Guest post by Margy Waller,
Cincinnati Fine Arts Fund

Many of us have spent years searching for the strongest possible message and the best case on which to build support for the arts. Yet, the messages we have used to create dialogue in communities across the country have not yielded the broad sense of shared responsibility for the arts that we seek.

In late 2008, leaders of the Fine Arts Fund, with financial support from The Greater Cincinnati Foundation and the Carol Ann and Ralph V. Haile, Jr./U.S. Bank Foundation, embarked on a research initiative designed to develop a communications strategy for an inclusive community dialogue leading to broadly shared public responsibility for arts and culture. The result of that work, The Arts Ripple Effect Report, was released early in 2009.

Perceptions shape behavior toward the arts

After a year of investigation and hundreds of interviews with residents of the area and surrounding states, this research—conducted with the Topos Partnership, a national communications research organization—finds that public responsibility for the arts is undermined by deeply entrenched perceptions. Members of the public typically have positive feelings toward the arts, some quite strong, but how they think about the arts is shaped by a number of common default patterns that obscure a sense of shared responsibility in this area.

For example, it is natural and common for people who are not insiders to think of the arts in terms of entertainment. Problematically, entertainment is a matter of personal taste, not public responsibility, and is viewed as an extra—not as a necessity. People make several assumptions that work against the objective of positioning the arts as a public good.

• The arts are a private matter: Arts are about individual tastes, experiences and enrichment, and individual expression by artists.
• The arts are a good to be purchased: Therefore, most assume that the arts should succeed or fail, as any product does in the marketplace, based on what people want to purchase.
• People expect to be passive, not active: People expect to have a mostly passive, consumer relationship with the arts. The arts will be offered to them, and therefore do not need to be created or supported by them.
• The arts are a low priority: Even when people value art, it is rarely high on their list of priorities.

These points represent the “default thinking” of people in the community, and indicate that the existing landscape of public understanding is not conducive to a sense of broadly shared responsibility for the arts.

A new message to inspire public support

Of the many communications approaches explored in our testing, one stood out as having the most potential to shift thinking and conversations in a constructive direction. This approach emphasizes one key organizing idea:

A thriving arts sector creates “ripple effects” of benefits throughout our community.

This message is at the heart of a communications strategy that helps position arts and culture as a public good, and helps people see this topic in a new way. In delivering this message, we have learned that the following two ripple effects are especially helpful and compelling to enumerate:

• A vibrant, thriving economy: Neighborhoods are more lively, communities are revitalized, tourists and residents are attracted to the area, etc. Note that this goes well beyond the usual dollars-and-cents argument and emphasizes creating an environment where people want to live, work, play, and stay.
• A more connected population: Diverse groups share common experiences, hear new perspectives, and understand each other better through the arts.

By conveying this message and describing key ripple effects, we are bringing new language with the power to create a broader sense of collective responsibility for the arts. This organizing concept for our message is simple and vivid, and helps people learn and remember our main idea.

This strategy emerged from significant testing conducted with a range of messages that are often associated with building public support for arts—including messages that emphasize civic inspiration, or focus on strengthening our identity as a great city, or highlight the positive connection between arts and youth.

It is fair to assume that at least some of the default patterns of thinking, as well as responses to messages we tested, reflect patterns that would be repeated elsewhere. We believe this research initiative provides a head start for those planning to embark on similar efforts in other parts of the country and at the national level.

Read the report and reviews.

Margy Waller is Vice President of Arts & Culture Partnership for the Fine Arts Fund, based in Cincinnati, Ohio. For more information and to discuss replication of this research, please contact her at mwaller@fineartsfund.org.

Is there anything special arts funders can do to help nonprofits and artists deal with the continued effects of a down economy? Something beyond continued funding opportunities, capacity building, and technical support?

That’s the question The San Francisco Foundation (a participant in Irvine’s Communities Advancing the Arts) and a group of Bay Area arts funders took on halfway through 2009. And the result was a welcome relief from hard times for 700 artists and arts leaders who attended the Dynamic Adaptability conference last week at the historic Herbst Theatre.

An untypical gathering

This conference brought together creative thinkers from arts, neuroscience, business, media and philanthropy for a day of conversations. The idea was not to highlight a single strategy, emphasize a certain type of skill, or support a specific new set of relationships. To the contrary, this was a day to do something different—to be stimulated and inspired, and to turn the tide from one of cautious hope to one of genuine optimism for continued vibrancy in the Bay Area’s diverse arts ecology.

The day was keynoted by Jonah Lehrer, neuroscientist and author of How We Decide and Proust was a Neuroscientist. His rich ability to make insightful connections between art and science was catnip for the group. In the context of deep understanding of the human brain and its dual needs for focus and relaxation, he makes the persuasive point that, “Art is truth. Art teaches us something special about the mind.” In particular, he makes the case that, “Arts are deeply practical in helping us think about thinking.” In this way, arts can play a role in helping people learn new ways of thinking—including creative thinking. It’s a powerful argument.

Informative material, informal exchanges

The conference featured doses of data, including new research from Leveraging Investments in Creativity (LINC) indicating that Bay Area artists are, when compared to their peers nationally:

• More affected financially by the recession (more declines in grant amounts, fewer sales of work, and greater declines in non-arts income)
• More likely to have second jobs in the arts (seven of ten artists nationally hold at least one job in addition to making art)
• More likely to engage in volunteer activities (in and outside of the arts) More likely to say that artists have a special role in strengthening their communities at this time
• More likely to believe that future success will require a new outlook and approach after the economy stabilizes
• More highly educated, less white and African-American, and more Asian and Latino

Brief presentations led to conversations among panels of practitioners and thought leaders on topics such as:

• How has the way that artists engage audiences and markets been affected by the recession? How can we help artists strengthen their connections with their audiences, communities and support systems?
• What inspires people to want to be involved in something beyond themselves, including arts and culture? How can artists and cultural organizations form deeper and more authentic connections with their audiences, donors and communities?
• What are the implications of the demographic and technological changes we are experiencing for arts and cultural organizations? How can we adapt effectively to the evolving environment?

Memorable lessons

The day was a juicy mix of reality check, intellectual calisthenics, and new tools and techniques. A few more highlights:

• Margaret Jenkins, who leads the dance company bearing her name, has navigated through many recessions in 35 years of choreographing community-based dance programs. Her advice spans dance and business: “The only way to keep your balance is to move forward.”
• Perry Chen, CEO of Kickstarter, an online funding platform for artists and other inventors, makes it clear that artists need to make a pointed ask. When artists ask “can you help me?” they will get some response. When they ask “can you help me do X?” they will get a better response. And when they ask “can you help me do X, for which you will get Y?” they get the best response. Donors want to invest in a particular project and outcome, and many really appreciate gaining something (even simple recognition or a pin or a free ticket) in return.
• Philip Huang, founder of Dana Street Theater, and a grantee of the East Bay Community Foundation Fund for Artists, put Perry Chen’s principles to work in a highly animated fashion, making an unexpected bid for arts funding from conference attendees. His new project is street theatre pantomime to be performed in the middle of the night, in view of people working out on the other side of the window in 24-hour exercise facilities. It’s titled Witness to Fitness. Philip’s spontaneous pitch raised nearly $200 of his $300 project funding goal. The trick behind his animated description of the project, his up-front response to questions from the crowd (Q: “Why are you doing this piece.” A: “Art doesn’t need to have a reason.”) and his unabashed request to be “showered with money” is simple. “Thrill yourself,” says Philip, “and the money will come.”

A recurring theme, brought home by several speakers, is the need to always have “faith in our stories.” Artists and arts organization leaders need to keep their stories relevant to donor interests, even if it is a small set of donors who have real interest in the art experience offered, and to make it easy for these donors to become part of the stories. As Perry Chen commented on the colorful and engaging pitch made by Philip Huang, many of those in the audience “will tell this story tonight,” and those who contributed to his art will feel they have “a special place in it.”

Visit the conference website for more information.

The San Francisco Foundation and East Bay Community Foundation are part of Communities Advancing the Arts, a major funding initiative of The James Irvine Foundation.

Five ways CAA-funded community foundations grew arts funds in the worst year since the Depression

Most nonprofit fundraisers are glad to see the calendar turn to 2010—personal donations in 2009 declined while social needs skyrocketed. During this tumultuous time, the arts giving landscape might have been bleak, but it was far from barren.

Lessons in success

Here are five lessons in success, based on wins in 2009, that point the way to more giving in the new year.

1.  Donors value leadership—and collaboration—in the arts.

Community Foundation Sonoma County connected five arts nonprofits with new and prospective donors through An Evening of Song & Poetry. This approach featured unprecedented local cooperation: each arts organization in effect introduced its largest donors to other nonprofits celebrated at an intimate evening event. The community foundation provided plenty of incentive for everyone—offering $50,000 as a match for any event attendees who chose to contribute funds to one or more of the arts organizations feted. Donors responded enthusiastically. Nearly 60 people contributed $90,000 through this appeal, representing nearly two dollars for every one pledged by the community foundation, and generating $140,000 in immediate support for these five organizations. Read more about this remarkable fundraising event.

2.  Artists have networks of new donors at the grassroots level.

An innovative matching commissions program, started by East Bay Community Foundation and picked up by The San Francisco Foundation as well as the Marin Arts Council, continues to gain steam. The program, more fully described here, provides matching grants—typically $5,000 or $10,000—to artists. To date, the artists who received matching grants have, in turn, generated contributions from 2,588 donors. This donor giving has provided $615,000 in new support for 182 artist-run organizations and artist-driven projects in the five-county Bay Area.

3.  Many donors know that now is the time to stand for arts, and to stand with their community foundation.

The East Bay Fund for Artists, which supplies the matching grants for the commissions program above, received a total of $75,000 from four donor advised funds in 2009. Diane Sanchez, Director of Grantmaking and Donor Services, is thrilled: “I feel very good about this because in a difficult year these donor advisors could have let this community foundation program slip off their list.” Only one of the donors sustains a dedicated focus on giving in the arts; the others had many appeals to consider for use of their funds. Plus, all these donors were working with lower fund balances than normal due to the loss of investment assets. “Their commitment in these tough times is a validation of our work,” adds Diane.

4.  Giving circles invite a welcome degree of donor engagement.

Sacramento Region Community Foundation knows that many arts donors appreciate connections. This notion has special meaning in a down economy, as pooling funds helps donors do more with their individual gifts. Plus, donor circles bring a social aspect to giving, helping individual givers learn from each other and share pride in the stories created through their collective support. There’s additional appeal when these groups of donors receive special access to arts experiences and face time with artists. All this adds up to success with the recent launch of donor circles in Sacramento. One circle is forming now with a lead giver at the $25,000 level, and other donors entering with a minimum contribution of $5,000.

5.  Long-term thinking still matters—so don’t give up on endowment building!

Orange County Community Foundation received a $250,000 contribution to its Arts Endowment Fund in late 2009. It’s the largest gift to the fund to date. Listen to Keith Swayne speaking about this decision by he and his wife: “Judy and I are delighted to make this gift, not only as a reflection of our belief in the importance of the arts to a thriving community, but as a challenge to other local philanthropists to do their part in strengthening the arts and cultural sector in Orange County.”
The Swayne’s action is creating buzz. Says Todd Hanson, Vice President of Donor Relations and Programs, “This gift gives confidence to other potential donors. It helps them see how they can help the fund grow quickly and become a cornerstone of stability in our arts sector.” Read more about this community foundation’s commitment to the arts.

