From the website Transom, Al Letson, host of the NPR show State of the Re:Union writes this manifesto for the Megopolis Festival that takes place June 5-7, in Oakland, California.
Grantmakers in the Arts
June 4, 2015 by Steve
The President's Committee on the Arts and the Humanities (PCAH) will expand its successful Turnaround Arts initiative into five additional school districts, as the program continues to successfully help turn around low-performing schools, narrow the achievement gap, and increase student engagement through the arts, announced the committee's co-chairs, George Stevens, Jr. and Margo Lion. This follows 2014's major expansion of the program after a Booz Allen Hamilton evaluation of the program's effectiveness.
June 2, 2015 by Steve
By Mark MacNamara, at San Francisco Classical Voice:
In the nick of time for many arts organizations, San Francisco Mayor Ed Lee has announced a “Shared Prosperity for the Arts Package.” Over the next two years, the city will contribute $7 million to programs supporting the arts. The windfall, the product of a glowing hot local economy, includes a $2 million enhancement to the Cultural Equity Endowment Fund and $1 million to Grants for the Arts, which supports small and mid-sized arts nonprofits, individual artists, and historically underserved communities. The package also includes a $3.8 million capital investment in the city’s Civic Art Collection and Cultural Centers, and additional funding for arts education.
June 1, 2015 by Steve
Jerome Foundation and Camargo Foundation have announced that Ben Cameron has been appointed president of both foundations, and will be working primarily in the US offices in Saint Paul, Minnesota. He will take these positions on January 4, 2016. “Ever since my years in the Twin Cities in the 1990s, I have admired the extraordinary leadership of the Jerome Foundation, long one of the most important arts foundations in Minnesota and New York, and its incredible President, Cynthia Gehrig,” Cameron said.
May 31, 2015 by SuJ'n
For the month of June, GIA's photo banner features work and projects sponsored by Creative Work Fund. With assistance from other generous funders, the Walter & Elise Haas Fund has managed the Creative Work Fund (CWF) for 21 years.
The CWF supports artists making new work through collaboration with nonprofit organizations of any kind, and demands payment of those artists. Over time, the ways artists and nonprofits organize themselves and make work has evolved, but they still find collaboration to be powerful and continue responding to the CWF with inspiring ideas. Since its inception, the CWF has awarded $10.1 million in grants.
May 29, 2015 by Steve in Emergency Readiness, Response, and Recovery
Record rainfalls, flooding and tornadoes continue to plague the country’s mid-section. And your GIA peers who are involved in the National Coalition for Arts Preparedness and Emergency Response are offering expertise and assistance to artists and cultural organizations affected by the extreme weather.
Theresa Scanlan of American for the Arts has been in touch many of the local arts agencies in Texas and Oklahoma to assess how and where aid is needed.
May 28, 2015 by Janet
By Janet Brown from her blog Better Together
Grantmakers in the Arts released its Statement of Purpose for Racial Equity in Arts Philanthropy in March 2015. It did not spring from thin air. Members concerned with social justice have been active within GIA for nearly a decade. Over the past six years, members have shown an overwhelming interest in equity issues facing their communities. Racial equity was deliberately selected four years ago for a thought leader forum in order to go deeper into one area of social justice. Two years later after several convenings of the social justice forum group, the GIA board of directors adopted racial equity in arts philanthropy as “core field work” and began its own training and preparation for a public statement and actionable steps.
May 28, 2015 by Steve
The Institute of International Education has announced the launch of a program to save the lives and work of artists who face persecution in their home countries. The new Artist Protection Fund (APF), a three-year pilot program supported by a $2.79 million grant from The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, will make life-saving fellowship grants to threatened artists from any field of artistic endeavor, and place them at host universities and arts centers in countries where they can safely continue their work and plan for their future.