Professional Development Program Presents its 200th Workshop in an Inspiring Cross-Country Weekend

Posted on April 18, 2012 by Alyson Pou

In Columbus, OH, Steve Lambert, an Artist Leader for the Internet for Artists workshop, explains the importance of using Content Management Systems.

This past weekend marked our Professional Development Program’s 200^th workshop! Since the program launched in 2003, we’ve presented PDP workshops with 87 community partners in 71 cities, and nearly 4,500 artists across the country have attended. PDP has been incredibly busy lately, with workshops in Puerto Rico, Ohio and North Dakota in the last weekend alone!

Creative Capital worked with Beta-Local to present our Spanish-language workshop, Taller Profesional de Desarollo para Artistas, for the second time in San Juan, Puerto Rico. Continue reading →

The MAP Fund Awards Over $1.2 Million to Groundbreaking Performance Projects

Posted on April 3, 2012 by Moira Brennan

2012 MAP Fund grantees The Body Cartography Project

The Multi-Arts Production (MAP) Fund, administered by Creative Capital, supports artists, ensembles, producers and presenters whose contemporary performance work embodies a spirit of exploration and deep inquiry. I’m so proud to say that today the MAP Fund announced—for the 24^th consecutive year!—a roster of grantee projects that will make anyone interested in contemporary performance swoon. Thanks to the generous financial (not to mention moral) support of our funders, the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation and the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, MAP is supporting 41 projects this year, with $1,200,000 in cash grants. This is the highest amount MAP has ever had the privilege of distributing, with the average grant at $30,000 (up from $25,000), and typically accounting for 30 percent of a project’s budget.

Before a single artist even sets foot on a stage, there’s so much to applaud in these works. Reading through the project descriptions one can’t help but be inspired by the courage and tenacity of contemporary performance makers all across the country. Issues that can seem paralyzing when encountered in a headline are here approached with a subtlety and humanity that leave little room for despair. I think of Susan Narucki’s San Diego-based project, Cuatro Corridos, which is using music and poetry to look at human trafficking across the U.S.–Mexican border. Or Kamala Sankaram and Susan Yankowitz’s new work, The Thumbprint of Mukhtar Mai, which will make an opera of the story of the first woman in Pakistan to bring her rapists to justice through trial. Continue reading →

Stuart Horodner on “The Art Life”

Posted on March 26, 2012 by Editor

We know (and like) Stuart Horodner because he’s been a member of our Visual Arts grant selection team more than once; has attended several of our Artist Retreats; and has worked with a number of our grantee artists over the years. We’d like to believe that his newly released book, The Art Life: On Creativity and Career, was inspired, at least in part, by his watching how Creative Capital works with artists, providing funding and professional development to help them establish and sustain their art practices over the long term. But like him, we’ve realized that money and services won’t help artists who aren’t seriously committed to their practices, who don’t have that indefinable “spark” that makes them artists, that makes them the real thing. That spark is what Stuart is trying to zero in on. We asked him how he came to write this book:

For several years now, I have had the sense that the focus on “professional practices” as taught in art schools and university art departments is only one side of the story. I must admit to having taught classes on this topic and lectured across North America, addressing how artists should approach galleries, what art magazines are good for, the best ways to visit an art fair, and other strategic matters. As an ex-dealer, gallery owner and art fair organizer, I have a lot invested in clarifying misconceptions and trying to keep artists from being disappointed for the wrong reasons, as well as providing insights about positive turns in their careers. The fact is that thousands of talented individuals get out of art programs every year, hungry for success and often saddled with debt. It’s not surprising that they have the marketplace on their minds and want to know any “words of wisdom” that will get them ahead. Continue reading →

PDP in New Orleans: “A Whole New Perspective on Working as a Professional Artist”

Posted on March 20, 2012 by Krista Fabian DeCastro

Creative Capital’s Professional Development Program (PDP) has worked with more than 50 communities across the country to present workshops that help artists to build sustainable practices. Earlier this month, PDP travelled to New Orleans to present a Core Weekend workshop, our hallmark professional development offering that tackles strategic planning, funding your work and promoting your work. This workshop, supported by the Kresge Foundation, was hosted by the Creative Alliance of New Orleans at the Joan Mitchell Center, and the PDP workshop leaders were Colleen Keegan, Jackie Battenfield, Aaron Landsman, and three Creative Capital grantees: Beverly McIver, Andrew Simonet and Byron Au Yong.

The diverse group of 24 workshop participants, mostly from New Orleans, included 13 visual artists, seven performing artists, two filmmakers, a poet and a fashion designer. By all accounts, this was a truly remarkable group of artists and PDP workshop leaders, making for an exceptional experience. Continue reading →

Creative Capital On the Road: Los Angeles, February 2012

Posted on March 8, 2012 by Editor

Creative Capital welcomed our new 2012 class of grantees with a celebration at LA><ART in Los Angeles on February 24. Left to right: Jill Hartz, Lyda Kuth (CC board), Sean Elwood (CC Director of Programs & Initiatives), Mike Plante (2012 grant panelist) and Richard Herskowitz.