Toward the new year

These five success stories remind us that the case for arts remains strong in spite of (perhaps even because of!) a poor economy. As always, the task is to connect to donor motivations, offer the giving options people want, and be confident in making the ask.

A year-end bonus: One of our most popular posts of 2009 is a feature on deepening relationships and understanding motivations by conducting personal interviews with arts donors. Materials and questions created by Alan Brown, an innovator in this field, are available here.

All activities reported here were conducted as part of Communities Advancing the Arts, a major funding initiative of The James Irvine Foundation.

Talk about a multiplier effect: Here’s how two community foundations leveraged private foundation dollars to seed a four-city partnership for the arts. It’s an equation worth knowing in regions where acting together is the better path for growing a vibrant, sustainable arts landscape.The action takes place in the East Bay, where the cities of Berkeley, Emeryville, Oakland and Richmond have distinct art scenes. According to mayors Tom Bates, Richard Kassis, Ron Dellums and Gayle McLaughlin, “The East Bay is a region of widely diverse cultural backgrounds. Our arts and culture reflect the region’s demographics.”

By the numbers

The East Bay contains:

• More than 6,000 professional artists
• One of the nation’s largest per capita collections of public art
• A depth and variety of art styles that mirror the diversity of the region—more than 150 languages are spoken in the area; many times that number of culturally specific art forms are practiced
• Hundreds of non-profit visual arts, music, dance, theater, multi-disciplinary and arts education organizations—from established international institutions to start-up neighborhood programs

From culturally specific traditional art forms to edgy and experimental expressions, this geography yields an astonishing array of art. The new four-city collaboration is well founded in promoting “world culture in the east bay.”

Out front and online

The East Bay Cultural Corridor is being marketed as 510Arts. (510 is the telephone area code for the region.) The partner cities worked together to build 510Arts.com as a gateway to arts in Berkeley, Emeryville, Oakland and Richmond. The website establishes a unified identity for all East Bay arts, and provides easy pathways to information about each city’s arts sector and happenings.

Organizations and artists submit information to their respective city arts agency to get placed online. The website is off to a hot start, with artists and arts leaders throughout the East Bay wanting to make sure they are a recognized part of 510Arts.

The website and overall 510Arts brand—including posters and materials that arts organizations can incorporate in their local marketing—were publicly launched through a media event featuring the mayors of all four cities, as well as the funders who made this collaboration possible.

The back story

Arts campaigns are not always easy to make happen. The same can be said for municipal collaborations, public/private partnerships, and foundation/government alliances. Yet all these elements are in the East Bay Cultural Corridor equation.

And the catalysts are two community foundations. East Bay Community Foundation and The San Francisco Foundation are collegial program champions for Bay Area arts. With funding support from The William and Flora Hewlett Foundation, Leveraging Investments in Creativity (LINC), and The James Irvine Foundation, and drawing on credibility developed through years of good work with local governments, these community foundations convened arts leaders from the four cities and facilitated a joint planning process.

“We believe collaborations and partnerships are not merely desirable, but are necessary in a world where limited resources must be leveraged for maximum impact,” reported Nicole Taylor, President and Chief Executive Officer of the East Bay Community Foundation. “Through this collaboration, we intend to throw a spotlight on the amazing richness of arts resources in these four East Bay cities.”

The process called for equal parts patience and persistence. All players needed to determine their level of comfort with, and assess their level of responsibility in, a collaborative effort. And each needed to in turn work through its own internal processes—which included gaining inputs and support from city administrators, elected officials, and community arts groups and leaders.

Steadily, the process gained momentum. A critical step was defining and having each mayor literally sign off on a formal set of operating principles for the collaboration.

A public declaration for the arts

It’s a terrific example for use in any potential arts collaborative—and for municipal arts partnerships in particular. 

It begins with a preamble, including making a direct connect between local arts and economic progress. Some excerpts…

We, the Mayors of the cities of Berkeley, Emeryville, Oakland and Richmond have come together to state our strong commitment to strengthening the regional economy through creating the East Bay Cultural Corridor.

The intention is to heighten awareness of our cultural landscape, deepen the impact of the arts on their cities, and further the sustainability of artists and arts organizations through arts marketing, economic development and cultural tourism.

The arts drive economies. Creating sustainable arts communities is good business.

From individual artists working and teaching in communities to nationally recognized theatres and museums, the East Bay provides arts experiences that make the area a regional cultural treasure. Its arts presence has contributed to urban development, has a positive impact on local businesses, and has the potential for creating more viable and sustainable communities.

The document goes on to express a purpose for the corridor; two excerpts stand out:

The arts culture in each partner city has different components, different strengths, and different ways in which it interacts with the larger community. This collaboration between these cities was created in recognition of this, and the knowledge that working together creates opportunity for a cultural presence with wider impact than each city could have individually.

We see this partnership as the beginning of a wider regional collaboration between government, arts and culture, and business in the years to come.

Next come five objectives that codify the win/win nature of this collaboration (each is further described in the full document):

1. Create a Relationship Between the Diverse Arts Communities of Each City
2. Leverage New Audiences and Resources for the Arts
3. Increase the Visibility, Accessibility and Sustainability of Arts Communities
4. Leverage New Resources for Each Partner City
5. Benefit Local Businesses Through Partnerships with the Arts, Regionally and Locally

Finally, a set of “principles of partnership” explicitly set out the expectations for each city—ranging from agreement that each has equal representation in the process to acknowledging that each has responsibility for completing its assigned activities in a joint work plan to launch and sustain the collaboration. See the full document here.

A happy beginning

Three of the mayors, as well as executive leaders for the foundations that sponsored this partnership, were center stage in a media event introducing the East Bay Cultural Corridor and 510Arts.com.

The good feeling among players, and high hopes for long-term success, were evident. “The San Francisco Foundation is honored to join forces with the East Bay Community Foundation, our sister funders, and the cities of Berkeley, Oakland, Emeryville and Richmond, to lift up the importance of arts and culture in the Bay Area,” commented CEO Sandra R. Hernández. “We look forward to the diverse fruits of this creative partnership.”

Media coverage was positive, leading people to 510.arts.com and emphasizing the cities’ shared goal of increasing the visibility, accessibility and sustainability of their arts communities.

Plus, the commitment—and structure—for the long term is in place. The four-city leadership group convened by the community foundations is now meeting on a monthly basis, and developing a regional advisory group made up of artists and nonprofit arts leaders, to steer the effort into the future.

Most meetings take place at the East Bay Community Foundation—a welcoming and productive place for multiplying the impact of individual actions.

East Bay Community Foundation and The San Francisco Foundation are participants in Communities Advancing the Arts, a major funding initiative of The James Irvine Foundation.

What makes arts donors tick? How can we connect with these givers?

These questions are top of mind for all who aim to increase donor support for community arts. Recently, a group of California community foundations turned to research guru Alan Brown to help deepen their understanding of donors. Their aim was clear: to shape more effective donor engagement strategies and accelerate local arts giving.

Alan crafted a powerful donor interview exercise that was put to remarkably good use by these community foundations—all of whom are part of Irvine’s Communities Advancing the Arts initiative. The process and its benefits are shared here, along with key documents, for use by others seeking to connect more closely with arts donors.

A meaningful experience

“I was a little apprehensive to dig as deep as the interview asked us to and was concerned we might be intruding too much into topics people considered personal, but donors had no problems with our questions, and what we learned was very helpful,” said Todd Hansen of Orange County Community Foundation. According to Melissa Kester of Community Foundation Sonoma County, “We had one long-time donor start the interview by telling us that we already knew everything about her giving and motivations… she then proceeded to tell us so many new things that we felt like we hadn’t known her at all!”

Alan, who is a consultant and principal with WolfBrown, created questions, placed them in an interview protocol and constructed a thorough briefing used to train a group of nine community foundations in all aspects of requesting, confirming and conducting the interview.

Once prepped, community foundations sent out staffers in pairs to conduct each interview.  Development, donor services, communications and program people, as well as CEOs, took part. “Everyone has interviewing skills,” suggested Alan.

Each community foundation assembled one or two interview teams. And each team conducted two or three interviews. All together, these teams conducted about 30 interviews with arts donors around the state (including some who give through their community foundation and some who do not). Team members then came together to compare results.

This process was designed to surface new insights about why donors give to the arts, and to help community foundations strengthen their relationships with specific arts donors. It did plenty of both. Hugh Ralston at Ventura County Community Foundation reported, “We had a very positive experience and rich conversation. The interview protocol worked very well. People were pleased to participate… and many valued thinking about the questions that we put forward.”

A ready-made process

Alan and Irvine have made this process and related tools available for use by any interested community foundation. Here’s how it works, in three primary steps.

Step 1. Set the stage and ask probing questions

Because multiple community foundations were involved in these interviews, they were able to introduce this exercise as a statewide study of arts donors. This framing was important—it helped donors know that this activity extended beyond their community and their community foundation. And it was made clear that this activity was about gaining information, not about asking for a new gift.

Interviews were scheduled for a maximum of 60 minutes. They were conducted using a sequence of questions organized in six core areas—each of which is stated below (along with a sample question or two), and presented in full in the attached donor interview protocol.

1. Leisure time. How are you most likely to spend your leisure time? How do you express yourself creatively?
2. Core values. When you think about all your various affiliations and causes, are there any convictions, beliefs or principles that explain why you do what you do?
3. Donor motivations. Generally, how do you decide which arts programs or projects to support? What influences your decision the most?
4. Personal involvement. How much personal involvement do you like to have with the organizations you support? How do you like to be involved?
5. Accountability. How are you assured that your contributions are well used? Do you trust arts groups to use the funds wisely, or do you like to have some proof or evidence that your contributions are well used?
6. Community foundations. Some people prefer to support arts organizations directly, while other people support arts programs through a community foundation. What are the pluses and minuses of each way of giving?

Step 2. Test the values framework

Interviewers then “tested” a values framework, constructed by Alan with content drawn from the comprehensive RAND Corporation 2005 research report Gifts of the Muse, to help donors better identify their motivations for giving to the arts. This diagram provides a visual picture of the many ways that arts programs create benefits for individuals, families and communities. These benefits are organized in five primary categories (each of which is further described in the framework document):

• Personal development
• Economic & social benefits
• Human interaction
• Imprint of the arts experience
• Communal meaning

Interview subjects were presented with the framework, and asked to describe, “Which of its benefits are most important to you? Which of the five areas or ‘spheres of benefits’ resonate with you the most?”

