Carmen Graciela Díaz's Blog

NYC Health + Hospitals’ Arts in Medicine program announced recently the selection of nine artists that will lead the community-based mural projects at eight hospitals across New York City. Patients, staff, and local community residents will join forces with these artists to create an integrated internal or external mural at these facilities.

Discussing a recent piece published by The Chronicle of Philanthropy, in which 25 leaders share how "the nonprofit sector is not immune to the ills of racism," Mark Levine writes that each of those interviewed has reached a position of power and influence but still faces "the challenge of being seen as alien or different."

Colorado Media Project (CMP) seeks to meet the information needs of Coloradans by working to strengthen Colorado’s diverse local news ecosystem, as the project's website explains. CMP is a grant-funded organization orchestrated by the University of Denver and the Gates Family Foundation, a local Colorado foundation, among others, including Bonfils-Stanton Foundation, as Nieman Lab reports.

Eddie Torres, Grantmakers in the Arts (GIA) President & CEO, wrote recently on the role of arts and culture in health, aligning with the 2019 Grantmakers in Health (GIH) annual conference on June 12-14, at which GIA presented the work of the Center for Arts in Medicine at University of Florida, The Kresge Foundation, and artist collective Harriet’s Apothecary.

After funding loss, the Alaska State Council on the Arts closed its doors Monday July 15, "making Alaska the only state without an arts council," as The Associated Press reported.

Thousands participate each year in Minneapolis' Art-a-Whirl, the largest artist open studio tour in the country, according to a recent article in Next City. But a recent survey-based study on the gentrification of Northeast Minneapolis found, among other things, that “the act of creative placemaking has driven Northeast Minneapolis’ unique form of gentrification in the Twin Cities,” with Art-a-Whirl as the sign of that change, as Next City reported.

Elizabeth Méndez Berry, Grantmakers in the Arts board member, and Chi-hui Yang make the case for the need for cultural critics of color and discuss the work of the Nathan Cummings Foundation and Ford Foundation's initiative, Critical Minded, amplifying the work of cultural critics of color, in a recent piece published in The New York Times.

At a time when reparations are subject of debate, the organizers of an Afrofuturist music festival in Detroit neighborhood that will take place in August charged white people twice as much to attend. A backlash followed, as media outlets like The Washington Post reported.

"The Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017 (TCJA) has added new urgency to the question of what is the future of charitable giving by individuals in the United States," states a post by Randy I. Cohen, of Americans for the Arts, and Patrick Rooney, of Indiana University Lilly Family School of Philanthropy.

Drawings by migrant children, released recently by the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP), depict how the children interpret conditions inside Border Patrol detention facilities, as media outlets like Time and Hyperallergic reported.