ARTPLACE Announces Four Grants to Alaska Non-Profits

By: May. 20, 2013
Enter Your Email to Unlock This Article

Plus, get the best of BroadwayWorld delivered to your inbox, and unlimited access to our editorial content across the globe.




Existing user? Just click login.

ArtPlace America announces today the award of over one million dollars in grants to four Alaska organizations (Anchorage Park Foundation, Bunnell Street Arts Center, Perseverance Theatre, and the Sealaska Heritage Institute) for a variety of Creative Placemaking projects. The projects were chosen from over 1,200 applications as exceptional examples of creative placemaking.

ArtPlace America is a collaboration of leading national and regional foundations, banks and federal agencies committed to accelerating creative placemaking - putting art at the heart of a portfolio of strategies designed to revitalize communities. This is ArtPlace America's third cycle of grant awards. With this round of grants, in total, ArtPlace America has awarded a total of $42.1 million in 134 grants to 124 projects in 79 communities across the U.S. (and a statewide project in the state of Connecticut).

ANCHORAGE PARK FOUNDATION: Maintaining their artistic focus on the subject of light and dark, themes of special interest to Northern dwellers, the Light Brigade, with the support of the Anchorage Park Foundation will plan, execute and document a series of site specific urban art interventions that will activate public spaces throughout the community followed by a pilot project to foster an upsurge in creative placemaking among Anchorage artists.

BUNNELL STREET ARTS INSTITUTE: ArtPlace America funds will support Old Town AIR, an Artist In Residence program for visiting artists from Alaska and the United States. The program galvanizes the community around Homer's Old Town neighborhood through the creation and presentation of new work that activates the Arts Center's space and surrounding outdoor sites.

Bunnell Street Arts Center's Old Town AIR has a unique focus: 'To inspire and create artistic events and diverse community involvement in our Old Town neighborhood'. Old Town AIR will achieve this mission by linking Old Town People's Garden, Bishop's Beach, and Islands and Ocean Visitor Center through signage, sculpture, murals, trails, ephemeral events and performances. Bunnell's stage for Old Town AIR is the Old Town neighborhood, including Bunnell's 1000-square-foot studio and performance space, along with Bishop's Beach and adjacent trails to the Alaska Maritime National Wildlife Refuge's Islands and Ocean Visitor Center.

PERSEVERANCE THEATRE: Perseverance Theatre will present the Rainforest Festival, a six-week, three-play theatre festival in Juneau. The productions will take place at locations around the city including its facility in Douglas, the University of Alaska Southeast, the Juneau Arts and Culture Center, and other venues downtown. Along with the three full productions, Perseverance will utilize the theatre artists to provide professional training opportunities, to engage in new play development work, and to present public readings of works in progress.

SEALASKA HERITAGE INSTITUTE: The $475,000 award from ArtPlace will help fund construction of the Walter Soboleff Center and monumental art for the 29,000 square foot building in Juneau. The twenty-million dollar center will stand in downtown Juneau, adjacent to the historic district, and one block from the waterfront. Most of the funds will go toward construction of the facility-SHI still must raise an additional $4 million to build it. A portion of the grant will be used to hire three master-apprentice teams to create monumental pieces, including a clan house screen and house posts for a ceremonial space inside the facility. Through its design and programming the Center will establish Juneau as the primary destination for authentic Alaskan Native art experiences.

"ArtPlace America recognizes the central role arts and cultural activities can have in the revitalization of American cities." Said Rip Rapson, chair of ArtPlace America's Presidents' Council. "With this grant award ArtPlace America is directing individual project support to scores of creative, high-impact projects throughout the country."

"ArtPlace America is also continuing to break new ground in drawing together some of the nation's leading foundations to think -- in a concerted way -- about how these kind of projects can become more widespread." Continued Rapson.

The 54 organizations that received grants were selected from over 1200 applications. Inquiries came from all 50 states as well as the District of Columbia. Grant amounts range from $750,000 to $33,000 with an average grant size of just over $280,000.

The complete list of 2013/2014 ArtPlace America awards can be found at www.artplaceamerica.org



Comments

To post a comment, you must register and login.

 

Join Team BroadwayWorld

Are you an avid theatergoer? We're looking for people like you to share your thoughts and insights with our readers. Team BroadwayWorld members get access to shows to review, conduct interviews with artists, and the opportunity to meet and network with fellow theatre lovers and arts workers.

Interested? Learn more here.

Vote Sponsor


Videos