The OGP grants are a whole new ballgame! Whether you are a past grantee applying for the 2009-11 cycle or a non-profit arts organization considering applying for the first time, you should familiarize yourself with the new guidelines as soon as possible and well in advance of the deadline for your OGP category.

The two major changes are:

All applicants must submit their financial data through the California Cultural Data Project (CACDP) with their OGP application. CACDP, which went online at the beginning of January, not only makes the grant application process easier but gives arts groups an improved ability to track and analyze their financial and operational data over time and compare it to their peers. Arts organizations need to complete their online data profile only once a year. It is available electronically and can be submitted as part of grant applications to all CACDP participating funding agencies throughout the year.

The online OGP applications are now through WebGrants, which has replaced E-grants.

Complete guidelines are at
/grants.html

Deadlines (all Wednesdays) are as follows:

OGP III (more than $1,500,000) - October 22, 2008

OGP II ($100,000-$500,000) - November 5, 2008

OGP 2.5 ($500,000-$1,500,000) - November 26, 2008

OGP I (budget under $100,000) - December 10, 2008

You can get a head start on your application by attending an application workshop. Consult the workshop schedule at /grants/app_workshop_schedule.html

In July the Arts Commission announced $4,518,000 in two-year grants to 155 nonprofit arts organizations through its Organizational Grant Program (OGP). Thirty-one (20 percent) of the organizations were first time County grantees. In addition to the grantees announced in July, 159 organizations are receiving the second installment of two- year grants awarded last year. These grantees bring the total number of arts organizations receiving County funds to 314. A complete list of 2008-09 grantees is online on the Arts Commission’s web site,
/grantabout.html

Inaugural grants addressing homelessness through arts programs awarded

The Los Angeles County Arts Commission has awarded five pilot grants of $18,000 each to arts programs designed for and serving the homeless community. The new program - Artful Solutions: Pathways from Homelessness - is the nation’s first arts and culture initiative that addresses the critical needs of the homeless population.

Each of the five grantees is partnering with a housing, shelter or social service agency in order to provide homeless individuals or families with quality arts programming. The collaboration is central to the civic objective of the initiative: to stabilize the lives of participants and improve their access to permanent housing. Grantees and partners are

Armory Center for the Arts in partnership with Union Station
California Institute of the Arts (CalArts) in partnership with My Friend’s Place
Imagination Workshop in partnership with New Directions
Los Angeles Poverty Department (LAPD) in partnership with Lamp Community
Venice Arts: In Neighborhoods in partnership with Ocean Park Community Center (OPCC)

A critical evaluation component is built into the grants. The concrete effect that the arts have on homelessness has never been formally documented. Each grantee and partner will work with consultant Mollie Lowery - founder of Lamp Community, a social service agency on Skid Row, and Lamp Art Project for the mentally ill - to develop methods to measure the impact of these arts-based services. Artful Solutions projects will take place over the next twelve months. This data will result in a national study, scheduled to be released in the fall of 2009, informing future strategies for resolving homelessness.

FIRST [INSIDE] THE FORD WINTER PARTNERSHIP SEASON OPENS NOVEMBER 7

Three of L.A.’s most adventurous theatre companies - Moving Arts, Circle X Theatre Co. and The Ghost Road Company – will present a season of world premieres at [Inside] the Ford in 2008-09.

The Ford Theatres complex, operated by the Los Angeles County Arts Commission, is best known for the May to October summer season of music, dance, theater, film and family events in its 1,245-seat outdoor amphitheater. The majority of the 100 plus performances in the Ford Amphitheatre are produced through the Summer Partnership Program; Los Angeles County-based producers and performing arts organizations, chosen through a competitive application process, receive significant promotional and technical support to present their events and keep the lion's share of the box office. Now, for the first time, this successful formula is being applied to presentations at [Inside] the Ford, the 87-seat indoor space that is one of L.A.'s most surprising small theaters.

A company of resident theater artists committed to producing only new and original work, Moving Arts kicks off the [Inside] the Ford 2008-09 Season on November 7 with Song of Extinction (Winner, 2008 Ashland New Plays Festival) by E.M. Lewis.

On January 17, award winning Circle X Theatre Co. unveils the newest play by Jim Leonard (The Diviners): Battle Hymn, about an American Mother Courage, her epic pregnancy, her past, her future - and her incredible search for the meaning of motherhood and love.

Capping the season, a trilogy more than 10 years in the making becomes complete beginning March 26. Inspired in part by The Oresteia, The Ghost Road Company's Home Siege Home, conceived and written by Katharine Noon and developed in workshop by the entire ensemble, is a highly theatrical multi-media piece that explores the intimate lives of one powerful family bent on vengeance for past wrongs.