Step 3. Pursue qualitative learning

This interview exercise was designed as a participative learning process—yielding qualitative data and deeper insights into individual donor interests. When the community foundation interviewers gathered to debrief their experience, Alan facilitated the group toward identification of relevant themes and implications. Highlights:

• There is an explosion of creative expression in society today; it is taking multiple forms (cooking, gardening, dressing, designing attractive living spaces, etc.).
• There is a narrative to learn about most donors—understanding how they are put together provides insight into understanding their giving. (One donor attended the interview debrief session, and through an informal exchange expressed a set of core personal values readily identified by the interviewer group. This donor cared deeply about community, investment in community, access to quality education for all people, and respecting and honoring the work of previous generations of family philanthropists.)
• Format innovation is the next frontier in audience development; the range of innovation is broad, and includes experiments such as providing longer intermissions to facilitate Twitter exchanges, to providing interpretive text on personal data devices (e.g., iPhones, Blackberrys) that can accompany musical performances in real time.
• Some donors are really interested in evidence of impact, which arts organizations don’t typically capture. Related, we are seeing emphasis on accountability because of donor interests and the economy.
• Performing arts organizations often lack quality photos and visuals that help people stay connected to their experience and thereby retain evidence of impact. Symbols of the experience are important. This helps explain why rock concerts sell t-shirts and sports teams sell hats at games. Consultant Jerry Yoshitomi was referenced for his emphasis on these “memory elicitation devices.” Alan said that, “printed programs are what people hang on to because they are not yet ready to let go of their emotional connection to the arts experience.”
• People have different attitudes toward engagement and different levels of involvement; part of our diagnostic process is to find out what level of involvement people want, and find interesting ways for them to be involved at that level. On a related note, Alan commented that, “It takes people about three years to learn the cultural assets of a community once they move to it.” And that, “people often get to know their community by going to museums.”
• The ability to identify cross-cutting needs that are not owned by any single institution, and that relate to donor interests, should be a strength of community foundations. An example Alan cited here is keeping older adults involved in creative pursuits. These types of opportunities are often bigger than any individual arts organization, and play to the strengths of community foundations to identify relevant needs, help people champion these needs, and advance a community vitality agenda.
• Local dynamics between the community foundation and arts community have implications for much of this work. Arts nonprofits have their own agendas and interests, and don’t always see community foundations as their advocates. Community foundations need to sit down with arts organizations early in the work of supporting community arts; once relationships develop, the networking and collaborations that follow are phenomenal.

Big take aways

What are the major lessons for all who are dedicated to growing community arts? Recognize donors for their expertise. Gain their opinions. Invite them to describe themselves. Learn and share their stories.
In other words, keep asking questions. And listening.

This learning experience was sponsored through Communities Advancing the Arts, a major funding initiative of The James Irvine Foundation.

This is the story of what a community—even one facing economic and social issues—can do to stake a claim for arts, and of how a community foundation can spark this public commitment.

California’s challenges are visible in its capital, where images of a tent city housing hundreds displaced by the economic downturn make international news.

Sacramento Region Community Foundation is active on many fronts to address human needs at this time of crisis, and has made a point of keeping arts very much in the mix of its local leadership agenda. The community foundation sponsored a series of high-profile spring events through its Advancing Sacramento Arts initiative, including a lively discussion with Michael Kaiser, President of the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts. In front of a packed house at a local performing arts venue, Michael was interviewed by a local arts leader.

Ten tips from an arts turnaround expert

Michael spoke to over 200 arts leaders, drawing on his experience and writing to share insights on how arts organizations can survive—even thrive—in a down economy. In a nutshell, here are his ten basic rules for every turnaround:

1. Someone must lead.
2. The leader must have a plan.
3. You cannot “save” your way to health.
4. Focus on today and tomorrow, not yesterday.
5. Extend your programming planning calendar.
6. Marketing is more than brochures and advertisements.
7. There must be only one spokesman and the message must be positive.
8. Fundraising must focus on the larger donor, but don’t aim too high.
9. The board must allow itself to be restructured.
10. The organization must have the discipline to follow each of these rules.

View the entire 90 minute event, including Michael’s complete message, by watching this video.

Connecting with public interest

One of the invitees to this event was new Sacramento mayor, Kevin Johnson. Michael Kaiser’s message immediately resonated with the mayor’s vision for the city—causing him to adjust his calendar to spend more time at this community event. Shortly thereafter, Mayor Johnson announced an initiative titled For Art’s Sake—establishing arts as a vital plank in the platform for making Sacramento a world-class city.

The mayor has proceeded to form a multi-sector coalition for the arts, to name a liaison to the arts community, and to initiate a popular and well-publicized process for creating new relationships and programs supporting the arts. He cites both the economic and cultural contributions of the arts. “Performing arts, visual arts and literary arts—we need all three to reach the potential of what Sacramento can be,” the mayor said in his speech. “Our commitment: We are going to promote the arts in a real way.”

Sacramento Region Community Foundation is at the table with the mayor and area leaders, finding ways to help strengthen For Art’s Sake while seeking ways to link it to programming and donor interests.

For the community foundation, it’s all about leverage—and leadership.

Sacramento Region Community Foundation is a participant in Communities Advancing the Arts, a major funding initiative of The James Irvine Foundation.

What can a community do when economic recession threatens local arts organizations and makes donors cautious about their giving? In Sonoma County, these scary circumstances led to a strategy for showcasing local arts—while helping donors reconnect to their passion for creativity in community.

If you’re looking for ways to make the case for arts in a community suffering hard times, you won’t want to miss the appeal of Dana Gioia. Dana is an internationally acclaimed poet and the recent Chairman of the National Endowment for the Arts. His 13-minute talk is powerful, moving and funny.

Dana’s remarks were a big part of an even bigger event that generated $130,000 in crucial arts funding.

Sonoma’s recipe for success

• Select five local arts nonprofits to feature, drawing from both proven and promising organizations. Make sure all are in tune with a spirit of cooperation—this event was about celebrating community arts, not competing for arts dollars!
• Recruit three world-class artists to perform in an intimate setting, accompanied by wonderful food, great local wine and beautiful scenery. The venue was an area winery with an impressive art collection and sweeping views of the Sonoma valley.
• Make it easy for each nonprofit, as well as the community foundation, to engage a set of its donors and prospective donors. The community foundation underwrote the event, so there was no cost to the participating nonprofits. These arts organizations were encouraged to position the event with their invitees in the manner they deemed best. Most asked attendees to make a donation as part of the invitation process—and received amounts ranging from $250 to $1,000. Others positioned this as a no-admission-fee event honoring invitees for their support.
• Announce that the community foundation is providing $50,000 as an incentive match for any attendees interested in contributing funds to the arts organizations feted at the event. This message was delivered as part of the invitation process, and reiterated at the event.
• Treat the audience to a profound artistic experience, featuring musical inspiration from baritone Rod Gilfry and pianist Jeffrey Kahane, plus Dana’s poetry.
• Deliver (via Dana) a passionate address connecting vibrant arts to community vitality, and issue a call for local philanthropists to step forward at this time of economic challenge.
• Combine this strong call with a soft ask. Attendees knew they were welcome to contribute and take advantage of community foundation matching funds (which applied to gifts made before, during or after the event), but no specific amounts were requested, and no “hard sell” was conducted. The tone for the evening was that of a thank you more so than a fundraiser. Donors responded positively, writing checks and making pledges for nearly $80,000 in new funds.

This video below documenting the development and presentation of the event performance provides a wonderfully produced example for community foundations interested in implementing similar programs locally.

Both videos referenced in this post have an ongoing life—each is being used in the context of small group donor parties.

Breaking new ground

The strategy for An Evening of Song & Poetry involved some first steps with lasting benefits. It brought about productive collaboration among five arts organizations—including the first-ever sharing of donor lists. It helped a key group of local arts donors gain a broader perspective on the arts community. And it placed the community foundation squarely in a leadership role, together with its partner, the Arts Council of Sonoma County.

Community Foundation Sonoma County is a participant in Communities Advancing the Arts, a major funding initiative of The James Irvine Foundation.

Here’s how one community is using video to showcase local arts—and appeal to existing and new donors.

This moving medium was a centerpiece in the 2009 Champions of the Arts Gala sponsored by the Arts Council for Monterey County. The Gala offered tribute to community arts heroes—artists, nonprofit leaders, education advocates, and donors. Each of their stories was presented through a series of professionally produced videos, all of which are available online and promoted through the Arts Council and its networks.

Gala planners enlisted another local hero—Academy Award winning director John Longenecker—who helped an arts nonprofit, Picture Monterey.org, gain equipment and training to create these videos.

Have a look

Community foundations and their partners in arts recognition programs should see these well-crafted products.

Check out the 22-minute group tribute (above), as well as a series of individual videos featuring each champion. For example, viewers get the first-hand story of cowboy Jack N. Swanson, and experience his work as an accomplished vaquero artist. It’s a colorful telling of an artist’s work shaped by the unique nature and character of his community.

Here’s the essence of the video featuring arts donors. This piece is strategically significant in encouraging more arts giving in an underfunded area of the region; it is being shared (via the web, email links and group gatherings) with current and prospective donors to the arts.

Arts matter for children in Salinas Valley. That’s the bottom line for David and Susan Gill, honored philanthropists at the Gala. The Gills support youth programs in the rural south county area because, according to Susan, “Arts are the only way to round out an education. We need to continue to inspire our children.”

Proceeds from the Champions of the Arts Gala help students in Monterey County schools receive training from professional artists.

The Community Foundation for Monterey County supports the Arts Council for Monterey County, and is a participant in Communities Advancing the Arts, a major funding initiative of The James Irvine Foundation.

The economy is at a 40-year low. Safety net issues are on the rise at an alarming rate. So why sustain a commitment to the arts?

Jim Canales, president and CEO of The James Irvine Foundation, answers this question in the following op-ed appearing in the San Francisco Chronicle.

Why the arts matter
James E. Canales
Tuesday, February 3, 2009

The arts are in trouble. Many of the institutions that make the Bay Area’s cultural scene so compelling are facing financial difficulties. Some are severely cutting programs; others are on the verge of closing. The arts are particularly vulnerable because they rely upon ticket sales and memberships, which are often among the first to be cut from consumer spending during an economic crisis. At the same time, the philanthropic revenues that arts organizations rely on – from government sources, foundations, corporations and individual contributions – all stand at risk today, given shrinking endowments and discretionary income.

Thankfully, arts leaders are applying their creative powers to these economic challenges, thus finding new ways to cut costs or raise revenues. For example, the Magic Theatre recently announced that it will be able to complete its season, thanks to an emergency fundraising campaign that brought in $455,000 from 1,100 donors. And the San Francisco Opera, in announcing its 2009-2010 season, was able to reduce its costs without compromising on artistic quality.

These organizations and their leaders deserve credit for doing whatever it takes to stay afloat. But all the creative ideas to keep the doors open won’t be enough if we don’t fundamentally change our collective understanding of why the arts matter.

When times get tough and choices must be made, it is often the arts that lose. Why is this so? When compared to health or human service needs, the arts are often viewed as less important and therefore more discretionary in nature. But this line of thinking misses the point about why the arts are so important. Until we fully recognize how essential the arts are to the vitality of our communities and our quality of life, our cultural infrastructure will continue to be given short shrift. There are countless reasons why we should renew our commitment to the arts. Consider the following:

• In the Bay Area, the arts create more than 31,000 jobs and generate $1.2 billion in economic activity every year.
• The arts produce $105 million in local and state tax revenue for the Bay Area (far more than the government spends on the arts).
• Surveys report that 93 percent of parents believe that the arts are essential to a well-rounded education.
• Ten million new jobs in the next decade will be in the “creative class,” according to economist Richard Florida. These are jobs that involve imagination and ingenuity which are best developed by experiencing the arts.

