Joseph L. Kagle, Jr. Peace Essays

One of my rules for helping organizations abroad is: When in a foreign country, remember that you are the foreigner. That is especially important as a working principle when trying to help organizations see a vision of what they can become in the future. You talk to everyone who has an idea. You attend Rotary meetings in that region and ask questions about how the business and professional community view the organization that you are trying to help. You talk to students, faculty and administrators. Then you begin to write, let others see the process as it evolves and finally come up with a vision statement. To help with understanding through “service above self” you must be able to listen as well as dream the new dream which is already started in the collective minds of the participants. This process is how peace may be possible. There have been guides to this process in the past:

It is possible to move mountains by carrying away small stones. Chinese proverb.

Kindness in words creates confidence. Kindness in thinking creates profoundness. Kindness in giving creates love.  Lao Tse 

Vision Statement

Mongolian University of Culture and the Arts

It was not a revolution. It was not sudden or abrupt. It was the year 2020. It was an educational, evolutionary slow sequence of events and decisions that started in 2004 with a simple question, “What will the Mongolian University of Culture and the Arts (MUCA) be in the year 2020?” Now standing in the newly dedicated sculpture garden of the university, returning students admired the pentagon structure and the magnificent, seated statue of the Buddhist goddess of the arts, Yanjinlkham. For years, she had been a painting or a print in each of the offices, reminding members of the administration, faculty, student body or visitors the purpose, mission and meaning for the university: to educate the brightest and best young minds to support, sustain and splendidly display the arts that they love so passionately. On four sides of the courtyard, stood the new architectural garments for the College of Fine Arts, College of Culture, College of Choreography and Music and the Institute of Culture. On the fifth side of the garden, it was open to Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia and the world because this is what happens in a democracy. It is the newest form of Jeffersonian educational democracy.  Managers for artists, art organizations, museums and libraries ( the caretakers for ideas and images) have been going out and making the world of art a better place for everyone. MUCA is now a universal word for excellence with their deserved reputation for creating leaders in arts management for the world market. What Genghis Khan had begun with his world conquest is this current, non-violent, evolutionary reality. The open end of the quadrangle is a symbol for the legions of arts managers who carry the freedom of the arts out into the world along a new Silk Road of achievement. What had been true in the 13^th century is a new reality in 2020. By the time that each of these individuals graduate, taking their knowledge and experience out into a changing environment,  they have already worked with national arts organizations, leading artists and the most up-to-date ideas in arts management.

As the former student sat in pleasant, green, sculpture-filled courtyard, he felt like one of his nomad ancestor who had traveled afar to conquer the world. Now, he did his work in a foreign country but hoped to return soon to Mongolia to direct an arts organization in his thriving, new democracy (a model for freedom in the Asian region). Soon his son and daughter would come to the University of Culture and the Arts and start their own nomadic journey. As his thoughts drifted back to his professors; the professionals that the university had brought in to light the flame of passion in his breast for all the arts; and the countless artists who had inspired and moved him to action in the arts management field, he pondered upon how this level of excellence had come into being.

He knew that in his third year at the university an important change had occurred with the University’s curriculum and underlying philosophy. Although concepts were still analyzed in the classroom, his professors had redefine the word “classroom” to mean anyplace in the world where one learns. Therefore part of his education had happened in the museum, backstage, the art gallery, artist’s studios and in the offices of business and political leaders who used creativity to shape Mongolian society and make profit for their business. He remembers the day that Yo Yo Ma came to the campus, played for an attentive audience and then discussed what it meant to be “an artist” and “a professional Most of all, what he learned at the University was that looking back to his Mongolian heritage and discovering that how he saw the world in a non-materialistic approach was something special which was needed and unique for the 21^st century. As a Mongolian arts manager, he was in demand because he had a tradition of valuing personal and creative traits more than the materials that they were made of and on. This was a distinct advantage in the post-modern world job market.

