ARTSblog

Greg Coppa

For decades, science and math educators have been the beneficiaries of government largesse, which has often been supplemented by corporate philanthropy. As a high school science teacher for three decades, I have often benefited from this policy along with my students and I have never questioned why it was so.

Many of my post-graduate courses were funded in whole or part by grants from the National Science Foundation. A good number of the many summer programs that I have attended were federally financed by one agency or another. Texts, videotapes, and computer software which I used were developed with government, corporation, or coalition assistance. And I have been very fortunate to have received honors and grants which have been sponsored by federal agencies and an assortment of professional societies.

I cannot warrant that every penny used to fund the variety of things just mentioned was spent wisely by the numerous government agencies and grant recipients. But overall I would have to say that from my vantage point, the taxpayers and corporate sponsors got their money’s worth.

People were trained, energized, and assisted so that they could become better teachers of science or math. Resources or teaching methods were developed which were often better than those previously utilized, or if they turned out to be worse, at least it was known for the future that that was the case. Failure was acceptable and looked at as part of the price for future success. Read the rest of this entry »

Max Donner

Government budget deficits and budget limits of charitable foundations have made alternatives for financing arts projects more important.

Five programs in Los Angeles this February showed that many other approaches to funding the arts can work well—and help arts organizations boost participation at the same time. Each program has taken a different approach to raising funds from private sources, demonstrating that there are many different choices that match the needs of different communities.

The Princess Grace Foundation USA celebrated its 30th anniversary with a reception for past grant winners in Beverly Hills and a gala for patrons in Orange County.  Generous contributions from patrons of the arts and several corporate sponsors have raised much of the $8.5 million in grants that the organization has awarded to promising artists and arts administrators.

But a significant source of funding for these grants comes from licensing projects and exclusive commemorative “Princess Grace” limited editions. The licensing program is highly selective and this has furthered traditional fundraising by prestigious associations with licensors, including Estée Lauder Cosmetics and Mikimoto Pearls.

Seven private companies and two nonprofit film festival organizations joined the Italian Trade Commission and public cinematic arts academy to present a weeklong festival of Italian art, fashion and cinema called “Los Angeles Italia.” Read the rest of this entry »

The Fairmont Hotel's Venetian Room Circa 1950

The historic Fairmont Hotel has sat atop Nob Hill in San Francisco for over 100 years; built and rebuilt after surviving earthquakes, fires, and numerous redecorating efforts for nearly eleven decades.

Pristine marble floors, crystal chandeliers, and towering Corinthian columns trimmed in gold punctuate some fun historical facts: the Cirque Room was the first bar in the city to open after prohibition; the International Conference held there after World War II led to the drafting of the Charter for the United Nations; and the Venetian Room  supper club, which has featured artists from Marlene Dietrich to Vic Damone, was where Tony Bennett first sang “I Left My Heart in San Francisco.”

The Venetian Room seemed an unlikely place to host an early morning discussion that was all about the future. Nevertheless, the “Funding & Changing Business Models” session I facilitated at the recent Grantmakers in the Arts (GIA) conference ended up filled with energetic and motivated funders, including state and local arts agencies, small family foundations, as well as regional and national foundations. As the group swelled two deep around, a cry went out to “Change the Model!” and we started moving tables (mindful of all the crystal). It was clear this was a hot topic. Read the rest of this entry »

John R. Kilacky

Culturally specific arts have to evolve, too

Many culturally specific creative organizations founded in the 1970s were centered on an identity politic of its core artists. While essential in its time, this focus ultimately limited an organization’s potential as time, issues, and the political landscape changed. Artists, too, constrained themselves if art practices were myopically identity-based. So much aesthetic change happens from the fringe; history continually bears this out.

Therefore philanthropy should always be seeding the future along multiple frontiers. But after awhile, if an artist or artist organization does not get traction in its community, then perhaps aesthetic Darwinism should prevail.  Read the rest of this entry »

Emily Peck

At last fall’s Independent Sector Conference, more than 900 leaders from the foundation world, corporate philanthropy programs, and nonprofit organizations were moved by the arts…literally, as choreographer Liz Lerman had conference attendees out of their seats reenacting conference highlights through dance (Check out the video below!).