But the importance of the arts extends well beyond economics and education. The arts expand our horizons, unleash creativity and build social bonds. During this period of unsettling change, the arts can provide us with pleasure and comfort, while also challenging us to see the world in new ways.

Two recent examples come to mind of the arts’ power to build community and create a sense of common experience. First was the inauguration ceremony of President Obama. Where did we turn to put this historic moment in perspective, to build a common sense of pride and hope for the nation’s future? We turned to the arts, of course, in the form of poetry, classical music and song, including performances by San Francisco’s own Boys Chorus and Girls Chorus.

Locally, the power and appeal of the arts was in evidence on a recent Sunday when dozens of museums and other cultural institutions opened their doors for free. Thousands of kids explored Asian culture at the Asian Art Museum, walked through a rainforest at the California Academy of Sciences, and explored world class art collections at the de Young Museum and SFMOMA. On this one day, people could experience the rich diversity of San Francisco’s arts organizations, regardless of economic circumstance. But, for the rest of the year, maintaining our rich cultural landscape is anything but free.

So, as your resources permit, attend a performance, buy a membership, and consider a contribution of any size. But also talk to your friends and neighbors about the transformative power of the arts and encourage them to support and advocate for the arts. The arts institutions that have created our cultural riches have done so much to help the Bay Area thrive. It’s time for us to return the favor.

James E. Canales is president and chief executive officer of the James Irvine Foundation, a private foundation dedicated to expanding opportunity for the people of California. The Irvine Foundation is one of the largest private funders of the arts in California, with annual arts grant-making of approximately $20 million.

This article appeared on page A – 13 of the San Francisco Chronicle

http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2009/02/03/EDQP15LUJN.DTL

John Killacky is on a quest for relevance. He fears that many grantmakers will establish new priorities and initiatives regardless of what the field of dance actually needs. He calls for foundations and arts organizations alike to hone their ability to adapt to changing times—emphasizing that being dynamic is as important as building endowment when it comes to long-term success.

These views are put forward in an article in VoiceofDance.com written by Killacky, who is program officer for arts and culture at The San Francisco Foundation.

Four trends of note

Killacky examines current trends transforming how dance is supported, accessed, engaged with, and popularized. Here are the trends, and a sample of his commentary on each:

• Race and ethnicity: “As our country continues to diversify, fairness and parity issues will demand that foundations consider future grantmaking through a racial equity lens.”
• Friendraising: “If there is any potential for growth (in arts nonprofit funding), it is in expanding individual donor bases.”
• Cyberspace: “Dancemakers can learn from media colleagues, making sure choreography is conceived for multiple platforms, the stage behind the fourth wall only being one of them.”
• Mass appeal: “Ever since the early ‘90s when ‘Got Milk?’ ads appeared, dance wondered how it could similarly capture public imagination. The reality now is that it has.”

In covering these trends, Killacky provides examples of practical responses—ways The San Francisco Foundation, other funders, and nonprofits can move into the future of dance.

The San Francisco Foundation is a participant in Communities Advancing the Arts, a major funding initiative of The James Irvine Foundation.

Arts funders and nonprofits agree: We are in an unprecedented time of financial distress, and no one knows when we will reach bottom. This new reality is causing reactions that range from caution to crisis in arts organizations.

“We’re seeing lots of white knuckle behavior at the moment,” reports one community foundation CEO. “Arts leaders are hanging on with everything they have and trying to prepare for what may be an even scarier ride to come.”

Much is being written to help provide perspective and practical suggestions to foundations whose concern for arts nonprofits is rising at the very moment when grantmaking assets are plummeting. This post provides summaries and links to some of these resources.

Don’t assume giving will go backward

Starting with a positive, a recent report indicates that, while charitable giving is affected by a roiling economy, the impact is not nearly as much as might be expected. In fact, tracking the numbers since 1969 shows that total giving in the U.S. has risen (in current dollars) every year but 1987—including many years that represented slow or negative economic growth. Of course, the rate of increase in giving is often less in lean years. The report Giving During Recessions and Economic Slowdowns (Giving USA 2008, Giving USA Foundation™) is available for purchase at www.givingusa.org

Keep investing, and making personal asks

In hard times, arts groups should continue to invest in and publicize their art, according to Michael M. Kaiser, president of the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts. And Ronald Levy, president of Lincoln Center counsels that this is a good time to remember that “shoe leather trumps mail” when it comes to development efforts. “It is harder to turn down a request to meet face to face for 50 minutes than a written proposal for $50,000,” says Mr. Levy. And don’t let a “no” discourage you. “For great fund-raisers,” he writes, “’no’ is just the beginning of a conversation.” These excerpts are from The Nonprofit’s Guide to Surviving a Downturn, The New York Times, November 11, 2008.

www.nytimes.com/2008/11/11/giving/11ARTS.html?_r=1&ref=giving&p

Stay in the know

The Foundation Center’s new online feature, Focus on the Economic Crisis, provides an array of resources to help nonprofits and foundations alike as they face the challenges of an unstable economy. Updated regularly, it contains news, interviews, research, blog posts, and podcasts about the crisis and its impact on philanthropy—as well as information on training and scholarships that will help grantseekers become better fundraisers in an increasingly competitive environment.

http://foundationcenter.org/focus/economy/

Check out additional resources

Crisis or Bad News: A Solid Crisis Plan is Your Lifeline
Crisis communications guidance; from the Communications Network

20 Emergency Funding Sources for Nonprofits
Ideas for revenue sources that can be accessed quickly; from the consulting staff at Fieldstone Alliance

Managing in Tough Times: 7 Steps
Insights and advice from experts in the field to help organizations weather the current economic storm; from the Bridgespan Group

Emergency Hardship Scholarships/Grants to Individuals
Keys for foundations to satisfy charitable purpose requirements in providing relief to persons impoverished as a result of low income or lack of financial resources; from the Council of Michigan Foundations

Changing Times Call For Foundations To Try New, Innovative Approaches To Sustain Nonprofits
Opportunities for foundations to more effectively serve nonprofits; from the Council of Michigan Foundations

Strategies for Foundations to Save Resources
Advice for coping with dwindling resources; from the Financial Times

A to Z Survival Guide for Uncertain Times
Tips for addressing financial challenges; from PhilanTopic

Making Informed Decisions in Uncertain Times [PDF]
A report on the impact of the economic downturn on community foundations, including information on grantmaking, spending policies, budget implications and communicating with stakeholders; from Community Foundation Insights

Weathering an Uncertain Economy [PDF]
Research on the impact of economic slowdowns on charitable giving; from the Center on Philanthropy at Indiana University

A Survival Kit for Fundraising in a Bad Economy
Tools for fundraisers, including articles, advice, books, and web and audio conferences; from the Association of Fundraising Professionals

8 Ideas for Finding New Donors in Today’s Economy
Advice for acquiring donors; from The NonProfit Times

Today’s challenges, Tomorrow’s Strength Nonprofits can Avoid Pitfalls – and Even Grow – in Tough Times [PDF]
Guidance for leading nonprofits through economic uncertainty; from Achieve

Bracing for Lean Times Ahead
Article on the impact of the economic crisis on philanthropy; from The New York Times

Hold a key thought

And keep in mind these words from George C. Ruotolo Jr. (chair of Giving Institute: Leading Consultants to Non-Profits)…

“Charities with a clear and compelling case and an established, loyal donor constituency will continue to succeed, even in difficult times.”

www.givingusa.org/press_releases/gusa/Giving during recessions 2008.pdf

This post is assembled in support of Communities Advancing the Arts, a major funding initiative of The James Irvine Foundation.

Where is art? Thanks to SparkOC.com, that’s a question of the past for cultural consumers in Orange County. The area’s arts council and community foundation teamed to create a one-stop info source for area residents and visitors.

This website is a central element in a larger strategy to celebrate and stimulate creativity throughout Orange County—a place where 64 percent of residents say that they or their family members create or participate in arts (research report).

This comprehensive vehicle features a searchable calendar of arts events; a directory of local organizations, venues and schools; classified listings for jobs, auditions and classes; and individual artist profiles. As part of the Artsopolis Network, it’s in a growing movement to effectively promote local arts and culture via the internet.

Something for everyone

SparkOC.com is a go-to place for all performance and exhibition information. It promotes theatre, dance, music and visual arts offered by more than 140 organizations and venues in Orange County. Online users also can find activities based on their interests in youth and family activities; classes and workshops; poetry and literature; festivals; events unique to Orange County, including History and Heritage, Science and Nature; and free public shows in all categories.

In addition, the site includes listings of special events and fundraising galas offered by arts and culture organizations, as well as weekly half-price ticket offers available exclusively through SparkOC.com.

“The goal of SparkOC.com is to inspire a groundswell of creativity and imagination throughout Orange County by increasing involvement with the arts,” said Richard Stein, executive director of Arts Orange County, which, together with the Orange County Community Foundation, developed the site. “SparkOC.com allows everyone to be in the know about the Orange County arts scene.”

SparkOC.com was developed in response to a landmark 2006 Cultural Indicators study   commissioned by Arts Orange County and the Orange County Community Foundation which found that 92% of residents agree on the importance of a vibrant cultural sector in the community, and that most said they would go to more arts and cultural events if they could find the information easily.

Orange County Community Foundation is a participant in Communities Advancing the Arts, a major funding initiative of The James Irvine Foundation.

While everyone figured the local arts scene in this Southern California area was booming, the Ventura County Community Foundation decided to get the facts. It turns out that arts are bigger news than anyone knew. The number of nonprofit arts organizations reporting more than $25,000 in revenues nearly doubled since 1996. Plus, at a total economic contribution of $121 million, these nonprofits are a major player in the financial mix—contributing to a regional arts economy that is on par with agriculture and construction.

It’s all in Ventura County and the Arts: Impact and Opportunity for Community. The report takes a holistic look at the state of arts in the region: arts’ scale, scope, and economic significance; the nature and needs of arts organizations and artists at work locally; levels of arts participation; and programs for arts education.  Research findings are in turn fueling strategies for ArtsLIVE in Ventura County, a multi-year initiative to strengthen local arts organizations and support local artists.

Key Findings

The following facts help paint the picture of the local arts landscape—and its contribution to community vitality.

1. Arts organizations in Ventura County are growing in numbers and size. Between 1996 and 2008, the number of nonprofit arts organizations in Ventura County registered with the IRS has grown from 213 to 312, and the number of those filing 990’s (forms required for organizations reporting income of over $25,000) increased from 84 to 158. The total revenue of these organizations increased from $10.6 million in 1996 to more than $74 million in returns sampled in 2008.
2. Arts organizations employ or involve thousands of people in Ventura County. Nearly 140 arts organizations surveyed are estimated to employ more than 2,000 people and about 1,000 artists, and involve nearly 8,000 board members and volunteers.
3. The arts boost the local economy significantly. Nonprofit arts organizations in Ventura County bring more than $121 million to the regional economy, are responsible for nearly 2100 jobs in the county and contribute a total of $21 million of tax payment to various branches of government.
4. The arts span all sectors of the economy. Nearly two-thirds of the arts organizations in Ventura County are nonprofit organizations, just over a quarter are for-profit businesses, and 5% are governmental.
5. The arts represent big regional impact. Arts-related businesses in Ventura and Santa Barbara counties and part of San Luis Obispo County generate nearly $2.1 billion in economic benefits, including supporting nearly 20,000 jobs. The arts sector contributes about the same amount to the regional economy as Ventura County’s agricultural production, construction or wholesale trade industries.