In the classroom, he had learned the rules and methods of management but he had been allowed and encouraged to practice them in the workplace. Part of his advanced thesis was formed with his work as Assistant Manager for the Mongolian Ballet Company. Part of his love of painting and crafts had come when he spent his summer working for the Mongolian National Art Museum. One can discuss the ethics of being a professional in an academic classroom but it is a totally different, but enlightening and rewarding, experience to be practicing those ethical standards on a daily basis. He knew as a touchable reality the pressures to uphold what are right and correct challenges each professional when his or her livelihood is in the balance. He knew that there is a vast distinction between “doing what is right as a professional in the field” and balance of “earning a salary by conforming to what was expected on the job”.

The Arts Management Information Resource Center (AMIRC), a division of the Mongolian University of Culture and the Arts, had taught him well and correctly in what it means “to be a professional arts manager”. He beamed with pride that the university was now universally known in the Asian region as the place to attend if you want a career in arts management. Each year, as had happened to him, the arts organizations of the world send representative to the University to interview the graduates. He had had his choice of several lucrative positions when he earned his advance degree. Therefore, in the years since his graduation, he had continued to follow the teachings that he had learned so well in his undergraduate and graduate days at the University. He remembered that each student began training in a core program the first two years and then, although continuing some required courses like management theory, economic and budget planning, working with a Board of Directors, English (as the language of money), market and public relations, he was able to create some of his own studies groomed for his needs and his outside work with an outstanding Mongolian arts organization. The first course that he took at the university is still vivid in him mind’s vision: Introduction to Arts Management. It was the primary required course for all students where the university started the process of bringing arts professional of all kinds into the classroom and discussing their professional and personal lives and how the two were managed.

His smile was genuine and remembered from long ago as he got up, strolled over to the new auditorium where the returning graduates were to be honored with a concert, an exhibition and a formal reunion get-together. He was proud to be an essential piece of the educational system of the Mongolian University of Culture and the Arts. Over the last ten years, he had helped to find positions for seventeen graduates in arts management. He would again in the future.

Once the process of helping to create a vision statement is established, it is easy to create others in that community. The Art Council of Mongolia was not part of my mission when I came to Ulaanbaatar, but through contacts, an exhibition and my own wish to help it became as important as the university vision statement. Here is another guide (and although I do not agree with the statement about marriage and how long it lasts, it is helpful as a road map for working):

If you want happiness for an hour, take a nap. If you want happiness for a day, go fishing. If you want happiness for a month, get married. If you want happiness for a year, inherit a fortune. If you want happiness for a lifetime, help others.    Chinese Proverb.

Vision Statement: 2022

Art Council of Mongolia

The year was 2022. It was cold and crisp but as usual a clear, blue and sunny day. Ariunaa Tserenpil, the Director Emeritus, sat at the large table in the Board of Directors Room, on the tenth floor of the newly-constructured Sony Building. Down below, across the tourist plaza, was the Zanazabar Fine Art Museum. She smiles to herself that the Red Ger Gallery which has been the home of traditional and contemporary art is now placed in the modern art wing and hosts 1000 attendees at openings. Moving into this large gallery to honor the ideas of present day artists and the rich heritage of Mongolian art happened ten year earlier, about the time of her retirement. The Red Ger is the Council’s commitment to giving an outlet for the embodiments of Mongolian artists’ images and ideas has been consistent over the least twenty years. . Ariunaa has witnessed vast improvements in the Council.. Her vision of continuity is the purpose of today’s visit. She is here to brief the new Executive Director and Chairman of the Board on a journey of decisions and excellence. .

She enjoys this time alone, to collect and arrange her thoughts, and to marvel at the miraculous improvements that had occurred in only two decades. The arts and culture of Mongolia had, through her time as executive director, moved out across the world and been embraced by many nations. The question that she was here today to expand upon is: How did it all start and what decisions made the excellence of today the reality she and others now viewed with pride?