For more information on the [Inside] the Ford 2008-09 season, visit http://www.fordamphitheater.org/en/events/inside_season.asp.

Top

ARTS EDUCATION UPDATES

Three new districts coming on board for the 2008-09 school year

The school districts of Glendale, Manhattan Beach and Temple City have joined Arts for All, the 10-year initiative to return sequential arts education to all 80 districts in Los Angeles County. Districts which engage in the Arts for All process commit to establishing the five foundation stones of quality arts education: a school board-adopted policy, plan and budget as well as the hiring of an arts coordinator at the district level and a student to credentialed arts teacher ratio no higher than 400:1. Arts for All, which began in 2002, is now working in 31 districts; 17 of these districts have arts coordinators.

Professional Artist School-based Training Program applications open in October

Arts for All's Professional Artist School-based Training Program annually accepts 16 professional artists, four per discipline in music, dance, theater, and visual arts, to participate in a three-part series of workshops culminating in the presentation of sequential lessons in Culver City Unified K-8 classrooms. Participants will receive a Professional Designation in Arts Education certificate and letter of recommendation upon successful completion of this workshop.

The next round of the program will run from January to June 2009. The application will be at /artsed/artsed_profdev.html by October 8, 2008. The deadline for applying is November 5, 2008.

The program is presented in partnership with The Armory Center for the Arts, The Music Center and Culver City Unified School District.

Arts for All cited in RAND study

Arts for All is recognized as a national model in a RAND study released in June. The study, “Revitalizing Arts Education Through Community- Wide Coordination,” cites Arts for All as an outstanding example of “how organizations that pool resources and coordinate activities can make it possible for more children to benefit from arts learning.” Leadership is identified as a key factor in the success of such efforts and the study underscores Arts for All’s setting of standards for collaborative approaches and particularly its success in garnering community-wide support for the initiative.

Los Angeles County was one of six initiatives in the country examined in the study; the others were in Boston, Chicago, Dallas, New York City and Alameda County in Northern California. Los Angeles County’s initiative is the largest in number of students and schools and the only one driven by a local arts agency.

The study highlights Los Angeles County, Alameda County, and Dallas as the three case studies that “deliberately combined several strategies, especially in their attempts to improve access.” They all “conducted audits, set a goal of access for all, developed strategic plans, made a case for arts education and advocated for the arts... these activities complement each other well and are more powerful in combination than in isolation.”

The study was commissioned by The Wallace Foundation and conducted by RAND, a non-profit research organization. The complete study is available at www.rand.org.

Top

CIVIC ART PROGRAM RESTORES WORKS IN COUNTY COLLECTION

The Arts Commission’s Civic Art program, known primarily for bringing to fruition public art that is part of County capital projects, also catalogs and evaluates older works owned by the County. Recently Civic Art staff guided restoration projects at the Los Angeles County Arboretum and the Compton Public Library.

In 1930, French sculptor Louis Aimé Lejeune created a marble statue for Anita Baldwin’s Anoakia estate in Arcadia. This classical sculpture of a woman holding a vase was donated to the County in 1991 and placed near the Arboretum’s waterfall. Unfortunately, being in this shady area caused dirt and mold to accumulate on the statue’s surface. In 2008, the LA County Arts Commission and the County Department of Parks and Recreation determined that the sculpture should be restored and relocated. The County hired art restorer Rosa Lowinger, and she and her team began the restoration process in August.  The sculpture was also then moved, by crane, to a sunnier and more open spot in the Arboretum’s Korean Garden. Background on the artist and the work can be found at /civicart/05_Fifth_District/civic_lejeune.htm

As part of Compton Library’s renovation this summer, the extraordinary ceramic tile mural by Dora De Larios completed in 1973 was cleaned and restored by Silverlake Conservation. The mural, which stretches from the outer entrance wall to the inner lobby area, had accumulated cracks and chips during the last 35 years. The restoration process corrected these problems and cleaned away dirt to reveal the mural’s vibrant colors. The restoration was completed in time for the library’s reopening during the first week of September. For more information visit /civicart/02_Second_District/civic_delarios.htm

To find out more about the Civic Art Program and the County’s art collection, log on to /civicart.htm.

Top

FREE CONCERTS IN SEPTEMBER-OCTOBER

The Arts Commission’s free concerts at community venues continue into the fall. Now through mid-October, 11 concerts representing sounds from across the musical spectrum take place from Encino to Whittier and Glendale to Gardena. For the full schedule visit /free_september08.html.

Top