Ventura County Community Foundation is a participant in Communities Advancing the Arts, a major funding initiative of The James Irvine Foundation.

A middle-schooler streams YouTube videos. A family shares its heritage through a holiday skit. A baby boomer starts a garage band. Today, many forms of cultural engagement take place off the radar of traditional nonprofit arts organizations.

How can community foundations help arts organizations better support the broad range of cultural engagement in diverse and changing communities? In particular, how can this support be provided more effectively and equitably? These questions are at the center of Cultural Engagement in California’s Inland Regions, research that explores patterns of cultural engagement in two rapidly growing, ethnically diverse areas: the San Joaquin Valley and the Inland Empire.

Study highlights

The study, conducted by WolfBrown, prompts new discussion of ways community foundations, donors, and nonprofits can support arts and culture. Key findings are:

• A broad, inclusive definition is important to understanding total cultural engagement—old definitions leave too much out
• Personal participation levels are high—many people are engaged in activities such as photography, painting or drawing, singing or playing an instrument, and social dancing
• Much cultural engagement occurs in non-arts spaces—for example, the home, places of worship and parks are among the prominent places in the cultural life of communities
• Heritage-based and social forms of cultural engagement attract racially diverse participants—many cultural activities are deeply embedded in religious, political and social contexts that vary by community
• The emergence of “curatorial” arts activities is changing the landscape of cultural engagement—many youth and a growing number of adults are selecting, organizing and editing the art in their lives
• Significant interest in arts learning activities goes unmet—for example, a significant number of respondents indicate they would like to take dance or music lessons, or learn more about photography
• Role models are key players in the cultural ecosystem—respondents who could identify a person who inspired or supported their creative expressions were much more likely to engage in participatory cultural activities and attend arts programs
• Certain types of programming may increase broad-based cultural vitality in communities and across cultural groups—examples include helping adults and children chronicle their lives and tell their stories; and helping identify and stimulate use of community venues, such as public schools, parks and outdoor settings, retail establishments and churches as programmable arts spaces

This executive briefing suggests additional program approaches for increasing cultural vitality, and contains questions for consideration by service providers and funders who are looking to broaden the intersection of arts and community.

This research was commissioned by The James Irvine Foundation.

Relevance. Responsiveness. Relationships. Any community foundation working in arts and culture wants more of each. The San Diego Foundation grows these assets through its Arts & Culture Working Group.

It’s an approach adopted in 2003 to connect community members to community foundation initiatives. Through this collaboration with volunteers, The San Diego Foundation can better address community and donor needs, be a more effective grantmaker, connect to new donors, and establish a stronger voice for local arts and culture.

Plugged-in players

The Working Group consists of community leaders with demonstrated expertise in a number of areas including higher education, business, arts administration, arts management consulting, finance and philanthropy. Members are approved by the Board of Governors’ Executive Committee and serve for three consecutive three-year terms, making service on the Working Group a significant long-term commitment. The Working Group makes grant recommendations to the Board. In addition, its members recommend policy, conduct grantee site visits, attend programs and events of local arts and culture organizations and guide fundraising strategies—although they have no “give or get” fundraising quotas. Sub-committees with additional members from the community share the workload and insure that decision-making is transparent and open.

Felicia Shaw, Director of Arts & Culture at The Foundation, reports that the Working Group strategy is effective because of each member’s commitment to a singular purpose—improving quality of life in the San Diego region. “By stripping away all other agendas, Working Group members come to the table with a shared belief that arts and culture is as critical to our quality of life as clean air, safe streets and open green spaces. Their leadership helps everyone at the Foundation address critical community needs—with arts and culture at the top of our list of priorities.”

A unique arts landscape

The Working Group formed its identity through a strategic planning process that began with a situation assessment: San Diego is a large county, geographically spread out, and with the distinction of being the largest border crossing to Mexico. The arts and culture community is broad and diverse, made up of approximately 300 groups, from established institutions such as The Old Globe Theatre and San Diego Opera to small grassroots community groups like the Playwrights Project and Eveoke Dance Theatre.  And this region shows up on much larger maps drawn in the arts and culture world:

• Balboa Park is the largest collection of museums in the country outside of the Smithsonian in Washington, D.C.
• San Diego theatre sends more plays to Broadway than other city outside of London and Chicago.
• San Diego is the only city on the West Coast to support eight major professional stages for three resident theaters.

A 2000 study by Americans for the Arts charted arts and culture as a $326M industry in the region. Cultural tourism is a major ingredient in this mix—people come to San Diego for the sun, surf and the world famous San Diego Zoo, as well as for a number of arts offerings.

Both the city and county government provide financial support for the arts, although with no county-wide arts council serving San Diego, The Foundation comes closest to providing leadership in arts for the entire region.

A compelling vision

With findings derived from an extensive external assessment and evaluation of the Foundation’s assets and opportunities related to arts and culture, the Working Group developed a sweeping vision: To galvanize the San Diego community around enhanced arts and culture and to ensure that the San Diego region has all the resources to become a nationally-competitive arts and culture center.

This assessment process yielded a number of strategies resulting in the launch of a new initiative, Art Works for San Diego. Grounded in the belief that arts and culture are powerful tools for community revitalization and civic engagement, this multi-faceted initiative includes the following components:

• Grantmaking – Funding a 12-month planning process (Phase I) and multiple-year implementation process (Phase II) for a limited number of nonprofit organizations and their arts and culture-focused projects
• Art Works! Academy – Ongoing training program for grantees and other select participants in principles of project planning, focusing on arts-based community development and civic engagement
• Advocacy – Strategic effort to educate community members about the value of arts and culture to San Diego’s quality of life, resulting in increased funding to nonprofit arts and culture organizations and to the Foundation’s Fund for the Common Good. Current focus is on arts education
• Donor Engagement and Education – Connect donors more deeply with arts and culture community through “high touch” activities, such as donor caravans, behind-the-scenes events and intimate donor dinners with artists as hosts
• Endow the Arts –“Drive to 25″ – Major fundraising campaign that seeks to establish a permanent fund for arts and culture at The San Diego Foundation to be used to sustain the initiatives of the Arts and Culture Working Group, including: grantmaking, outreach and capacity building activities. Currently, in quiet stage of campaign to test the feasibility of a $25 million fundraising goal by 2011

The San Diego Arts & Culture Working Group is supported by Communities Advancing the Arts, a major funding initiative of The James Irvine Foundation.

What’s your earliest memory of the arts?

Chances are, your recollection made you smile. That’s a testimony to the power of the personal question–and the way  it can help you engage donors in community arts.

The right question provides a window for understanding, and tapping into, the values that underlie any donor’s decision to fund arts. Experience and research tell us that helping people connect their personal values to relevant programs is the way to build ongoing commitment. For example, a donor who values youth development and equity in education may well want to support arts in school, or provide ways for students to engage with arts in a variety of venues outside the school day.

Another of my favorite questions is: Can you tell me about a personally significant or meaningful arts or cultural experience in your life? I advise all of my clients to ask this question regularly. I’ve found that after answering the question, people are more likely to tell a friend, buy another ticket, or make a donation.

Want to experiment with this idea?

You can take a simple test–and check out a survey that generates insight into donor values and practices. (Survey has been closed since this was originally posted.)

Holly Sidford, Marcy Cady, Alexis Frasz and I are involved in the Cultural Master Planning process for the City of Los Angeles. One aspect of our work is a public participation survey, where we’re attempting to learn about people’s involvement, either as spectators or direct participants in local arts. We had over 400 responses to the survey in the first 5 hours.

As a test, I’d like everyone to respond to this survey. (Again, survey has been closed since this was originally posted.)

The survey includes the question about a significant or meaningful arts experience. Over the next week, see if responding encouraged you to tell your personal story or ask this question of others.

I’d also like to hear from anyone who has already asked this question with audiences. What have been the results, if any?

Jerry Yoshitomi is Chief Knowledge Officer for MeaningMatters. He has served as a consultant to Communities Advancing the Arts, a major funding initiative of The James Irvine Foundation.

Art brings people together. So it’s natural for community foundations to place art—and artists—at the center of events intended to deepen donor engagement. The opportunities for creativity are endless. Receptions in private sculpture gardens, intimate readings by award-winning authors, road trips to major galleries, dinners celebrating up-and-coming artists, and behind-the-scenes tours are just a few ways donor events are taking place around California.

Through this experience, community arts leaders are learning that there is a big difference between a good event and a strategic event. The former is marked by smooth logistics and smiling participants. The second features both these attributes—plus a purposeful evolution in each attendee’s commitment to funding arts.

It’s about moving along

According to an event guide developed by and for community foundations, strategic events are part of a process designed to move donors along a continuum of involvement in funding local arts. Some have virtually no awareness of the need for community arts support. Others are steady arts givers. Most are somewhere in between.

The guide includes a set of tips for treating each event strategically: identifying your audience, defining a specific objective for each participant, clarifying a method for achieving the objective, and measuring results. It emphasizes the need to make sure that each event is part of a process that involves pre- and post-event action. And it features a week-by-week event planning checklist that can be adapted for local use.

This guide was developed through Communities Advancing the Arts, a major funding initiative of The James Irvine Foundation.

All local arts organizations seek financial sustainability. Getting there, however, can be a challenge—even for the most established nonprofits. Community foundations are working to help, and in Monterey County the process begins with a simple but strategic self-assessment tool.

”Our goal is to help arts organizations reflect on their existing strengths, resources and readiness to undertake different fund development strategies,” says Kaki Rusmore, Management Assistance Program Officer at the Community Foundation for Monterey County.

Charting success in three dimensions

Applicants to the Communities Advancing the Arts grant fund of the community foundation receive a ready-to-use tool. This single page was squeezed down from a more complex assessment used in earlier capacity-building efforts. It helps nonprofit leaders think about three essential components in their fund development work.

• Strategy: Considering the optimal mix of revenues by category (earned income, donations, grants, endowment) and by fund source (individuals, businesses, government, foundations); and identifying activities used to generate funds (campaigns, events, donor cultivation, grant proposals)
• Systems: Assessing the organization’s planning process, database management capabilities and ongoing approaches to implementing—and improving—fund development actions
• People: Taking stock of the skills and knowledge of both staff and volunteers related to the roles most essential to fund development, and measuring the extent to which all internal parties are fully on board with fund development efforts

This self-assessment is conducted as part of the application process for first-year funding within a program that spans three years overall. The assessment guides grantees in measuring their strengths and challenges as they develop a proposal for individualized capacity building in fund development. And it’s a critical first step in creating a fund development plan.

”We want to help each nonprofit group identify strategies that would fit with their organization’s mission, audience and future plans,” reports Kaki. ”Once the groups are funded, these initial assessments will be the basis for a more in-depth assessment with a consultant. Based on the full assessments, the groups hold board and staff retreats to discuss and create fund development plans that can be implemented in years two and three.”

This capacity-building program began through Communities Advancing the Arts, a major funding initiative of The James Irvine Foundation.

Check back in December to learn more about how this tool worked for the groups involved.

Every work of art tells a story. In Monterey County, stories of life told through art are fueling the emotional well-being, cultural pride, and civic engagement of local groups. It’s happening through Mi Vida/Mi Pueblo (My Life/My Town).

