On Feb. 12, the artists Christo and Jean Claude’s “The Gates” opened in New York’s Central Park. More than 7,500 vinyl arches are spaced along the park's 23 miles of pedestrian walkway like giant croquet wickets, each one strung with billowing saffron fabric.
Though the project is expected to generate $80 million in tourism revenue for the city, the artists had to fund it completely out of pocket. The husband and wife opened their wallets and shelled out $20 million, just to put their art on display.
Thirty blocks downtown, Churchill graduate Steve Luber is thinking about how artistic endeavors are financed.
Luber, who will be 24 next week, is the man behind “Steve Sells Out,” a one-man performance piece he expects will debut off-Broadway in April or May.
The idea behind the work is simple: Luber solicits donations to fund the as-yet-unwritten show, and the donors get to influence what goes in. More pay, more say.
“I created my own little autonomous funding system in which I’m just going directly to people and instead of pandering to governments or corporations, I’m just asking, ‘What do you want?’” Luber said.
After graduating from in 1999 from Churchill, where Luber was a Showstopper, directed the “Blast from the Past,” and starred in numerous plays and musicals.
"In 33 years of teaching and directing, he's one of the best I've worked with, in terms of talent personality, hard work, dedication," said Dr. Tom Bogar, director of theater at Churchill from 1989-2000. "He had so many creative directions. And tremendous creative energy."
Bogar cited Luber's lead role in "Crazy for You" and said that with his talent, Luber "could just step into any Broadway production at any time."
Luber majored in drama at New York University and became interested solo performance. An original show grew out of Luber’s undergraduate work: “Rock Star” which he performed in New York in September 2003.
Based on the success of “Rock Star,” Luber was invited for a residency at the Montana Artists Refuge, in Bain, Mont., 40 miles south of Helena.
Luber went with an idea for a play that never materialized. What did materialize was the realization that the markedly different arts communities in Montana, New York and Washington all had one thing in common.
“I was just really entertained at how incredibly different they all are, and also how they’re all in the same boat, just everyone clamoring for funding,” Luber said
“I was a grad student after that so I just did what any good grad student would do and just started researching and researching and researching,” he said. He found that the United States lagged well behind European countries in funding for the arts. He learned that France finances the arts partly through a large tax on pornography. And he found out that one of his favorite New York theater festivals is funded by Altria, the parent company to Phillip Morris, which Luber said he “would be willing to wager a lot of artists wouldn’t want to get behind personally.”
The most significant “funding” for the arts in the U.S. comes in the form of the tax breaks benefiting non-profit organizations, which in turn finance artists, Luber said, and he was disillusioned with “How people sort of commodify themselves to these organizations. They kind of package themselves to fit some kind of a mold that they may or may not actually fit.”
That was when he started thinking about cutting out the middle man.
So far “Steve Sells Out” has raised $600. That doesn’t sound like much, but Luber believes firmly that he can put on an effective play with very little money. And he insists that “Steve Sells Out” will be performed, even if he has to do it on the street.
He’s begun work on the script and is in negotiations with the owner of a brand new theater in Chelsea, where he hopes “Steve Sells Out” will be the inaugural show.
Luber is keeping quiet about the ideas he’s received so far from donors, but said that he’s been impressed by their variety and creativity: everything from playing a musical instrument, to, yes, taking off his clothes.
He reserves the right to refuse an idea (and of course, turn down the money), but, he said, “I can’t honestly think of something somebody would want me to do that I wouldn’t be willing to do for the right price.”
He had initially set a Jan. 19 deadline for contributing, but changed his mind and decided to keep accepting suggestions on an ongoing basis. “Even if it’s the night of the show, if you’re going to be donating to the show, I will work it in,” he said.
Luber said he can always pick out the ideas that come from other artists because, “They just try to think of how to make my job more difficult.”
Luber believes that watching other people squirm may be entertainment at its best and is confident that “Steve Sells Out” will be genuinely entertaining and smart.
But he admits that his take on funding is partly an irreverent statement and in that sense, the performance is already underway.
“The message is embedded in the process itself,” he said. Thus, even if the show is a dud, “I think I’ve proven a point.”