ARTSblog

Name: Bill Cleveland

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Web Site: http://www.artandcommunity.com/

Bio: Bill Cleveland’s early passions were writing music and “changing the world.” After studying psychology at the University of Maryland all three came together in a place called Buckhorn Centre. Established in the early 70’s, Buckhorn was a Canadian version of California’s Esalen Institute. Bill’s art and community tutelage continued in 1977, when he was hired to run a program funded through the US Department of Labor’s Comprehensive Employment and Training Act, (CETA) at Sacramento’s Metropolitan Arts Commission. Through CETA, unemployed artists were hired to make art in hospitals, prisons, public housing, senior centers and the like. Ironically, by the end of 1979, CETA had become the largest Federal arts program in US history. In 1981, Bill joined another unlikely cultural partnership at the California Department of Corrections. In partnership with the William James Association and UCLA Artsreach, Bill helped make the Arts-In-Corrections Program the largest arts residency program in the country with a faculty of hundreds of artists and 20,000 participants. In 1989, after serving 18 months as an Assistant Director at Corrections, Bill turned his attention to running a new California state agency called the California State Summer School for the Arts. Bill’s continuing interest in what he calls “arts-based community development” led to the creation of the Center for the Study of Art and Community in 1991. Since the mid-90s, Bill has also been studying and writing about community arts efforts in Africa, South America, Asia, and Europe.