A series of art workshops in and around the agricultural community of Greenfield brought together mothers, fathers and family members of all ages. These workshops led to exhibits of poetry, paintings, photographs, videos, books and narratives inspired by the artists’ personal experiences in this community.

Making connections

“It was an opportunity to bring the arts to an underserved region of our county,” according to Judy Sulsona, Executive VP for the Community Foundation for Monterey County. “And it was an opportunity to demonstrate the importance of arts to the health of a community, particularly as a vehicle for preserving and celebrating cultural identity, which is essential to the mental health of individuals and families within diverse groups.”

Mi Vida/Mi Pueblo was a true collaboration. It involved local libraries, governments, arts nonprofits, the Arts Council for Monterey County, First Night Monterey, and the Community Foundation through its Communities Advancing the Arts (CAA) and Poder Popular programs. The workshops engaged more than 50 people—ranging in age from 6 to 70. A summer exhibit and accompanying reception were big hits as well.

Expanded impact

The reach of the Mi Vida/Mi Pueblo project went well beyond Greenfield.

The summer exhibit, held in June, included entertainment by young musicians from the Alisal Center for the Fine Arts (a CAA grantee). County Board of Supervisors member, Simon Salinas, congratulated all participants and shared his enthusiasm for the arts as a community resource and inspiring force in the lives of local children and families.

Earlier in the year, the Mission Cultural Center for Latino Arts in San Francisco had curated an exhibition of the original work created in the Mi Vida/Mi Pueblo workshops. The works were on display in January 2008 and included photography, painting, story-writing, puppetry, and poetry. Each work told the compelling story of its individual artist, reflecting her/his life experience living in Monterey County. Forty-five Greenfield workshop participants attended the opening reception of the exhibit; they were bused to San Francisco by First Night Monterey.

New levels of public visibility—and support

The power of Mi Vida/Mi Pueblo is gaining the attention and commitment of public officials.

Greenfield City administrators want to include space for an arts center and classes in local development plans, to support an arts booth at the popular weekly farmers market, and to find other ways to include arts in youth and career development programs.

This project was launched through Communities Advancing the Arts, a major funding initiative of The James Irvine Foundation, and is now sustained through the collaborative efforts of First Night Monterey, the Arts Council for Monterey County and the Community Foundation.

A bigger table means room for more people. Sacramento Region Community Foundation is expanding the table—virtually—with a blog aimed at encouraging conversation about local arts. It’s at advancesacarts.blogspot.com, and it supports multiple gatherings that are taking place around a single question: What’s the best way to bring new, long-term resources to arts organizations in Sacramento?

The first of these sessions drew more than 35 of the region’s most influential and passionate supporters of the arts. The second involved leaders from more than 20 local arts organizations. Highlights of both sessions are reported on the blog, which invites additional input from community members.

Information, ideas and insights generated will fuel the work of an Arts Advisory Committee this summer; in turn leading to a new round of grantmaking in the fall. “We wanted to capture knowledge in real time,” said Priscilla Enriquez, the Community Foundation’s Chief Giving Officer, and creator of the blog.

And the blog will play an ongoing role—helping the foundation and community track progress and keep an open line of communication.

Check out this site and register for automatic updates at advancesacarts.blogspot.com.

This project was launched through Communities Advancing the Arts, a major funding initiative of The James Irvine Foundation.

It’s one program with two benefits. The Sonoma County Artist Awards boost the reputations of working artists early in their careers, and raise public awareness of local arts. The awards are a collaboration of the arts community, with leadership from the county’s Arts Council and Community Foundation.

A stunning catalog showcases the 2008 visual arts award winners. They were drawn from a cadre of nearly 100 eligible artists. A panel of area curators and art professionals narrowed the list of applicants before a set of outside experts from the Bay Area chose the three winners: Julie Cavaz, Sarah Frieberg and Geirrod Van Dyke. Each received a $5,000 award—the largest available to individual artists in Sonoma County.

A public celebration of arts and artists

In Sonoma County fashion, the artists were celebrated in a creative light. The three award winners enjoyed their first museum opening on a spring Saturday evening. Earlier that day, 32 of the nominated artists were honored through an invitational exhibit sponsored by the City of Santa Rosa. It took place in Courthouse Square.

“It was accompanied by wild and wooly entertainment—stilt walkers, fire dancers, hip-hop demonstrations,” reported Melissa Kester, Arts Development Officer for Community Foundation Sonoma County. “A marching band then led the way to the Sonoma County Museum reception two blocks away, where the three winners’ work was being shown.”

The biennial Artist Awards have been so well received that, in 2009, the Community Foundation and Arts Council of Sonoma County are adding another award to encompass performing, music and literary arts.

This program was begun through Communities Advancing the Arts, a major funding initiative of The James Irvine Foundation.

It’s a communications conundrum. Community arts leaders have plenty to say about why donors should invest in this arena, but it can be challenging to find the best ways to express these messages.

There’s the question of what to state first. Some professionals say lead with instrumental benefits—the role arts play in boosting economic development or helping kids learn, for example—and establish these bottom-line societal advantages right up front. Others say it’s better to promote intrinsic benefits—the ways arts evoke an emotive response—and get started by making a more intimate human connection.

Then there’s the need to establish urgency for private donor support of arts. In California, state funding declined precipitously in recent years, reaching a low of 3 cents per person in 2005.

In 2006, a set of California community foundations and their local arts partners took this dilemma to heart, and mind. Sharing and assessing arts messages, they joined to create and test an approach that is now being used in several communities—and communications.

What makes for effective messaging?

These participants in the Irvine initiative, Communities Advancing the Arts, set out to develop messaging that was clear, consumable, and comprehensive. Specifically, they wanted to reach out to new donors in a manner that:

• Uses simple language and concepts
• Is easily remembered and presented by staff and volunteers
• Features a flexible structure—so main messages can be mixed and matched to specific communication opportunities
• Translates into a variety of looks and media

A modular messaging structure

They devised a solution that is straightforward and sophisticated. It uses three main messages to answer one core question:

Why support the arts?

• It feels good.
• It does good.
• It’s time now.

Each of these primary messages sits atop a set of secondary messages that present a complete case for the arts. And this approach is inherently modular—some community foundations prefer to lead with intrinsic benefits (it feels good), others with instrumental benefits (it does good). The third major message (it’s time now) helps establish the urgent need for individual donors to invest in arts.

Multiple media

This messaging is being applied in a number of media.

• Orange County Community Foundation, together with Arts Orange County (the area’s arts council) co-branded these messages, as shown on this print ad.
• Community Foundation Silicon Valley (since merged with the Peninsula Foundation to create Silicon Valley Community Foundation) built a comprehensive set of materials to advance the arts using these messages.
• California Community Foundation incorporates these messages to help open its brochure promoting its Arts & Culture Fund.
• Community Foundation Sonoma County features these messages in banners and a brochure supporting its Emerging Artists Endowment Fund.
• Community Foundation for Monterey County organized a public service announcement based on these messages.

These messages and communications were created through Communities Advancing the Arts, a major funding initiative of The James Irvine Foundation.

Take a moment to imagine what Los Angeles would be like without theatre, dance, music or paintings. That line, penned by Antonia Hernández, President and CEO of the California Community Foundation, opens a new brochure making the case for arts and culture as the lifeblood of a vibrant community. Everyone knows L.A.’s reputation as a hotbed of artistic innovation and diversity. Less known is the extent to which arts and culture are underfunded in this locale.

For example, the City of Los Angeles spent $.78 per person in arts grants compared with San Diego at $5.48 and San Francisco at $20.67.

Overlooked: smaller organizations and individuals

Especially vulnerable are small to midsize organizations and individual artists in the county. One study showed that more than 80% of arts funding went to groups with budgets of $2 million or more; these larger players make up less than 6% of the total nonprofit arts sector. Another study showed that only 2% of all arts funding in L.A. between 1998-2002 went to individual artists.

Funders in Los Angeles put their money in specific projects and events (78%), with far less (22%) going to general operating costs, endowment building, and capital campaigns.

Launching a community campaign

Through its Arts & Culture Fund, the California Community Foundation seeks to change this situation for the better. The foundation is calling on community to grow its endowment to $27 million by 2015. The goal is to help 150 emerging and mid-career artists rise to the next level, and 100 small and midsize organizations reach new audiences. In particular, the foundation aims to increase participation of diverse, ethnic and low-income individuals and communities in the arts.

This brochure includes more research data on the L.A. arts and culture landscape, as well as stories of the big impact that relatively small investments can make in this arena.

It was created with support from Communities Advancing the Arts, a major funding initiative of The James Irvine Foundation.

What should community foundations consider before entering the arts arena? Plenty. That’s the word from more than 30 program, donor services, and communications pros representing ten community foundations—each with multi-year involvement in Irvine’s Communities Advancing the Arts initiative. They represent a wealth of successes, lessons learned, and continued passion for the work. And they shared their responses to this question at a 2007 initiative convening.

So if your community foundation is new to the world of arts, you can take note of these tips from your been-there-doing-that colleagues.

• Build an internal partnership across community foundation program, donor services, and communications people—start here and keep it together every step of the way
• Bring a learning mindset to the process, and plan to adapt as you go
• Gain up-front buy-in from your arts council as well as arts nonprofits, not to mention your community foundation board and staff; help all understand that this is a long-haul commitment, including a commitment of resources
• Inform your planning with state and national research (some great sources are located in the “Links” to the left on this page)
• Assess the arts environment, including its strengths, needs and capacities; uncover the “connective tissue” in your arts sector by knowing, studying and understanding the actors
• Conduct research and assess data; be sure to examine the intersecting needs of community, arts nonprofits, and artists
• Recognize critical local issues, which may include arts access and cultural participation, policy and public funding, arts education, nonprofit sustainability, and nurturing the next generation of artists
• Communicate a vision for the arts community; create this vision with key stakeholders
• Establish and convey clear goals and expectations
• Employ all available assets: your staff and board, your role as convener, your credibility, your relationships, etc.
• Leverage existing resources (e.g., a local nonprofit advancement center) as well as channels and events that provide access to new relationships
• Support self discovery of the need for capacity building by nonprofits; invest in this capacity through technical assistance
• Pick your consultants carefully: the right researchers, facilitators, and planners make a huge difference
• Connect your case to a prosperity model; this is about communities advancing through arts
• Combine the interests of donors, “pillar” arts organizations, grassroots arts organizations and the community foundation
• Engage donors: many types, in many ways, at many points; time the optimal moment for initial involvement, which may be in the planning and research phase
• Lead through advocacy; including getting in the “ask” business (e.g., get your CEO out front asking the community to support arts)
• Demonstrate tangible progress—create and conduct programs that illustrate you are for real, and don’t run away from community conversations about the value and/or definition of art

Start by taking stock

Of course the first step is to assess your organization’s own capacity and readiness to contribute to a vital arts sector as part of a vibrant community.

To sum it up, the voice of experience says go forward with your eyes open, and enjoy the journey. It’s a rewarding one for artists, art agencies, arts donors, and all community members—including the community foundation!

This above content was generated through participants in Communities Advancing the Arts, a major funding initiative of The James Irvine Foundation.

