January 10, 2015
Delaware, Pennsylvania, NEFA: Internet-Enabled Technology Serving the Arts
More than a decade after the rise of “Web 2.0,” the proliferation and falling cost of on-line and other digital technologies means that state arts agencies can do more now than ever to engage their constituents and support artists, arts organizations and arts audiences in their state. This month, State to State looks at three ways state arts agencies and regional arts organizations have harnessed Internet-enabled technology to better serve the arts.
Smartphone App Connecting Artists and Audiences
The Delaware Division of the Arts is offering a new smartphone app to make it easier to browse the state’s arts and culture opportunities and to make plans to enjoy them. What’s On, available for free on iTunes and Google Play, features an interactive map locating ongoing and upcoming performances, exhibitions, films, concerts and more across Delaware. By tapping event icons on the map, a user immediately accesses links to event websites as well as contact information, driving directions and other useful information. These listings and their logistics also are available in the form of a searchable list. The app draws on the Division’s existing on-line calendar of arts happenings, DelawareScene.com, which has been connecting audiences to artists and arts organizations—and vice versa—since 2008. The Division of the Arts developed the app in partnership with the Delaware Government Information Center, the state agency responsible for leveraging the Internet and digital technologies to connect citizens and government agencies. To learn more, contact Division of the Arts Program Officer Katie West.
New Website Features Grantee Stories, Videos
An updated Pennsylvania Council on the Arts (PCA) website has launched that draws on the power of social media, including its new Facebook page highlighting arts activities and opportunities around the commonwealth, to better connect with its constituencies and promote the efforts of its grantees. The new site’s intuitive architecture is built on three main navigation headings reflecting the common reasons various people visit it. Two of the sections—Who We Are and What We Do—provide, respectively, information about the Arts Council’s purpose, staff and structure and details about its grants and services. The third, What You Do, stands apart as it showcases the work of PCA grantees to organize and present diverse, exciting and engaging arts and culture events. Incorporating its new YouTube channel, PCA features in this section videos telling “Impact Stories” of its Arts in Education grantees and recognizing the “Best of the Best” projects supported by its Pennsylvania Partners in the Arts grants. PCA Program Director Caroline Savage managed the effort to revamp the website. For more information, contact PCA Deputy Director for Communication & Special Assistant for External Affairs Heather Doughty.
CreativeGround Directory
CreativeGround is New England’s free on-line creative economy directory, featuring 30,000 profiles of cultural nonprofits, creative businesses, and artists of all disciplines and mediums. Launched in January 2014, CreativeGround is a project of New England Foundation for the Arts (NEFA) that replaces its two former arts directories, CultureCount and Matchbook.org, and is built on partnerships with the National Endowment for the Arts and New England’s six state arts agencies. Designed to meet the needs of the region’s artists, arts audiences and arts administrators—as well as non-arts entities like city planners and private developers—CreativeGround allows users to sort profiles through specific combinations of variables such as arts disciplines, services, populations served, languages spoken, institution/business type, venue characteristics and accessibility features. The on-line directory is a versatile tool, enabling users to promote their work, to connect with each other and to collaborate and cross-pollinate. Because such connections sustain the creative economy, individual profiles on CreativeGround include a section for highlighting working relationships, which the website quantifies to indicate the depth and breadth of creative activity and enterprise in New England. In addition, CreativeGround supports state arts agencies, powering, for example, the cultural directories and artist rosters of Rhode Island, Vermont and New Hampshire. Find out more about from NEFA CreativeGround Administrator Allie Fiske.