Visual arts

2005, 36 pages. Alliance of Artists Communities, 255 Main Street, Providence, RI, 02903, 410-351-4320.

This report documents an initiative of the Alliance of Artists Communities to answer the question, "What does California look like to its artists?" Reflections and work of seven artists in different residency programs provide a snapshot of the state from a range of cultural perspectives. Engaging photographs by Kim Harrington supplement the text.

2005. Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, 65 Bleecker Street, 7th floor, New York, NY 10012-2420, 212-387-7555.

This book chronicles the Warhol Foundation's five-year initiative to build capacity of thirty-one small contemporary visual arts organizations located throughout the country. This ambitious program awarded $125,000 to each organization and provided additional technical assistance according to their needs. The challenging typography, layout, and binding of the book convey a strong sense of the organizations portrayed.

A few years ago, Laura Penn, managing director of Intiman Theatre in Seattle, met me for coffee at the Saint Francis Hotel. I was between sessions of the Independent Sector's (IS) national conference in San Francisco. Laura had never heard of IS and was curious about it. The Independent Sector is a coalition of corporations, foundations, and private voluntary organizations that works to strengthen nonprofit organizations and is committed to advancing the common good in the U.S.

It is very unusual for any urban renewal plan not to include reference to the role that arts organizations and arts buildings can potentially play in regeneration. Most recently, in Hurricane Katrina's wake, both have figured prominently in discussions about the future of New Orleans and Biloxi. But the discussions about arts organizations and those about arts buildings are curiously and uncomfortably divorced.

We live in a world of "widespread hostility toward the United States and its policies."1 This antipathy is not limited to the countries and peoples that are directly affected by the U.S. "war on terror" and its attendant pol-icies, but includes many of our former allies and fellow democracies. A friend who just returned from a year in Spain reports that she spent a significant amount of time and energy convincing people she met there that the U.S.

2005, 256 pages. University of Illinois Press , 1325 Oak Street, Champaign, IL, 68120-6903, 217-244-4689

In the author's own words, "This book is a report card on American Culture. Not the culture of Wal-Mart and the cineplex, but culture as it is lived closer to the ground, local culture, neighborhood culture... It is about dancing, not about watching somebody else dance on television. There is a big difference.”

2004, 80 pages. Artrain USA Ann Arbor, MI, 48104

The essays that accompany this four-color exhibition catalog of "Native Views," an art show of contemporary works by Native American artists, explore how Native artists are influenced by popular culture. The exhibition, presented by Artrain USA, is housed in vintage rail cars and is touring the country via the nation's railways. Guest curator Joanna Osburn Bigfeather lends her perspective to the works along with the other essayists.

2005, 80 pages. Cultural Initiatives Silicon Valley 1153 Lincoln Avenue, Suite I, San Jose

2004, 171 pages. Association of Performing Arts Presenters, Washington, DC, 20063

As grantmakers, we have choices. Finding the right tool for the job and experimenting with tools to learn the range of their usefulness is what grantmakers do.