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Dear Arts Advocate,
Welcome back to our newsletter!
This quarterly newsletter will focus on the following MCA updates throughout the year:
· January Budget reminder + Maryland Arts Day reminder
· May/June Session recap + MD Arts Summit reminders or recap
· September Summer highlights + ARTSLab save the date
· December Holiday + ARTSLab recap + Maryland Arts Day save
the date
We will still be sending separate emails for important events including reminders and registration, but we hope this will provide some fun news in the meanwhile.
HIGHLIGHTS
ArtsLAB is just around the corner, check out the official date in What’s New. This November, we’re voting for our next Governor amongst several other important races! Scroll down to the DROP to read more. We’ve spotlighted Allegany County-based artist Michael Hunter Thompson in Key Players for his dedication to community engagement and legacy-making.
Check out our summer newsletter if you missed it!
Happy scrolling,
Safiyah and the Team at MCA
WHAT’S NEW
MCA-specific updates | ArtsLAB reminder
WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 16, 2022
ArtsLAB is a professional development symposium where artists, arts professionals, advocates and more come together to discuss current issues and concerns facing the arts sector. This event will once again be virtual due to the ongoing pandemic.
DID YOU KNOW?
Funding, advocacy or policy news & fun facts
MCA IS ABLE TO TABLE YOUR NEXT EVENT TO SUPPORT VOTER REGISTRATION.
Email us at info@mdarts.org and Scroll down to read more about this election season.
THERE ARE MANY ARTS FUNDING OPPORTUNITIES
The $40million in Arts Relief Funding (advocated for by MCA, awarded to MSAC for distribution) is already being allocated in numerous ways. READ
MORE HERE about how you may be able to get a scoop of the pot. There are too many to list, but here are some that stick out:
As an individual artist:
- You can apply to be a panelist or juror.
- Here is an example of the Maryland State Arts Council seeking panelists for various artistic disciplines; panelists are offered $50 for training and $200 per monthly review.
- Here is an example of the Baltimore-based Grit Fund seeking
jurors for their annual grant applications; jurors are offered a $400 stipend.
- Look out for your local organizations seeking panelists or jurors!
- You can apply to receive a NYFA Rauschenberg Medical Emergency Grant — unrelated to MSAC
- “One-time grants of up to $5,000 for recent unexpected medical, dental, and mental health emergencies to artists in financial need* who are practicing in the visual arts, film/video/electronic/digital arts, and choreography.”
- Cycle 15 opens TODAY September 27, with a deadline of October 28, for emergencies occurring February 1, 2022 and
later.
- This grant is not limited to New Yorkers! I (Baltimore-based Safiyah) received a RMEGrant earlier this year.
As a small arts organization:
- You can apply for MSAC’s monthly, rolling Creativity Grant for Projects
- Intended to support specific arts projects, events, or programs funding up to $4,000 and is also open to individual artists.
- You can apply for to MSAC’s monthly, rolling Professional Development Opportunity Grant
- assists artists and arts organizations to implement best practices by embracing growth, learning, and discovery for economic sustainability up to $2,000.
Annapolis-based news and political need-to-knows
Nov 8th is VOTING DAY across Maryland
This election season we look forward to receiving responses from our Gubernatorial, Comptroller, and States Attorney General candidates on their relationship and commitment to the arts. This information will be used in our forthcoming, pocket-sized
Voter Engagement Guide for you to bring to the polls! Until then, use VOTE411 to familiarize yourself with the ballot.
MCA IS ABLE TO TABLE YOUR NEXT EVENT TO SUPPORT VOTER REGISTRATION
Email us at info@mdarts.org and Scroll down to read more about this election season.
AROUND TOWN
Upcoming events throughout Maryland
LET US KNOW IF YOU ATTEND ANY OF THE EVENTS IN THIS NEWSLETTER USING THE HASHTAG #AdvocacyAve AND TAGGING @mdcitizensarts!
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New Works
Friday, Sept 30 @ 8:00pm, 7:30 doors
2640 Space — 2640 St Paul St, Baltimore, MD 21218
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Fells Point Fun Festival
Friday-Sunday, September 30 – October 2 @ 11:00 am – 6:00 pm
Fells Point Fun Festival — 812 S Ann St, Baltimore, MD 21231
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Latin Rhythms Festival
Saturday, October 1, 2022 at 12:00 pm – 10:00 pm
BlackRock Center for the Arts — 12901 Town Commons Drive, Germantown, MD 20874
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William Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night
Saturday, October 7 – 30 @ Various Times
Classic Theatre of Maryland — 1804 West Street, Annapolis, MD 21401
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Community Dance Team Showcase!
