Philanthropic practice

Launched by the chef and restauranteur Rick Bayless, the Bayless Family Foundation selected three nonprofit Chicago theater companies with issues as the inaugural recipients of its Stepping Stone Grants. The $150,000 grant, as Nonprofit Quarterly reported, is intended to help the theaters overcome financial barriers to their growth and stability and help them achieve their artistic and administrative growth.

Grantmakers in the Arts is delighted to share this year’s “Foundation Grants to Arts and Culture, 2016.” In their analysis, Candid (formerly Foundation Center) has included both grants made by foundations directly supporting culture through arts portfolios and grants in support of culture through Grantmakers in the Arts is grateful to amplify the work of other grantmakers – in such fields as education, community and economic development, climate justice, and information and communications – who also see the value of arts and culture as part of their work. This arts funding at the intersection approach is one which GIA recognizes culture as essential to all social change within the larger social sector.

Women of color face systemic obstacles to their advancement over and above the barriers faced by white women and men of color, according to a new report by the Building Movement Project.

A recent piece in the Harvard Business Review states that as investors are eager to generate both business and social returns, one avenue has been impact investing or "directing capital to ventures that are expected to yield social and environmental benefits as well as profits."

Resonance: A Framework for Philanthropic Transformation is a guide that, according to the announcement, seeks to inspire institutions to redistribute wealth, democratize power, and shift economic control to communities.

"One thing that is really important to building community and creating systems change is developing space that builds agency and power,” says Sage Crump, program specialist for the National Performance Network (NPN)'s initiative Leveraging a Network of Equity (LANE) in an article that addresses advancing systems change, transformative justice, and shifting power to achieve a justice ecosystem.

Funders supporting legacy institutions that use the arts to address social challenges and promote access across historically underserved populations is the topic of an article last year addressing the partnership between the William R. Kenan, Jr. Charitable Trust and New York City organizations to explore how arts organizations can better serve diverse communities.

In data, "many untold stories and futures are nestled between rows, columns, formulas, and colors on a spreadsheet," writes in a recent post Adriana Gallego, chief operating officer of the National Association of Latino Arts and Cultures (NALAC). In this piece she says how patterns remind her of how impactful Latine communities are.

As we welcome 2019, ideas around a more just and fair philanthropic field are inevitable. Dana Kawaoka-Chen, executive director for Justice Funders, says "we need a just transition in philanthropy that redistributes wealth, democratizes power, and shifts economic control to communities. In other words, we must transform our relationship to capital and to our communities."

More foundations are choosing to operate within a limited lifespan. For The Atlantic Philanthropies, "the commitment in 2002 to close its doors by 2020 reflected founder Chuck Feeney’s Giving While Living approach to philanthropy and his desire for the foundation’s funds to achieve maximum impact within that time frame and beyond."