2009 Grantmakers in the Arts Conference

It’s been a pleasure covering the 2009 Grantmakers in the Arts Conference for you all, and I hope you’ve enjoyed getting a glimpse into sessions you may have missed or the conference as a whole (if you didn’t have the … Continue reading →

Wednesday morning, a crush of arts funders, news media, and video crew crowded along with your friendly blogger host for the final GIA Conference event: a speech by Rocco Landesman, the recently appointed chairman of the National Endowment for the … Continue reading →

My final day at the Grantmakers in the Arts Conference began with a GREAT panel on “new models, new leaders, new ideas” for arts organizations and philanthropy, organized and moderated by Marc Vogl from the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation. … Continue reading →

Tuesday closed out with a panel featuring the Montana Arts Council‘s experience with a Wallace Foundation-led initiative to cultivate new audiences for the arts. With folksy aplomb, Cinda Holt took us into the heart of the Montana frontier and described … Continue reading →

Tuesday afternoon featured a session on advocacy for arts organizations and foundations, organized by Janet Brown of Grantmakers in the Arts and Bob Lynch of Americans for the Arts. Lynch could not attend as scheduled, but sent Chief Counsel of … Continue reading →

Following the conclusion of the Sewing Sails in a Perfect Storm panel, we headed to the ballroom for a lunchtime plenary session with Kakuna Kerina, former executive director of Harlem School of the Arts. Grantmakers in the Arts executive director … Continue reading →

Moderated by Bill Cleveland of the Center for the Study of Art and Community, this session focused on two foundations that have made sweeping changes to their program strategy in the past year. The Boston Foundation, represented by Ann McQueen, … Continue reading →

The third day of the Grantmakers in the Arts Conference opened with another set of breakfast roundtables. I attended “Not Asking Nonprofits to Do More with Less, Or the Uneasy Art of Communicating with Our Grantees During a Downturn,” facilitated … Continue reading →

On Monday, I attended an off-site session at chashama’s 126th Street artist studios, which provides workspace for 38 artists in a rapidly gentrifying area of Harlem. The subject of the meeting, appropriately, was the arts and economic development. Organized by … Continue reading →

The jam-packed days of the 2009 Grantmakers in the Arts Conference are now in full swing, and yesterday’s was especially full to the brim. Our morning started bright and early at 8:00 with a selection of “breakfast roundtables”: informal topical … Continue reading →