GIA Blog

From Dana Goldstein, Columbia University School of Journalism:

With the NewSchools Venture Fund Summit kicking off (on May 17), I thought I'd do an overview of the state of K-12 education philanthropy.

The NewSchools Venture Fund is one of the founding institutions of "venture philanthropy," a school of charitable giving that borrows its ethos from the world of venture capital. Venture philanthropists seek out non-profits that pursue social change while embracing data-driven corporate accountability standards.

The Games for Change 8th Annual Festival will be in New York, June 20-22, at NYU's Skirball Center. Often referred to as “the Sundance of Video Games,” the Festival is the biggest gaming event in New York City. It brings together leaders from government, corporations, civil society, media, academia, foundations, and the gaming industry to explore the increasing real-world impact of digital games as an agent for social change. The Festival is also a showcase for some of the most innovative new games in production.

The National Assembly of State Arts Agencies maintains up-to-date information on the budget proposals affecting state arts agencies. This resource is available in .pdf form at www.nasaa-arts.org/Research/Funding/State-Budget-Center/FY12R&EProposals.pdf.

Americans for the Arts latest State Arts Action Network bulletin, SAANbox, has updates on the situation with State Arts Agencies—an area of considerable drama these days, it seems. Yesterday's SAANbox includes news from many states including the heartland states of Colorado, Oklahoma, Missouri, and Kansas, where the governor may veto funding put in place by a legislature dominated by his own party.

Read yesterday's SAANbox here.

The Lincoln Center's President Reynold Levy was on MSNBC this morning to discuss how arts organizations can thrive in a tough economy, and how Lincoln Center has managed to balance their budget every year.

This weekend in LA, I went to see Art in the Streets — the exhibit on graffiti and street art at the Museum of Contemporary Art — a brilliant meditation and documentation of graffiti as an art form from the … Continue reading →

I am furious. Is it too much to ask the greatest nation on earth to encourage learning in the arts and make it accessible to every child throughout their K-12 public education, taught by arts specialists and respected by decision-makers as a means to a creative life, workforce and engaged learner? Here’s the string of events that started the firestorm in my head last week:

Louisa McCune-Elmore has been named as the new executive director of the organization. McCune-Elmore joins the Kirkpatrick Foundation after a thirteen-year tenure as editor in chief at Oklahoma Today magazine, where she garnered numerous awards and national recognition. She graduated from San Francisco State University in 1992. Her career, largely as a journalist and editor, has included work with such publications as Harper’s Magazine, George, Worth, and American Benefactor, a magazine dedicated to philanthropy.

For his newest blog post, Barry Hessenius talks with GIA Board Member Kristen Madsen, Senior Vice President of the GRAMMY Foundation and MusiCares Foundation, about the business of music.

As a bonus, Barry posted a video of Kristen's speech from earlier this year on Hip Hop and the power of vocabulary.

Looking to lay some groundwork for the technology track at the Grantmakers in the Arts 2011 Conference in San Francisco? Rhizome, a nonprofit affiliate of the New Museum, is dedicated to the creation, presentation, preservation, and critique of emerging artistic practices that engage technology.