Invest in what works. So goes the saying—as well as The James Irvine Foundation’s interest in advancing community arts. Irvine announced nearly $3.2 million in new grants to a group of California community foundations. It’s the second phase of Communities Advancing the Arts, an initiative that placed $4.75 million in 13 community foundations between 2004 and 2007. Irvine’s initial $4.75 million investment generated a solid return. It helped participating community foundations mobilize $59 million in assets for the arts over three years (a 48 percent increase in assets dedicated to the arts), as well as create 181 new funds dedicated to the arts at participating community foundations.

The timing couldn’t be better

Public funding for the arts has reached new lows in recent years. The California Arts Council, which traditionally funded local arts programs throughout the state, has seen its budget slashed from $31 million in 2000 to just $5 million in 2007. Private donations have also dipped over the past 15 years, leaving many arts organizations struggling for survival. Communities Advancing the Arts is intended to foster grantmaking and spur individual donations to arts organizations in targeted communities.

Phase two participants are:

California Community Foundation
East Bay Community Foundation
Community Foundation for Monterey County
Orange County Community Foundation
Sacramento Region Community Foundation
The San Diego Foundation
The San Francisco Foundation
Community Foundation Sonoma County
Ventura County Community Foundation

Full press release

Who knew? A surprising 64 percent of residents say that they or their family members create or participate in arts. It’s a fact that shows the value of research, and it came from the Orange County Cultural Indicators Report, this community’s first-ever study of arts giving and donor perceptions. The study was conducted by the Orange County Community Foundation and Arts Orange County. The attached report describes resident values and behavioral drivers related to the arts. It includes the case for investing in a creative community, a review of the research findings summarized below, and a set of recommendations for advancing the arts and culture sector.

Key findings

1. Orange County residents agree on the importance of a vibrant cultural sector in Orange County and recognize the social and personal benefits of the arts: 64 percent revealed that they or their immediate family members actively create or participate in the arts.
2. A deepening relationship with the arts leads to attendance and financial investment. Research reinforced that early or informal family involvement in the arts are the strongest drivers for future attendance.
3. The county’s nonprofit arts sector is young and undercapitalized. Seventy-five percent of local arts organizations were founded in the last 35 years.
4. Orange County residents place a high priority on the importance of the arts in the development and education of children. A remarkable 98 percent of residents agree that arts are critical for the education and development of children.
5. Orange County has a unique set of cultural assets that tells the story of the county’s cultural history and creates the cultural face it presents to the world. The County of Orange and its 34 cities have the capability to leverage these cultural assets to help create a unique sense of place for Orange County residents and visitors.
6. Leadership at all levels will be required to make Orange County a more creative community. These leaders can be bolstered by evidence of community support: 92 percent of residents agree on the importance of a vibrant cultural sector in Orange County.

This activity was conducted as part of Communities Advancing the Arts, a major funding initiative of The James Irvine Foundation.

While lots of communities want to build a creative economy, too few are able to pull everyone together around a plan. Not so in Monterey County, where collaboration, research and dialogue led to a countywide blueprint for collective action. The process was led by the Community Foundation for Monterey County in tandem with the Arts Council for Monterey County. And it produced the first comprehensive approach to advancing local arts and culture.

Seeing the big picture

The attached report states the case for investing in a creative economy. It then presents goals, recommended strategies, and a timeline for implementing an action plan to advance this creative economy over a five-year period. It addresses the role of arts and culture in community life, makes a case for increased donor support to sustain arts and culture as part of a vibrant region, and describes an approach for increasing cultural patronage. It includes a review of local demographic trends pertinent to the arts.

Purpose and goals

The purpose of this planning was three-fold:

1. To guide actions of and collaborations among artists, arts agencies and arts educators regarding research, program development and public awareness
2. To guide public and private investment, including an array of short-term and long-term loans, grants and earned revenues
3. To guide the Arts Council for Monterey County in leading countywide research, planning, advocacy and support

Four goals resulted from this process:

• Develop greater participation in Monterey County’s culture and creative activities by residents and visitors
• Build and strengthen the creative industries as a major economic cluster in the region
• Make effective use of arts, culture and creative opportunities to promote vibrant and healthy communities, including education and workforce development
• Develop visible support mechanisms to nurture and promote arts, culture and creativity

This planning activity was conducted as part of Communities Advancing the Arts, a major funding initiative of The James Irvine Foundation.

Community foundations take heart: new donors are out there! They may just be waiting to be asked. A pilot program challenged arts nonprofits in and around Oakland to attract individual donors. And it worked, bringing in more than 800 new givers. The idea came from the East Bay Community Foundation, and was quickly adopted by The San Francisco Foundation.

Good numbers

East Bay Community Foundation offered matching grants of up to $10,000, and selected 15 organizations to receive matching commissions supporting 36 artists. The San Francisco Foundation offered matches up to $5,000, and supported 22 organizations commissioning 36 artists. Incredibly, these grants were matched by a total of 801 donors with gifts averaging $236.17.

On-the-ground value

Sherri Young, executive director of San Francisco’s African-American Shakespeare Company, wrote: “This funding challenge was a wonderful opportunity for our supporters to step up and give, and a true reason for us to ask for funds. It was an eye-opener for us in challenging preconceived ideas about who has money and who did not. The challenge works and is encouraging for organizations such as ours to increase our individual donor base in a way that works for us.”

Eugene Rodriguez, Executive Director of Los Cenzontles Mexican Arts Center in San Pablo, wrote: “The outcomes of the donor match have been broader and deeper than we had anticipated. It enabled donors to become part of our core artistic process thereby strengthening their understanding of the many facets of our work and deepening their connection and commitment to the organization and its mission.”

Lasting benefits

This approach continues to have a major impact on smaller arts organizations that lack significant fundraising infrastructure. Regranting funds went to a number of organizations that had never fundraised for artistic commissions before; many had no idea that their supporters would respond so favorably. More importantly, the success of the matching commissions helped build a donor base that these organizations can continue to connect with in support of future financial sustainability.

This activity was conducted as part of Communities Advancing the Arts, a major funding initiative of The James Irvine Foundation.

A new study helps answer the old question: What do arts bring to communities? It documents the economic impact of the nonprofit arts and culture industry, and covers 156 communities and regions representing all 50 states and the District of Columbia. The study was conducted by Americans for the Arts. It includes diverse communities, both rural and urban, ranging from four thousand to three million people.

The attached study focuses solely on nonprofit arts and culture organizations and their audiences and excludes spending by individual artists and the for-profit arts and entertainment sector. The two largest U.S. cities, New York and Los Angeles, each with more than $1 billion in organizational expenditures, were excluded from this study to avoid inflating the national estimates.

Arts are big business…with big benefits

America’s nonprofit arts and culture industry generates $166.2 billion in economic activity every year—$63.1 billion in spending by organizations and an additional $103.1 billion in event-related spending by audiences. The national impact of this activity is significant, supporting 5.7 million jobs and generating $29.6 billion in government revenue.

The impact of spending by nonprofit arts and culture organizations is far reaching; they pay their employees, purchase supplies, and acquire assets within the local community. Additionally, unlike most industries, nonprofit arts and culture leverage significant event-related spending by their audience. Whether serving the local community or out-of-town visitors, a vibrant arts and culture industry helps local businesses thrive.

Less public support for arts is the trend in many communities. Monterey County has reversed the pattern. Here is a happy story of increased commitment to arts by a local government, and of collaboration between a community foundation and arts council to make it happen. It begins in the context of public sector budgets.

Monterey County, like virtually all local governments in California, has faced severe financial pressures in recent years. In response to these challenges, county funding of the Arts Council declined from a 2003/04 high of more than $500,000 to less than $95,000 in 2006/07.

Based on continued budget concerns, county staff’s recommendation for 2007/08 funding was $120,000.

A winning combination

Working in tandem, the Arts Council of Monterey County and the Community Foundation for Monterey County engaged the County Board of Supervisors to revisit this recommendation. By emphasizing the vital role of arts and culture in economic development (Monterey continues to be a hot spot for national festivals as well as a welcome home for emerging and established artists) and in quality of life (for current residents plus those considering locating to the region), these community leaders helped the Board of Supervisors rethink the emphasis given arts in the county budget.

The result: an increase in funding to more than $300,000 for 2007/08.

Even better, the Supervisors committed to restore and revitalize the historic formula (abandoned in recent years) for ensuring that arts have significant support from the county’s coffers.

According to Paulette Lynch, Executive Director of the Arts Council for Monterey County, the visible involvement of the community foundation was essential to helping county leaders understand the broad-reaching impact of the arts, as well as the value of investing in a creative economy. Following the Board of Supervisors’ action, her note to community foundation colleagues concluded, “Thanks to you all, the arts are back on track in Monterey County and poised to take a leadership role in the creative economy.”

The Community Foundation for Monterey County is a participant in Communities Advancing the Arts, a major funding initiative of The James Irvine Foundation.

Raising permanent funds for arts and helping local artists launch careers are two challenges faced by many communities. Both led to one solution in Sonoma County: an Emerging Artists Fund. It connects the power of endowment giving to the value of providing early support to artists. And it has real appeal for arts donors.

The fund was created by the Community Foundation Sonoma County in partnership with the Arts Council of Sonoma County.

An Emerging Artists Award was developed to bring visibility to this fund. In its first year, a panel of well-known local artists, gallery owners and curators reviewed the work of 78 artists. They narrowed the pool down to 25. A small team of respected curators from outside the area then chose three winners featured at a special awards event.

Event objective

Illustrate the benefits of, and great need for, an Emerging Artist Fund by introducing it in an inspired way.

Recipe for success

• Invite a diverse group of arts enthusiasts—both experienced and new to arts philanthropy—to a light dinner and refreshments
• Combine with emerging artists as well as leaders of local arts organizations
• Add a tour of the hosts’ sculpture-filled home, including a sneak-peek of public art prior to its debut
• Mix in intriguing speakers: Katharine DeShaw, Executive Director of United States Artists, to describe national arts funding streams; Ned Kahn, an internationally known local artist, to tell how an emerging artist grant changed his life; Steve Oliver, Board Chair of San Francisco MOMA, to share his personal commitment to supporting artists and the Emerging Artist Fund
• Award three new artists each with $5,000 to advance their work and community contributions
• Top off with stories of how relatively small levels of financial support have made a big difference in the careers of art creators

Results

New connections—between arts supporters, artists, and the fund that helps fulfill the greatest aspirations of all. And new resources—the community foundation is well on the way toward hitting its initial goal of gaining $300,000 in new community support for the Emerging Artists Fund.

This activity was conducted as part of Communities Advancing the Arts, a major funding initiative of The James Irvine Foundation.

San Diego has lots of arts and culture. But no one really knew how much the community cared about this arena… until the community foundation took a look. This research project studied who in the community is involved (or not) in the arts. It measured commitment to arts. And it examined the state of the nonprofit arts sector. The study was commissioned by The San Diego Community Foundation.

The attached report captures results of the study. It describes the role of arts and culture in community life, makes a case for increased donor support to sustain arts and culture as part of a vibrant region, and presents a plan for increasing cultural patronage. It includes an overview of the research methodology used.

Key findings

Five items headlined the results of this study.

