The Massachusetts Cultural Council has announced its 2011 grantees under the Adams Arts Program for the Creative Economy, and we are again one of the lucky grantees, but this time to scale up our Berkshire County matched savings program and make it available to artists elsewhere in the state in addition to the Berkshires.
Yikes, how are we going to pull this off?
As usual, with help from partners. MASS MoCA takes the lead organizing role (I’ve been joined by a couple of terrific part-time interns, Martina Caruso and Lauren Shea, to help with this effort) but much of the work to connect with artists in local communities will be done by such partners as ArtMorpheus, the Boston Redevelopment Authority’s Artist Space Initiative, the Cultural Organization of Lowell, New Bedford Economic Development Council, and our friends in the Berkshires at the Pittsfield Office of Cultural Development, MCLA’s Berkshire Cultural Resource Center and Berkshire Creative.
Other experienced partners have roles to play in training, artist selection and management of the matched savings accounts: ArtHome; the Arts & Business Council of Greater Boston; Massachusetts Small Business Development Center Network; and the Midas Collaborative.
Looks like I’ll be spending a lot more time on the phone and in the car in 2011, getting to know artists in the far-off reaches east of here.
If you’re a low- to moderate-income Massachusetts artist interested in applying this year, follow Assets for Artists on Facebook and Twitter to catch the announcement of our new application guidelines (to be published in the next few months) and to keep up with our other news.
