As far as the event support part goes, I figured we would be doing a lot more but we actually did not do a whole lot of work. For some reason, I thought we would be like extra servers or something like that, going around and taking people’s drink orders and then delivering them. We mainly just helped move around some furniture and laid out brochures on the tables before the event. After the event ended, we helped encourage people who were still lingering to leave the bar, as everyone was supposed to be out by a certain time that was quickly approaching. That part of our job title was very easy and painless. The other part of our job, however, is not.

Screenshot from Natalie Leduc's Computer

I currently am and have been feeling extremely overwhelmed by the amount of work involved in this trip. I was already stressed out with the blog posts, final showcase, and digital story but then I found out I would have to make a promotional video for Ó Bhéal and that just made it worse. Since I am the only person in the group with a nice camera, I have the job of filming everything and taking any photographs we may need. On top of that, since I have all of the media on my laptop and since Dylan and I are the only ones doing this for Community Engagement, I have also been given the job of editing the video. The other group members have offered to help and have been, but the majority of the work seems to be falling on me. On the bright side, Paul Casey seems very relaxed about the product of our work and has said that if it works great, but if not we should not worry. Obviously, I still want to create a video they can use, but having him say that did alleviate some stress. 

One thing I have learned from this process is that one person cannot be in charge of every aspect of arts administration; it is best when the responsibility is shared among a group. The amount of work involved can become overwhelming and the individual would likely not have any time to actually create art at that point. There are many facets to arts administration that many people do not think of, and I must give respect to those who manage this work.