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The GIA Library is an information hub that includes articles, research reports, and other materials covering a wide variety of topics relevant to the arts and arts funding. These resources are made available free to members and non-members of GIA. Users can search by keyword or browse by category for materials to use in research and self-directed learning. Current arts philanthropy news items are available separately in our news feed - News from the Field.

In the Face of Recession, What Are Arts Funders Doing?

As funders we have three main challenges: first, getting a handle on the extent and impact of the recession; second, exerting leadership — being bold, positive, and opportunistic without being insensitive; and third — and most important — asking ourselves the same tough questions that we are asking grantees: how do we slip the vice-like grip of old mindsets and behaviors and adapt so we increase our relevance, resilience, and meaningful contributions to our community?
  — Foundation President

The Impact of Technology on Copyright and Creativity

Remix: Making Art and Commerce Thrive in the Hybrid Economy
Penguin Press, 2008, 352 pages. ISBN-10: 1594201722

GIA Members Responses to Economic Downturn Survey

In late January GIA polled its 309 member organizations about their organization's responses to the economic downturn. 117 (38%) members responded, which provides a healthy sample of the membership.

Members reported their expected 2009 arts grantmaking would likely compare to 2008 as follows:

  • 41% expected that 2009 would be the same as 2008.
  • 13% expected that it would be reduced to 90% of 2008.
  • 12% expected that it would be reduced to 80% of 2008.
  • 11% expected that it would be reduced to 70% of 2008.

read:write

2008, 64 pages. Arts Council England, 14 Great Peter Street, London SW1P 3NQ, UK, 0845-300-6590, www.artscouncil.org.uk

http://www.artscouncil.org.uk/documents/publications/
phpvMEmeh.pdf

Clay Shirky: Here Comes Everybody

2008, 327 pages.

The more things change, the more they remain the same.
— Jean Baptiste Alphonse Karr, 1849 French critic and writer

FCC Decision Reinforces the Principle of an Open Internet

The Federal Communications Commission formally voted Friday (August 1, 2008) to uphold the complaint against Comcast, the nation's largest cable company, saying that it had illegally inhibited users of its high-speed Internet service from using popular file-sharing software. The decision, which imposes no fine, requires Comcast to end such blocking this year.

—Saul Hansell, The New York Times, August 2, 2008

What was at stake

Funding Mid-Sized Organizations

How can funders apply what they know about changes in the external environment—in demographics, use of free time, use of disposable income—to best serve and stabilize theaters and other mid-sized arts groups?

Sue Coliton, Paul G. Allen Family Foundation (moderator); Nancy Fushan, Bush Foundation; Lawrence Thoo, San Jose Office of Cultural Affairs; Ben Cameron, Doris Duke Charitable Foundation (interlocutors).

We Are (Not Really) the World

We live in a world of "widespread hostility toward the United States and its policies."1 This antipathy is not limited to the countries and peoples that are directly affected by the U.S. "war on terror" and its attendant pol-icies, but includes many of our former allies and fellow democracies. A friend who just returned from a year in Spain reports that she spent a significant amount of time and energy convincing people she met there that the U.S.

Web Sights

Early in 2004, the Graduate Center of the City of New York convened ten small to mid-sized arts organizations to talk about what had happened to them in an experimental, internet-based project funded by the Ford Foundation. The ten, from across the country, are community-based cultural organizations; they share a commitment to emerging and experimental artists and art forms, and a commitment—equally firm—to their local or nearby communities. Despite their similarities of mission, the ten were not familiar with each other's work.

Blogging Toward Philanthropy

Following up on Stan Hutton's introduction to arts blogs in the last Reader, in this issue we're looking at the beginnings of the philanthropic blogosphere. As with many blogs covering a specific field, philanthropic blogs tend to offer either personal journals of opinion and ideas or periodic news round-ups, brief abstracts of articles or publications and links to the original. Some, of course, provide both.