1. Cultural participation needs to be deepened and expanded.
2. San Diego’s arts and culture community is under-funded.
3. People care about the arts: two-thirds of San Diegans would be willing to pay more taxes to support arts and culture.
4. The region places high priority on increasing arts education.
5. The San Diego Foundation should be a catalyst to help strengthen the arts and culture community.

Today, the foundation has advanced beyond this initial research to create a set of strategies for deepening the connection of arts to community throughout the San Diego area.

This research activity was conducted as part of Communities Advancing the Arts, a major funding initiative of The James Irvine Foundation.

“I am raising my son differently because of our work in the arts.” Shelley Hoss, President of the Orange County Community Foundation, is taking her organization’s newfound role in the arts personally. The story begins in the mid-1990s, when Shelley’s team recognized that arts represented “a gap in both our knowledge base and our role in this county. Living up to our responsibility to serve donors and community meant building more knowledge, relationships and value in the arts arena.” Three years into Communities Advancing the Arts, this sense of responsibility morphed into genuine passion. Says Shelley, “I have become a convert to the critical role of the arts in a healthy community, and for healthy individuals. Art is not an add-on or a bonus or something to do if you can get to it. It’s a key part of quality of life, which is what we are all about.”

Todd Hanson, Vice President for Donor Relations and Programs, is a believer as well. “Prior to this initiative, we would not have said much about the importance of the arts when talking with donors. Now, when a donor wants to know about community needs, we add arts to the mix, and we do it without detracting from any other area of community need.”

A fragmented arts scene

Orange County is home to nearly 500 arts organizations. Fewer than 20 are big players with more than $1 million in revenue; well over 400 are small organizations with revenue of less than $99,000. Arts venues, like the population, are dispersed throughout this urban county. A centralized art district does not exist, so attracting audiences is a challenge, and there is limited awareness of Orange County’s rich arts programming and offerings.

The community foundation saw the need to know more about the arts landscape before attempting to engage donors in this arena. It took action, conducting research with Arts Orange County to better understand local attitudes.

Opening eyes

Released in 2006, the research report made it clear that Orange County residents care about the arts:

• Sixty-four percent of residents (and/or their immediate family members) actively create or participate in the arts.
• Seventy-five percent of local arts organizations were founded in the last 35 years.
• Ninety-eight percent of residents agree that arts are critical for the education and development of children.

“This research sent us in a whole different direction,” says Shelley Hoss. The community foundation had begun with an assumption that it would be building a case for more arts giving among its traditional donor base. The effect of the research was revolutionary, Shelley reports. “It caused us to see that our work is about bringing arts to all the people of Orange County. It’s about drawing the entire spectrum of our community into a pipeline to generate support for arts.”

Going deep

This new view led to strategies for building infrastructure that could support this pipeline. Key ingredients include:

• A working partnership with Arts Orange County, and an ongoing commitment to help this local arts council become stronger and more sustainable
• An increased grantmaking emphasis, with a record level of $2.4 million in arts support in 2007
• Intentional support for small arts nonprofits, including using Irvine regranting funds to supply $250,000 across 25 organizations, and launching a series of customized technical assistance workshops designed to help these organizations move forward in a sustainable way.

More depth will be added in a next stage of work, featuring continuing partnership with Arts Orange County to:

• Engage local donors and raise a $1.2 million endowment for local arts programs
• Support local arts organizations’ efforts to build endowments
• Focus on youth, including grants and support for arts education in all schools across the county
• Launching a comprehensive website promoting Orange County arts events, venues, and organizations

It’s all part of a new awareness. According to Shelley, “Impact in arts lies largely with the arts organizations themselves. Their ability to plan, market, attract audience, deliver quality experiences… that’s what makes this sector go.”

Transformative power

Early into its learning curve, the community foundation saw the possibilities for impact. “We talked about it with lots of people and heard about these ideas from enough local arts organizations to see that all kinds of things were doable, if someone could get the ball rolling,” says Shelley. “There was plenty of pent-up demand, and we could help match it with supply.

“Our role of neutral convener really came to bear here. We were positioned nicely to say things other people were thinking, and to get groups talking who wouldn’t normally talk to each other.”

The community foundation has benefited enormously from this process. For example, Shelley and Todd now have regular contact and “warm, collegial relationships” with virtually all leaders of the 10 major arts organizations in the county; just three years ago they were zero for 10 in this arena. They also report a huge transformation in how the arts community views the community foundation. At the beginning, attitudes “probably ranged from being curious to thinking of us as a competitor,” says Shelley. Today the perception has completely shifted. The community foundation is seen as having a strong commitment to arts, and to having an impact for all arts organizations from small and new to big and mature.

Broader value

“The learning from this is transferable to other things we are doing,” says Todd Hanson. Of particular relevance is the community foundation’s broad interest in growing more field-of-interest funds, with appreciation that work building an arts endowment will set the stage for expansion to other program areas.

Shelley adds that, “Experience with arts has forced us to think about our messaging relative to other nonprofits. It affects how we describe the community foundation to grantees as well as to other nonprofits that we are not funding. Several of them are bigger than us, yet we can show how we add value to their work.”

“Working with the Orange County Community Foundation to cultivate local donor interest has helped to increase our long-term viability,” said Lawrence Rosenberg, Founder and Co-director of Anaheim Ballet, which promotes the practice of ballet among diverse youth in Orange County. “We’re proud of the work we do to introduce more than 30,000 students annually to ballet and performance art through community outreach, education, professional concerts and our online video series. Thanks to this help from the Orange County Community Foundation, we have a greater ability to raise awareness and positively impact the lives of more young people.”

Arts have been good for Orange County Community Foundation. And for Shelley’s family, “My husband and I are doing things in arts that never would have happened before this initiative. Our son was introduced to the symphony at age 2, and is in dance at age 4. It’s a whole new way of looking at life.”

Orange County Community Foundation is a participant in Communities Advancing the Arts, a major funding initiative of The James Irvine Foundation.

“The arts are common ground for community, a meeting ground,” says Melissa Kester, Arts Development Officer for Community Foundation Sonoma County. “It’s about expressing different points of view, understanding things in new ways, and coming together around shared experiences.” This insight opens a window for viewing the foundation’s partnership with its local arts sector.

“It is a relationship that began in 1989,” reports CEO Kay Marquet, “with an initial grant made possible through the National Endowment for the Arts. And it is a relationship that has blossomed in recent years through a creative, collaborative focus on the arts.”

Making connections

This focus involves connecting with individual artists, arts nonprofits (ranging from grassroots organizations to nationally recognized arts centers), donors and other funders who seek to build community through arts. At the center of this network is a strategic partnership between Community Foundation Sonoma County and the Arts Council of Sonoma County.

“The Arts Council is a wonderful resource to, and an effective champion for, this region’s diverse, dynamic arts sector,” adds Robert Judd, Community Foundation Sonoma County Vice President for Programs. “Together with a cadre of local arts organizations, we are able to present a united sector. This in turn allows us to invite a wider base of donors and public leaders to step forward—and add to an ever-greater vision for what arts can achieve in and for this community.”

Some big steps forward

Recent results of this approach have been encouraging, to say the least. Between 2005 and 2007, with support from The James Irvine Foundation’s Communities Advancing the Arts initiative, the Community Foundation and Arts Council worked with local leaders to establish a Santa Rosa Arts District in the center of the county’s largest city. Three popular, countywide projects were initiated as well: an Artist Awards program, Sculpture Sonoma, and Performance Sonoma.

As part of the Performance Sonoma festival, 12 local performing arts organizations put on productions related to the featured theme, Crossing Borders. In Healdsburg, The Imaginists Theatre Collective created an original production, “The Divide/La División,” which explored issues of immigration and the challenges in finding common ground between local immigrant Latinos and resident Anglos in the area. The bilingual production led to an opening in community dialogue around these challenges (view a video documentary on YouTube).

“Participating in Performance Sonoma allowed our company to explore issues that influence everyday life in our community,” said Brent Lindsay, The Imaginists’ Executive Director.

Community Foundation Sonoma County also launched an Artists Award as a way to raise the visibility of budding local visual artists. Six award winners selected by a panel of highly-regarded independent judges have received unrestricted grants of $5,000 each. In addition to the grant funds, the winning artists have enjoyed growing recognition within Sonoma County and beyond. For example, Seth Minor, a 2006 award winner, is commissioned to create public artwork for the City of Santa Rosa. Complementing these efforts to support local artists, the foundation also worked with Sonoma State University to conduct a series of public discussions for artists on navigating “the business” of the arts.

A growth agenda

Community Foundation Sonoma County and its partners aim to double the nearly $300,000 already raised to endow the Artists Award Fund, with the goal of expanding awards to include performing and literary artists. Near-term plans involve further engaging with the City of Santa Rosa around its newly-established Arts District—and working collaboratively with private donors and public officials to create a lasting and vibrant downtown arts area.

Also on the drawing board are plans to explore creating a signature festival that would invigorate local arts audiences and attract tourists to the region’s arts scene. And an exciting project is well underway, led by the Arts Council, to provide a centralized online portal for arts information and access throughout Sonoma County.

Lessons learned

What have Community Foundation leaders learned so far? Three major lessons stand out. For one, creating partnerships is worthwhile work—but takes time. “We probably underestimated this point as we got started on a more earnest approach to arts outreach three years ago,” says Melissa Kester, who also emphasizes the importance of carefully assessing and understanding the capacity of key partner organizations.

Second, deeper engagement with the arts sector—nonprofits, government, and donors—can be a model opportunity for community foundations to explore new ways of working. According to Paul DeMarco, Finance and Administration Vice President, “In many ways this program is serving as a prototype for our role in community leadership… providing us with new ways to interact with donors… and helping us demonstrate high levels of value through our work convening others.”

Third, and perhaps most important, says Kay Marquet, “We are proving that arts are as good for community as community is for arts.”

Community Foundation Sonoma County is a participant in Communities Advancing the Arts, a major funding initiative of The James Irvine Foundation.

Sometimes the first step is the hardest. Recognizing that small, community-based arts organizations often need help starting their own fundraising, two Bay Area community foundations took action. The tool they created helps these nonprofits follow a simple blueprint to build a base of donors. It’s part of the technical assistance these organizations supply to grassroots arts grantees. The tool was created by The San Francisco Foundation and the East Bay Community Foundation. The attached file overviews the simple, strategic five-part approach used to help emerging arts organizations engage with donors who value their contributions to community.

A five-part approach

The tool and its elements were introduced at a technical assistance workshop:

1. Gain conviction—develop the courage and commitment to raise funds to sustain your work.
2. Clarify identity—sharpen your image and establish a position based on your unique qualities.
3. Activate network—recruit and equip those who value your work to connect you to others who may value your work.
4. Engage prospects—make contact and provide positive artistic experiences for your potential new donors.
5. Cultivate relationships—increase and track contacts with your key prospects and donors, creating strong personal connections.

This tool was created as part of Communities Advancing the Arts, a major funding initiative of The James Irvine Foundation.

Everybody wants to know more and do less, right? The James Irvine Foundation and 30 arts grantmakers are launching the California Cultural Data Project. It’s a statewide collaboration standardizing the information funders collect from grant seekers. The idea is to simplify grant applications, improve grant tracking and get the most from analysis of arts programs and unmet needs. The goal is to build the sector’s collective knowledge and impact. Many community foundations are participating. Additional info at Irvine website. Read more.