Americans for the Arts

“To fundamentally transform the field in order to meet a fundamentally changing nation and time, we need to fundamentally change who is in the field ”

This was the prompt I was given, earlier this year, when I was asked to speak at the Americans for the Arts Convention. It so happens that I spend a lot of time thinking about transforming the arts and culture field; on the account of the fact that I work for Fractured Atlas, a nonprofit technology organization that helps artists with the business side of the creative work, where transforming the status quo of the field is part and parcel of everything that we do.

Nancy Hanks

Americans for the Arts is proud to announce that 2012 marks the 25^th anniversary of the Nancy Hanks Lecture on Arts and Public Policy.

The lecture itself is dedicated to an impressive and influential individual -- Nancy Hanks, former president of Americans for the Arts (then known as the American Council for the Arts) and chairwoman of the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA).

Chairwoman Hanks was appointed by President Nixon in 1969, four years after the founding of the NEA, and served two four-year terms.

Under her tenure, the NEA’s budget grew by a staggering 1,400 percent! This budgetary expansion is demonstrative of the critical role Chairwoman Hanks played in the development of the NEA and the arts in America.

Hanks proved to be an articulate and effective advocate for the importance of federal arts support during an especially vulnerable time. As members of Congress continued to dispute the very existence of the NEA, she was able to personally persuade dozens of legislators to vote for increased appropriations.

Tim Mikulski

It's become a tradition that ARTSblog offers up a question as part of our annual New Year's card (our 2012 question will be posted in two weeks), so I didn't want to take away from that when I started writing a "Happy Holidays" post this morning.

As I began writing a simple message thanking our members, friends, arts leaders (both emerging and emerged), artists, arts administrators, arts educators, social media readers, bloggers, advocates, funders (current, past, and future), partner organizations, business leaders, and (insert anyone I accidentally missed here), I searched the Internet for a quote that would be appropriate for the holidays or New Year that also included the arts.

I found a few that I liked, but then it dawned on me. I need only look back to our 2009 Nancy Hanks Lecture on Arts & Public Policy given by Wynton Marsalis. His performance/speech was titled "The Ballad of the American Arts."

As he covered our country's history, the end of Marsalis' speech talked about the future and I think this passage sums up the end of year/holiday feeling that many of us have this time of year:

This year marks the 25^th anniversary of National Arts Advocacy Day (AAD), the largest and most wide-ranging, one-day advocacy effort in support of the arts.

Advocates come from across the country come to Washington, DC, to meet with their members of Congress and staff members as part of the event. While the topics range from charitable giving incentives to cultural exchange, the keystone issue for many advocates remains support for the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA).

Here is what last year's National Arts Advocacy Day Co-Chair Kerry Washington had to say about the importance of NEA funding (and other issues):

If that wasn't enough, check out some of the stats that demonstrate the scope of the NEA’s impact:

• Nearly 2,000 NEA awards have been made in communities in all 50 states.
• 100 percent of Congressional districts will receive at least one grant, and 3,000 or more communities will participate in NEA-sponsored projects. These communities will benefit from these projects in ways such as touring and outreach.
• Nearly 90 million individuals benefit from NEA programs, including 9 million children and young adults.
• The NEA has awarded more than $4 billion to support artistic excellence, creativity, and innovation for the benefit of individuals and communities.
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