NebraskaStrong Creative Relief is a new partnership between the Nebraska Library Commission and the Nebraska Arts Council (NAC). The goal of the collaboration is to use the arts to bring people together and affirm resourcefulness, civic cohesion, grit and community pride—all essential to recovery in regions of Nebraska damaged by this year’s record-breaking floods. NebraskaStrong…
According to the results of a pilot social impact study that the Utah Division of Arts & Museums (UA&M) is conducting, museum visitation is correlated with statistically significant increases in health and well-being, intercultural competence, strengthened relationships, and continued education and engagement. UA&M undertook this project with Thanksgiving Point—a nonprofit farm, garden and museum complex…
The Michigan Council for Arts and Cultural Affairs (MCACA) recently launched a five-part series on Michigan Public Radio featuring stories about how creative expression brings people and communities closer together. Each segment of Creating Connection MI is a meditation on the connectivity of the arts and the positive roles that culture and creativity play in our personal…
This year, there is a new category of the biennial South Dakota Governor’s Awards in the Arts—presented by the South Dakota Arts Council and Arts South Dakota—that honors efforts to support tribal communities. The Outstanding Support of the Arts to Native Nations with Lands in South Dakota Award recognizes an individual, organization or business that…
This fall, California Poet Laureate Dana Gioia—who served as the chair of the National Endowment for the Arts from 2003 to 2008—completed his term of literary public service to the state by organizing and hosting the first large-scale gathering of California’s poets laureate past and present. The event, which was designed not only to celebrate…
In Iowa, where three-quarters of the state’s 544 public libraries serve communities with fewer than 2,500 residents, there is a new initiative to support creative aging in rural areas. Iowa Arts Learning in Libraries is a collaborative effort of the State Library of Iowa and the Iowa Arts Council (IAC) to offer free arts classes…
The New Jersey State Council on the Arts (NJSCA) is the first-ever state partner in the Diversity in Arts Leadership (DIAL) internship program. Created by Americans for the Arts (AFTA), this national program, which began in New York City, strives to strengthen and advance diversity in the arts management field and help foster the next…
ARTShops is a collaborative effort of the Alaska State Council on the Arts (ASCA) and The CIRI Foundation—with support from the Alaska Arts and Culture Foundation—to catalyze Alaska Native artists’ creative leadership and community development throughout rural Alaska. Every year since the pilot program launched in 2016, a jury-selected cohort of four artists participates in…
With a $1 million Civil Monetary Penalty grant from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services and the Tennessee Department of Health, the Tennessee Arts Commission (TAC) is implementing Music & Memory Tennessee, a model therapeutic-music program that will serve at least 2,200 patients in 147 nursing homes over the next three years. Music &…
One of the ways the Florida Division of Cultural Affairs (DCA) has realized the vision of its 2015-2020 strategic plan to foster vibrant, thriving and healthy communities is to partner with the University of Florida Center for Arts in Medicine in support of its Florida Arts & Wellbeing Indicators initiative. DCA funded the three-year effort to develop…
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