Congratulations to AS220 and New Urban Arts for being among the 104 finalist for the 2013 ArtPlace’s Creative Placemaking grants. The finalists for this years grants include groups from 72 communities in 33 states and the District of Columbia and were chosen from 1,225 letters of inquiry from across the country.
Last year both WaterFire Providence and Community MusicWorks were fortunate to receive ArtPlace grants. WaterFire Providence received a $454,000 grant to develop the following programs in 2013:
- Public arts incubator – We will create new public art elements and will also partner with a range of artists and cultural organizations across Providence to collaborate on new art installations and experiments with innovative placemaking techniques.
- Creative placemaking learning lab – We will collect and share the latest and best practices from WaterFire, Providence and around the United States and globe. We plan on developing a series of workshops, symposiums or even a conference as well as online resources that will feature some public art and creative placemaking
Both AS220 and New Urban Arts are located in the Downtown/Federal Hill area of Providence that was recently named by ArtPlace as one of the top ArtPlaces in the country. AS220 was founded in 1985 on the principle that freedom of expression is crucial for the development of strong communities and individual spirits. New Urban Arts is a nationally-recognized community arts studio for high school students and emerging artists in Providence, Rhode Island.
WaterFire wishes both AS220 and New Urban Arts the best of luck in securing an ArtPlace Creative Placemaking grant in 2013, their work helps to make Providence a vibrant and culturally rich place to live and work.
For the full list of finalists please check out ArtPlace’s blog.
About the author
I've worked at WaterFire Providence since 2003. For the first 9 years of my career, I worked in the Production Shop learning all of the details that go into the physical production of the event. In 2012 transitioned to the role of managing WaterFire's social media and web presence. I now head up WaterFire Providence's digital projects including, web, social, databases, and our physical IT infrastructure.