Ruby Lerner (CC President & Executive Director) greeted the group and introduced our 2012 grantees in Film/Video and Visual Arts. Continue reading →

Creative Capital Workshops at the Santa Fe Art Institute

Posted on February 2, 2012 by Michelle Laflamme-Childs

PDP Artist Leader Dread Scott (2001 Visual Arts grantee) leading the Internet for Artists workshop at Santa Fe Art Institute

On January 20-23, the Santa Fe Art Institute, with support from the Kresge Foundation, brought Creative Capital’s Professional Development Program (PDP) to Santa Fe for two workshops: the Internet for Artists (IFA) weekend workshop and a one-day Verbal Communications (VC) workshop.

The artists who participated in the workshops were selected from a pool of applications by a committee of local artists, curators, writers and educators. The result was a group of artists at varying stages of their careers driven by the common goals of connecting to other artists and building up the foundations of their art practices with professional development training.

The weekend opened with the Internet for Artists Friday night introductions. In PDP’s Core Weekend workshops, each artist has five minutes to show slides and talk about his/her own work to the group. The Internet for Artists workshop puts its own spin on this by assigning each artist another participant to research on the Internet prior to the session, and then giving each artist two-and-a-half minutes to present the artist they researched. It’s a fast way to make it very clear that the management of your web presence must be a high priority in your professional practice and was a great way to bring the group together as a community of practicing artists. Continue reading →

Introducing the Doris Duke Performing Artist Initiative at APAP NYC

Posted on January 10, 2012 by Rachel Ford

The APAP|NYC Conference. Photo by Jacob Belcher/APAP.

Every January, APAP|NYC offers an opportunity for over 4,000 arts professionals, performing arts professionals, artists, managers and service/support organizations to gather to plan their seasons and build their tours. Organized by the Association of Performing Arts Presenters, this conference also features hundreds of artist showcases. You can sample an incredible range of work, from puppetry to a Chinese jaw harpist—in just one weekend.

This year, I came to APAP|NYC not as a producer with a roster of artists to promote—but as an arts supporter, leading a special interest session for conference attendees on the new Doris Duke Performing Arts Initiative, and more specifically, the Doris Duke Performing Artist Awards, which is administered in partnership with Creative Capital. Continue reading →

Tampa Tales: Performing Artists at NPN’s Annual Meeting

Posted on December 12, 2011 by Kemi Ilesanmi

Kristina Wong (2006 Performing Arts) presented her new play Cat Lady at the NPN Conference in Tampa.

Despite living in Tallahassee over two decades ago, I only recently learned that Tampa is considered Gulf Coast Florida not Central Florida! On my first visit to the city, I spent three days at the National Performance Network’s inspiring, informative and fun Annual Meeting.

Since Creative Capital is headed into a Performing Arts grant year, NPN’s gathering easily shot to the top of our annual conference attendance list this year and I served as the official Creative Capital representative. NPN is a national organization supporting artists in the creation and touring of contemporary performing and visual arts, and its annual meeting brings together over 300 performing artists, presenters and funders to discuss pressing issues in the field. One “idea forum” I attended outlined lessons learned by the Joan Mitchell Foundation’s important initiative on the issue of legacy planning among artists, while another looked at the challenges of supporting performing arts residencies. Continue reading →

Creative Capital as Arts Incubator: Lessons for the Field

Posted on December 1, 2011 by Editor

Ebony McKinney, Founding Director of Emerging Arts Professionals/SFBA, wrote a guest post for the Americans for the Arts blog called “Arts Incubators: Creating a Roadmap for Resilience.” We were thrilled to see that the article cited Creative Capital as a model for how arts incubators can play an important role in not only supporting innovation and risk taking, but also by cultivating our most important assets—social and human capital. Here is an excerpt from the post:

In New York, Creative Capital grew out of the demise of individual grants from the National Endowments for the Arts. The Andy Warhol Foundation and a few others thought a response to support individual artists and risk taking should be developed. It was the middle of the dot.com boom and venture capitalism was growing in popularity.

Ruby Lerner, director of Creative Capital, was charged with creating a “21st century arts organization,” drawing inspiration from venture capitalists and mutual aid models, and thinking through the possibility of bringing together grantmaking and artist services, while incorporating an entrepreneurial spirit.

The staff at Creative Capital wanted to move artists out of the “starving artist mindset” and treat them as vital parts of the community by exposing avenues to a sustainable career, which would allow for more meaning and dignity. Over 400 artists have become part of the program since it began in 1999. Continue reading →

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