GIA Blog

Andrew Taylor is Director of the Bolz Center for Arts Administration, an MBA degree program and research center in the University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Business. An author, lecturer, and researcher on a broad range of arts management issues, Andrew … Continue reading →

(10-6-10) The NASAA awards program showcases best practices of state arts agencies and regional arts organizations, recognizes exemplary leadership, and demonstrates how government creatively, effectively and efficiently serves the public through the arts.

This year's recipients are recognized for their outstanding leadership and contributions to the field. All three awards will be presented October 15 at Assembly 2010 in Austin, Texas:

• Gary Young Award: Arlynn Fishbaugh
• Distinguished Public Service Award: Lu Ellsworth

(10-5-10) The Sundance Institute's new initiative Film Forward is a curated group of five American and five international independent films selected for screening at select U.S. venues and venues around the world, including American embassies.

(10-5-10) The National Science Foundation, a federal agency, make a substantial grant to the arts.

(9-29-10) "Reports of the nonprofit sector’s death have been greatly exaggerated. So, too, have assumptions about for-profits’ intrinsic efficiency (and amorality). Along with these has come a flurry of activity designed to make for-profits look more like nonprofits and vice versa."

Read more.

This weekend I had the great privilege to talk with current and past board members and staff of Artist Trust, an organization that supports individual artists in Washington. Led by Fidelma McGinn, this is one of several organizations in the country running stellar grantmaking and service programs for artists. In addition to a great group of people, they met in Snohomish, WA, a small town surrounded by mountains with a river running through it.

(9-28-10) Theater Communications Group (TCG) announced the third annual Free Night of Theater New York City, which will take place at nearly 100 participating Off-Broadway, Off Off Broadway and Independent Theaters in all five boroughs during the entire month of October 2010. Introduced by TCG as a three-city pilot-program in 2005 and to New York City in 2008, Free Night of Theater is now presented in more than 23 states.

(9-28-10) A large number of artists among this year's fellowship recipients. See the complete list.

(9-27-10) Earlier this month, the Center for Effective Philanthropy (CEP) invited Ron Ragin, associate program officer in the Performing Arts Program at GIA member William and Flora Hewlett Foundation, to contribute to the CEP blog. Ragin responded with four well executed and arts program specific entries on matters ranging from investing in grants-related data collection to providing general operating support to nonprofits. He also provides a candid and informative response to the CEP Grantee Reception Report commissioned by Hewlett in 2009.

(9-27-10) Calvin Hennick for The Boston Globe:

The Boston Foundation, the biggest public philanthropy in New England, and three other nonprofits today unveil a new fund to help local charities work together, or even merge, to better serve their communities.

Over the next five years, the $1.7 million Catalyst Fund for Nonprofits will offer grants meant to help charities form partnerships, combine functions like bookkeeping or community services, or merge into new groups.