Art Fag Funding... Wherefore Art Thou? UPDATED

As mentioned here previously, the blog Art Fag City--one of my personal faves--issued a funding challenge to the arts community last month: help it raise $6,000 by New Year's or there would be no more AFC.

On December 30, AFC blogger and general life-force Paddy Johnson announced that she only had $500 left to raise reach her goal of $6,000.

Personally I think $5,500 is an amazing amount of money to raise by a blogger in just over a week. But I was worried Johnson might still keep to her ultimatum of "$6,000 or nothin' doin'." This fear was exacerbated when she promised to blog January 2 but didn't. Neither did she on the 3rd or 4th. All this had me going "C'mon lady, $5,500 is an amazing accomplishment--do a couple of pieces for the Canadian papers and call it an even six grand!"

Today, I see, with some relief that she's back. And I hope she's a-stayin!

In the interim, the episode leaves much to ponder on strategies for funding art writing and criticism--blog-related and otherwise. Johnson published a cogent post on this during her funder; I published a much longer, less pointed, rambling one. Maybe a combo of the charity-funding model (which print mag Canadian Art uses) with ads and subscriptions is a way to go? Any other ideas?

UPDATE Paddy emails me that even though she didn't post the animated sequence of Damien Hirst's skull blinking, she has likely meet or even slightly exceed her fundraising goal. Yay!