Inviting Ms. Lerman to bring her magic to the conference was just one of the ways that Americans with the Arts partnered with Independent Sector to infuse the event with the arts.

Americans for the Arts President & CEO Bob Lynch explained why Americans for the Arts was ensuring that the arts were woven throughout the conference in his presentation at the opening plenary session:  Read the rest of this entry »

Kathy Smith

The recent events in the Kansas state government were like “déjà vu all over again” for those of us in Topeka. In 2005, our city council decided that our local arts council would no longer receive funding from the general budget, or any budget for that matter.

In response, the Topeka Community Foundation moved ahead with plans to create a privately funded entity, ARTSConnect, which would be a part of the United Arts Fund network.

This was a welcome concept among those in the arts community – a stable, sustainable plan for general operating funds, plus an organization who would help to provide that umbrella for all organizations and individuals who are passionate about the arts and our community.  Read the rest of this entry »

Adam Huttler

[During last week’s Private Sector Blog Salon], fellow guest blogger Diane Ragsdale got me thinking after she posed the question: what would have happened if the nonprofit regional theatre movement had embraced (and had the opportunity to embrace) the L3C instead of the 501(c)(3) corporation?

This is an interesting and subtly radical thought experiment. Diane is effectively proposing that we rewind history and build what we now think of as the nonprofit arts sector as a socially-conscious for-profit arts sector instead. Has the horse left the barn or is it really possible to reinvent ourselves at such a fundamental level?

In truth, I’ve always believed that the alleged conflict between artistic purity and commercial success was largely overblown. If anything it’s a healthy tension, not an insurmountable chasm. Certainly there are arts organizations whose missions are to push aesthetic envelopes and operate at the leading edge of craft and artistry. They will always need philanthropic subsidy to survive, and so they should probably be 501(c)(3)s regardless. But these brave, unpopular pioneers are the exception, not the rule. Most of us operate in the vast middle ground between Broadway and The Wooster Group.  Read the rest of this entry »

Adam Huttler

The L3C (low-profit limited liability company) construct has been getting a ton of virtual ink lately. As a way of establishing my dubious credentials, I’ll note that I was among the first in our field to note the arrival of the L3C, and I’ve written and debated about it quite a bit since then. Fractured Atlas formed an L3C subsidiary for our insurance program back in 2008.

All of that is just to establish why I’m having trouble thinking of something new and inspiring to say about the L3C. I suppose it also explains why I’m interviewed on the subject frequently enough that I can confidently lump the questioners into two categories: (1) big thinkers – often grad students or consultants – who see tremendous potential in the L3C but have only a vague concept of its real legal and financial contours, and (2) jaded skeptics – often professors or attorneys – who know just enough about the L3C to have serious doubts about its applicability to the arts.  Read the rest of this entry »

Diane Ragsdale

In his book The Revolutionary Stage, Joseph Zeigler states that Arena Stage in Washington, DC, began as a for-profit corporation by selling shares totaling $15,000 (at seven percent interest) to 300 Washingtonians. As part of doing research related to my dissertation topic—the impact of economic forces on the American resident theater movement—I recently read a speech called “The Long Revolution” written in 1978 by Zelda Fichandler, founder of Arena Stage.

She writes that she founded the theater in 1950 as a regular profit corporation, in order to better maintain control of its artistic policy, and that the theater became a nonprofit seven years later “in order to become eligible for gifts and grants, especially from the Ford Foundation which entered the field that year.”

Ms. Fichandler elaborated on the transition to becoming a nonprofit, saying:

“[…] we made all of our expenses at the box office for roughly the first fifteen years of our existence. It was as late as the mid-sixties when we conceded that we couldn’t continue to do this, but had to become a deficit-producing organization.  Read the rest of this entry »