Saturday, October 8 @ 4:00 pm
Olney Theatre Center — 2001 Olney-Sandy Spring Rd, Olney, MD 20832
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Baltimore Clayworks FIRE FEST 2022
Saturday, October 15 @ 2:00 pm
Baltimore Clayworks — 5707 Smith Ave., Baltimore, MD 21209
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SunFest Ocean City
Thursday – Sunday, October 20-23, 2022
Thursday, Friday and Saturday @ 10 am – 7 pm; Sunday @ 10 am – 6 pm
Ocean City — 698 N Atlantic Ave, Ocean City, MD 21842
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Lost in the Stars
Sunday, October 30 @ 3:00 pm – 5:30 pm
Maryland Hall — 801 Chase St., Annapolis, MD 21401
If you’d like to see your event featured in the December newsletter, please email us your event details at info@mdarts.org!
KEY PLAYERS
A spotlight interview with an individual who is either an independent artist, member of an arts organization, and/or member of the Maryland General Assembly.
Michael Hunter Thompson
We chose to spotlight Michael in this edition because of his success with Fade to Blue (2020-2022), a community engaged, photo-based preservation project in Allegany County, including distinguished accolades, boisterous support, and a culminating book of over 100 individual oral histories from photo shoot participants of the “over 500 alumni and
former staff [who] returned to Allegany High School.”
Michael says, “Although I’m very proud of the photographs I captured and the book I created, it’s the personal connections that I made over the past two years that I will never forget!”
INTERVIEW with MCA
Safiyah, MCA: First I want to thank you so much for the great energy you brought to the Summit this past June. You’ve had a lot of success with your community photo archiving project around the abandoned Allegany High School. Can you tell me a bit about your relationship with the school and the school’s role in
the community or its history?
Michael: I am a 1999 graduate of Allegany High School and my mom taught art at Allegany for 18 years. AHS, located in Cumberland, MD was the first public secondary school in Allegany County, beginning in 1887. It moved from building to building at the beginning before settling at a new school built on a site called Campobello on
Sedgwick Street in 1926, which this project is about. Generations of families attended school there until it closed in 2018 when a new facility was built and Allegany on Sedgwick Street was razed in 2022.
Safiyah, MCA: You’ve shared with us that you had a whole Fade to Blue weekend! That can only mean this project has had a lot of traction in your community. The weekend consisted of an opening reception, book launch and large celebration including a band, a Governor’s Citation, the Mayor’s support and dozens of attendees sporting blue. Was this just a major reunion of Allegany High School’s alumni or something much larger? What do you think
contributed to the outpouring of support for your project?
Michael: The celebration, held after the exhibition’s opening reception was most definitely a major Allegany school reunion. It brought generations of alumni back to the area as well as local non-alumni together to celebrate what the building meant to this community for almost a century. There were an estimated 1,500 to 2,000 attendees. But that was only a fraction of the project’s scope. It really was something much larger. The community rallied around it because it gave them an opportunity to have one last positive shared experience in their high school before it was gone forever. Many of them had never met before and began sharing stories and interacting bringing the community even closer together. I was able to capture this experience through photography and interviews, which will now live on although the building itself is gone.
Safiyah, MCA: Artwork that tells a story about the
history of a place, person, or thing is my jam. And as a social practice artist, I also love community engagement. So lastly, can you talk about the artmaking perspective of this project and the steps you took towards community involvement throughout the project?
Michael: I love trying to tell a story with a single image. One moment frozen in time that hopefully captures the viewer’s imagination. So, I planned about 40 different staged photographs in and outsides of the school using a range of generations in each image to capture a coming of age at Allegany. The building was vandalized but the figures in the images are acting as if school is in session giving the images an extra layer of curiosity. The community was engaged from the project’s inception through a Facebook Group I created. It was the easiest way to communicate information, scheduling and share images and stories. The group is now over 3,600 members and still growing although the project has come to its conclusion. Five hundred of them participated in the photographs at the school and I interviewed 100 of them for the Fade To Blue book. The project had many components and layers over a two year period, and the community was watching and participating every step of the way.
It is clear the care with which Michael has served his community and the wealth of knowledge and history that Allegany High School and its community hold! Here’s some anonymous feedback of Michael’s impact on attendees at his Maryland Arts Summit session:
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“This was an excellent session. It was really good to hear a passionate artist (and one NOT from a major metro area) speak about his project. Very inspiring.”
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“Hearing Michael’s story about his engagement with the community was really powerful. He presented his project in a way that made me excited to learn more and pursue my own community engagement strategies. I also appreciated how he framed his presentation as offering a model for community engaged projects. I would be interested to hear
more about how he would break down that model into actionable steps.”
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“A truly inspirational story of an artistic vision turning into a community project & more.”
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“Probably the best session I attended. Art meets community with compassion and love of ones
history.”
ACTIVITY
Coloring, crossword, or matching game
Let’s start with distinguishing important organizations for you to know!
Playing for a prize: The first 3 people to tag us on Facebook, Instagram, or Twitter with your completed (and correct) Crossword will receive a free 8-pack of Crayola crayons from our annual legislative crayon drop mailed to you free of charge.
MATCH these arts organizations with their respective counties.
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