New Grant Awards Made to Sonoma County Creatives

Creative Sonoma is very proud to have significantly expanded our grant making portfolio this year. Over the past 2 months, we have awarded $184,000 to 28 recipients for creative projects through our Arts Education Innovation, Pop-Up Creativity, and Summer Arts Youth Program Grants.

July 2017

The Arts Education Innovation and Pop-Up Creativity awards bring our total grant making for the 2017 Fiscal Year to $204,500, a $104,000 increase over the prior year. And by the end of July, we’ll have kicked off our 2018 Fiscal Year by awarding $100,000 to arts organizations for our third year of Summer Arts Youth Program Grants, and $12,500 to 5 musicians or bands in our second year of funding through Next Level Music Grants.

Grants will fund projects across the county to enliven neighborhoods and communities through the arts. These grants play a central role in Creative Sonoma’s mission to advance and support the creative community.

Summer Arts Youth Program Grants will facilitate arts training for young people this summer who will learn acting, classical and mariachi music, bookmaking, functional art and more. Arts Education Innovation Grants will offer music, theater, writing and other genre instruction in both in and out of school settings throughout the year. And Pop-Up Creativity Grants will provide temporary art activities including anonymous love letter exchanges, mobile art booths, yarn bombing, and a 90 second film festival. Check out each of the grant program pages for a list of all current and past grantees, or scroll down to the lists below. 

Grants are provided based on the success of our own grant writing efforts  in other words, we regularly walk in the same shoes as our constituents in researching and cultivating grant making organizations who can potentially provide new funding for re-granting in Sonoma County. We anticipate that the levels of available grants will fluctuate from year to year, but it is always our hope to maintain a strong baseline of funds into the community for the work you do to make Sonoma a remarkably creative place.

 

2017 ARTS EDUCATION INNOVATION GRANTS

California Parent Institute:  help Phoenix High School’s students explore their world and express themselves through the performing arts

California Poets in the Schools:  deliver high quality poetry writing workshops at underserved schools throughout Sonoma County

Chops Teen Club:  support Chop’s summer arts program in Santa Rosa and to increase youth access to quality art education

Imagine Bus Project:  inspire behavioral change in incarcerated youth through visual arts and creativity

Luther Burbank Center for the Arts:  partner with Lincoln Elementary School District to create an in-depth and extended arts integrated residency

Sonoma Valley Education Foundation:  support the youth-development Valley Vibes Orchestra program for socio-economically disadvantaged students

Transcendence Theater Company:  provide at-risk, low-income youth access to professionally taught performing arts workshops and performances

 

2017 POP-UP CREATIVITY GRANTS

Nicoletta Camerin:  photograph and interview the Mexican Community in Boyes Hot Spring, telling their stories and showing how valuable and essential their work and culture are in our society

Della Fattoria:  Petalumagic Garden will be a temporary public artwork and social sculpture on view at The Della Lounge

Global Student Embassy:  engaging high school students with Sebastopol community residents in the art of natural building through the construction of an outdoor pizza oven and gathering space

Judy Kennedy:  yarn-bombing the 50 bike racks located in Santa Rosa’s Courthouse Square with colorful hand-crocheted sleeves

Jill Valavanis:  creating a Love Letter Art Walk, a free art-making event in The Springs area of Sonoma Valley

Video Droid:  My Life: In 90 Seconds or Less invites independent and amateur filmmakers to create their video self portrait, to culminate in one-day film festival event in Santa Rosa

The Village Builders:  creating a mobile exchange booth and traveling art station in Sebastopol using a repurposed phone booth on a trailer

Jake Ward: a “block party” style music and art festival located at the Roseland Village Neighborhood Center featuring all Roseland-based artists

Womb Space Collaborative Arts:  imagining the Roseland neighborhood’s past, present, and future via love letters of visual and written language and addressed to the community in a public celebration

 

2017 SUMMER ARTS YOUTH PROGRAM GRANTS

6th Street Playhouse:  providing theatre students a nurturing and challenging atmosphere where they have an opportunity to learn, grow, and express themselves through the craft of theatre and performance

Art Escape:  conducting Art of Mexico Camp, for kids, and Art of Character Design Camp, for teens, to culminate in an art show

Artstart:  apprentices from the Summer Program will interview and photograph Palms Inn residents, a motel recently re-purposed to house approximately 100 homeless people, and paint a mural onsite

Cinnabar Arts Corporation:  a Young Repertory Summer Camp providing youth with the opportunity to explore their creativity through musical theater, with each camp culminating in live performances of a Broadway musical 

Healdsburg Center for the Arts:  the Summer Art Camp program will provide scholarships for youth for art classes such as “Design a Game Cardboard Arcade”, “Exploring Acrylics”, and “Book Making”

Imaginists:  apprentices take a devising/writing workshop and rehearse and perform in the annual free, bilingual, bicycle-powered tour, EL SHOW EL ARTE ES MEDICINA/THE ART IS MEDICINE SHOW 

Luther Burbank Center for the Arts:  Summer Arts Sessions for Youth allow young people to positively connect with peers, family, schools, and their cultural heritage during summer camps held at their neighborhood school

Main Stage West:  during Summer Drama Camp, students will compare and contrast various villains in Shakespeare’s plays, Greek mythology, and contemporary classic comics

Petaluma Arts Council:  Summer Arts Camp for Kids & Teens is a 10-week series of 4-day camps where students learn a variety of art-making techniques

Santa Rosa Symphony:  the Summer Music Academy brings together young musicians of every skill level for three weeks of immersive instrument and performance training with accomplished professional musicians

Sebastopol Center for the Arts:  the Summer Art Camp provides 6 weeks of full-day art enrichment including visual arts, functional arts, poetry, performing arts, and more

Sonoma Conservatory of Dance:  the Summer Dance Workshop is a five-week experience grounded in the joy of movement and creative expression

 

 

Pictured above left to right, 2016 Summer Arts Youth Program Grantees:  One City Arts in Santa Rosa, Mariachi Camp in Cloverdale, and Mosaic Camp at Healdsburg Center for the Arts.