It had all began with an acceptance of a challenge. How does an art council balance the rich culture of the Mongolian past with the inclusion and influx of new ideas that technology hammered over the airways, through print media and by visiting artists and cultural experts from abroad? Where does the Council’s Board of Directors find the finances to start innovative art education programs and hire the leadership and staff to make their policy decisions a daily reality?

It had all begun with the acceptance of Mongolian culture as a needed element for the world in the 21^st century. The nomad mindset and tradition of fierce independence is now envied and embraced outside the borders of Mongolia. 

The Board of Directors from the beginning had accepted its fiduciary responsible with a brilliant, simple idea. Use the idea and history of the expansion of Mongolian Empire but update it to fit the demands of this new century.  Smiling, she remembered the time when the only extension of the Council was an Arts Council of Mongolia-US. Just the other day, a new branch was opened in Somalia, Africa. That addition completed the creation of satellite organizations on every continent. When the American post had opened in 2003, no one thought that it was such a revolutionary idea to have an extension in Seattle and Denver. Now, there are mirror organizations on every continent. In South America, it is the Arts Council of Mongolia- Brazil (Rio de Janeiro). In Europe, there are three satellite Arts Councils of Mongolia: Germany (Berlin), England (London) and Russia (Moscow). With pride, Ariunna remembers the land-breaking day when the new fund raising foreign extension of the Council opened in the Mideast with the Art Council of Mongolia-Turkey (Istanbul). The concept of organizations dedicated to raising and sending funds back to Mongolia was now a reality in Japan (Tokyo), China (Hong Kong), Australia (Sydney) and Korea (Seoul). Just as business had outsourced the manufacturing of objects in the late 20^th which sold to the whole world so had the Council outsourced the raising of funds, exchange of artists and sharing of programs.

It was still a yearly conflict but now policy changes in how governments saw the arts and culture was a reality. The Mongolia government gave one third of the annual budget. They had been compelled to see the worth of the arts and culture to Mongolia’s national image and reliance upon eco-tourism as a national fund source. Politicians now see that what Genghis Klan started by moving out across the known world to bring home treasures, the Council did daily by selling Mongolian arts, culture and way of life. The nomadic tradition of viewing the world from a non-object perspective was important to the 21^st century.

Materialism was still around but for many concerned people it had run its course. Today, the nomadic love of process and touchable reality was embraced universally. Ariunaa would tell the new Director and Chairman about the never ceasing balancing act on a tightrope between embracing the future (Mongolia wanting what they saw on television of the “good life” and symbolic ownership of objects) and a Nomadic tradition (owning only a few outside things but a vast store of beliefs and patterns of culture inside, which could be moved in an instant). In the Gobi, the Hilton Corporation had opened a space age ger and oasis. With donations coming in from world centers of financial power and programs going out to all these centers and the Asian region, policy change supported and legalized in the Mongolia was a reality. The balanced annual budget was 1/3 state money, 1/3 program fees and 1/3 fund raising resources. With this base, new improved changes had come about in arts education and the structure of grants.

There was now an army of artists, 500 strong from all over Mongolia, who went out across the nation, Asia and, through exchanges with other nations, the world. They were called Nomad Artists in Education. Each had to submit a portfolio of work for a five-year inclusion on the roster of those artists who had been judged by an international panel.

They are critical to the education of each Mongolian child. Every school had a museum gallery where the children, after a training course taught by visiting museum professionals, were interviewed, voted upon and selected as the Director, Assistant Director, Curator, Preparator and Board of Trustees. The empowered children ran the gallery, selected the exhibitions of other children’s work, exchanged exhibitions with children in other countries, and made all the decisions that any museum gallery might need to make. Without knowing it, they were teaching themselves how to manage “anything”.

