● RISCA, with additional funding from The US Department of Agriculture and the New England Foundation for the Arts, collaborates annually with The Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art’s (MASS MoCA) to bring its Assets for Artists program to Rhode Island. Assets for Artists is a matched savings account program offering matching funds of $1,000 ($2000 for artists meeting low-income eligibility criteria), workshops and personal training to improve artists’ financial and professional/business skills. Click here for a look at the artists involved in this program. [Learning]
● RISCA’s Investments in Arts & Culture Program (IAC) provides annual operating support to arts organizations across Rhode Island that make important contributions to the vitality of our communities, the economy of our state, the education of all Rhode Islanders and our quality of life. Organizations must demonstrate excellent artistic, educational and cultural value; responsiveness and engagement with their community; and a high level of financial and managerial accountability, including a history of support from RISCA. Our Arts Access Grant Program (AAG) is an entry-level
grant program for new arts or non-profit organizations, to support community-based projects. [Creation, Engagement, Learning, Livability]
● Through Project Grants for Individuals, RISCA supports highly creative and talented artists who seek to produce, perform, teach or share their work with the public. Project grants to individuals might include the coordination of community arts events, public performances, arts workshops, creative collaborations, and exhibitions and installations with a strong public component. RISCA’s Fellowship Program encourages the creative development of artists, including folk and traditional artists, by enabling them to set aside time to pursue their work and achieve specific creative and career goals. And RISCA’s annual Fellowship Show, which moves to a different location each year, features the work of that year’s fellowship recipients. [Creation, Engagement, Learning,
Livability]
● The Rhode Island General Assembly recognized thirty years ago “that public art is a resource which stimulates the vitality and the economy of the state’s communities and which provides opportunities for artists and other skilled workers to practice their crafts,” and by law established our state’s Public Art Program, administered by RISCA. This program commissions works of art for public facilities, provides opportunities for the public to engage with the art, seeks to educate Rhode Islanders on the value of public art and the role it plays in community life. [Creation, Engagement, Learning, Livability]
● RISCA is a participant in the Cultural Data Project, in partnership with the Rhode Island
Foundation, the RI Council for the Humanities, and a few private foundations in our state. We see this initiative as a significant step toward fully understanding – and communicating – the impact the arts have economically and culturally to our state. Recent press articles on the overall economic impact of the arts have used CDP data.
● RISCA also does a series of small, community-based projects, like organizing the display of local artists in Congressman David Cicilline’s (RI- Dist 1) office, or hosting a “theatre social” with members of the local theatre community.