With money coming in from the Mongolian government, program fees and an international network of fund raising, the Arts Council of Mongolia is able give grants in four areas of need: major arts organizations (“national ARTS organizations” who fit the stated criteria of: 1) a budget over a certain level, 2) a paid executive director, 3) a program of arts education, 4) community wide board of directors and 5) a published annual report), other arts organizations and artists, art education programs in the schools and innovative ideas. 

The last twenty years had slipped by so fast that it was rewarding to sit here now and review the accomplishment of so many minds, hearts and efforts. Mongolian arts and culture had transformed the society for the betterment of each citizen. Partners in the arts had helped to change policies, tax structures and arts organizations, enabling initiatives, operations and programs which had their seed with the Arts Council of Mongolia. Finally, Mongolian art and culture had taken its place on the world stage and added to the excellence of a global community.

All this, Ariunna would tell the new leadership. The torch of creativity will be passed again.  

The last thing that you do (so that you leave a record of the process and the outcome of your efforts) is to write a report to those who have financed your adventure to Mongolia: the Fulbright’s Council on the Exchange of Scholars. Again, there have been those who went before to guide your actions and your hand in helping others toward democracy, freedom, peace, understanding and excellence.

To laugh often and much; to win the respect of intelligent people and the affection of children; to earn the appreciation of honest critics and to endure the betrayal of false friends; to appreciate beauty, to find the best in others; to leave the world a bit better whether by a healthy child, a garden patch or a redeemed social condition; to know even one life has breathed easier because you have lived, this is to have succeeded.      Ralph Waldo Emerson

There is no greater feeling of accomplishment than to give “service above self” and wed it to “service without borders.”

Mongolian Story for Fulbright

When first contacted by Mongolia about coming there to help them with arts management, I thought: “In 2001-2003, I went to the Republic of Georgia on a Fulbright, why not go to the end of the earth?” I was wrong. A friend of mine once told me in Taiwan that you travel to find yourself coming around from the other direction. He was right. I found in the nomadic tradition of Mongolia a part of myself, an important lesson that we all (centered in the materialism of the 21^st century) must learn: what we are inside is more important than the objects of ownership outside.

One day when we left the city with Rector Bumingdorf of the Institute of Fine Arts, I discovered again that it is not the government or their legislation that shapes a society. It is the deep-felt customs of the ordinary people. We stopped at a pile of rocks with two dead limbs wrapped in blue cloths in the middle. Bumindorf told us: “Circle the mound three times, picking up stones and throw one onto the pile after each circle. This is what we all do when going into the country. We honor the sky and the earth.” At an artist’s simple home, the painter offered us vodka, dipping his ring finger in the liquid, flipping it to the sky and then touching his forehead as an honor to Buddha and thought. At a mountain monastery later, thousands of school children bowed their heads to touch ancient rocks.

I brought 28 works of art and exhibit them at the Zanazabar Museum of Fine Arts, Red Ger Gallery (over 300 in attendance at the opening, including Mongolian artists). Zanazabar was a critical Buddhist leader, painter and sculptor. The arts (traditional and contemporary visual arts) are alive and thriving in this nation of 2.5 million in a land two-thirds the size of America. Mongolia is 96% Buddhist. Many young people crowded my classroom and came to the exhibition. Mongolia has a population where 65% are under the age of 35. It is a young, open, free, flexible and welcoming democracy. The sky is always blue. The land outside the cities is uncluttered and gorgeous. Mongolia is a lovely lady in blues and tans with rounded gers gracing her curving landscape.

In Ulaanbaatar, for three weeks, I worked with the Arts Council of Mongolia, Mongolian University of Culture and Arts, Institute of Culture, Institute of Fine Arts, Mongolian Artists Union, Mongolian Museum Association and met students and faculty on curriculum development. I did in that short time what I was unable to accomplish in over a year in Georgia. I changed the arts management curriculum for a university system, bringing it up to 21^st century standards. I found there openness to ideas, flexibility of effort and professionalism of faculty members that made all my work possible. It will be interesting to go back next year and see how these seeds of effort bear fruit.