Blog
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MainX24 Will Soon Be Here! Monday, November 07, 2011
SAVE THE DATE! DEC. 3, 2011
The 24 hour long neighborhood festival supporting the Southside and celebrating those who love it is just around the corner.So scope out your parade spot, pick out your pet’s costume, and dig out your party hat. And most important, mark your calendar - it’s an all day thing!
Keep up with MainX24
www.mainx24.com
facebook.com/mainx24
#mainx24 -
Musician Christie Burnsʼs MakeWork Grant Project Is Coming to Fruition This Weekend! Tuesday, November 01, 2011
Christie is bringing veteran string teacher, Pamela Wiley, to Chattanooga this weekend for the OʼConner Method Teacher Training Seminar. Join area string instructors in learning to teach the OʼConner Method at The Folk School of Chattanooga. See the above flier for more details about the seminar, and this video for information on the OʼConner Method.
MakeWorkʼs art grants programs is currently raising funds to continue supporting artists like Christie to inspire Chattanooga!
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Why MakeWork Matters to Me—Christie Burns Wednesday, October 26, 2011
Christie Burns, a local musician founder of the Folk School of Chattanooga, tells us why MakeWork is important to her life as a Southside picker.
MakeWork Grantee Christie Burns from CreateHere on Vimeo.
“My money is just like me: small but mighty!”
Generally I hold my head very high, knowing that MOST of the pocket money I throw around gets thrown into the local economy—I mean HYPER local, like within a mile of my house. It takes nothing for me to drop $8 on delicious beers for myself and a friend at the Terminal, or $8 on tacos from the cart next to the old Discoteca. I know that a coffee (in a Folk School mason jar) and 3 four-seed brochens with butter and jam make the perfect Niedlov’s breakfast (under $3!) or if I wake up with an extra large appetite, a tenner will get me something amazing at the Bluegrass Grill. I spent $45 on a shiny red bicycle pump at the new bike store on Main Street, simply to have the chance to welcome the new guys to the neighborhood (and so I wouldn’t have to bug everyone else every time I needed air in my tires). I probably didn’t need to spend so much on a pump, but I know I’ll have that thing forever, and I’ll always remember buying it from the place three blocks up from my house when a little “welcome to Jefferson Heights” probably mattered to them. I’m one of Sandy’s loyal supporters, so it’s pretty normal for me to donate $10 for a flower to decorate my fiddle on Monday nights at the Market St. Tavern. Add all this up, and hypothetically we’re talking about $74 joyfully spent in a single day around the southside/downtown. Or take the bike pump out of the equation, and we’re at $29 in purchases and donations I would never second-guess. These are the businesses and individuals I love, that make every day in Chattanooga really great, that I’d miss terribly if they were to go away.
After four years of giving away free money to fund really creative ideas, the MakeWork program (constantly refining their systems and processes, an art in itself) has a chance to raise a big bundle of redistributable cash—but it’s not something that just gets handed to them. They have a few tasks to complete in order to show the Lyndhurst Foundation and other major donors that THEIR support is well-placed. One of these tasks is to get 100% support from their closest circle of friends: the MakeWork grant recipients. If it feels strange to switch from being the “supported” to being a “supporter”, I’m right there with you. It’s like, gee, why would I be applying for grants if I had enough money to donate to granting agencies? Shouldn’t I be spending any spare (hah!) money on the things I purportedly do as an artist, and aren’t there rich people and corporations around here that should do the donating? Yes, as an artist I know I should be careful with my funds. When I run out of money (which happens more than I’d like to admit) all of my ideas have to sit on the back burner while I figure out a way to get the bills paid…But in all my care to make sure everything’s covered, I feel like I’d better stay close to the people who’ve put the pieces together in such a way to allow a few of my ideas to come to life. Ok, so right now MakeWork is asking me and the other current/past grant recipients to get their names on the donor list.
Honestly, I made only a small donation, something that felt “safe” to my bank account today…the same kind of contribution that I’d easily make to a friend’s kickstarter project just to say, “yes, I care”... a donation that is well within the ballpark of my regular Southside walkin’ around cash. I’m grateful for the local brews, the local tacos, bicycle experts on every corner, and a small group of hardworking people who see to it that artists in Chattanooga get big opportunities at least once a year. I think Kate and Helen at MakeWork really mean it when they say they’re looking at their grantees simply for 100% participation, so you can give any amount and still get in the game. This 100% stat will help them leverage the big bucks and show the other players in the game that they have the support that really matters—that even us artist types with our fluctuating incomes give enough of a hoot to give a little bit back for the perpetuation of these grants. I was able to earmark my little donation for future music projects in our city. What a great feeling!
I’m raising a glass to MakeWork and all the hard work they’ve put in so far to make cool things happen around my town. A toast to your success as CreateHere becomes “CreateWuzHere”, to lots of future funding and a further refinement of the work you do. Cheers to the donors, big and small, who provide something of a “love fest” for the arts in Chattanooga. And, finally, a big high five to my fellow grantees who stay in the game beyond their own projects, shifting from recipient to donor and back again—making sure they’re right there playing whatever role is needed when a focused community effort is required to make the arts thrive!
Think this is something you could get behind?
Donate here.
Read about it here. -
Democracy: A Search for Solutions Wednesday, September 14, 2011
Jack Levine - The Arrest – 1983—oil on canvas— 24 ¼ x 24 ¼ inches—Gift of Ralph Shumacker in loving memory of his wife, Elizabeth Schumacker—Collection of the Hunter Museum of American Art, 1998.11 (Art © Estate of Hughie Lee-Smith/Licensed by VAGA, New York, NY; Art © Estate of Jack Levine /Licensed by VAGA, New York, NY)When discussing public policy, we tend to view the world through a monetary lens. Simply “throwing money” at a problem does not make it go away, and doing so often disregards the importance of socio-cultural variables - the people and social trends involved in the process. The best piece of legislation with a huge amount of financial backing will still fail if those working on it are not inspired and empowered to make it succeed.
Addressing crime is no different. We tend to forget that police officers are human, and we rarely see ourselves as part of the crime-prevention process. But in order to reduce crime, everyday citizens must be involved, police officers must be morally supported, and local government officials must consider how all political resource allocation affects the Police Department’s ability to do its job well.
Funding is definitely crucial, and the more police officers a city can hire, the better; but economic pressures are relentless, and there are specific ways we - the City of Chattanooga- can better utilize the resources we already have in place to reduce crime rates. The Police Department is already over-worked and under-funded; and so we must take responsibility for becoming more active.
Over the past 4.5 years, CreateHere’s work has proven two things about improving a community, through government oversight or grassroots organizations:
1. It takes catalysts, leaders unshakably committed to solving a problem.
2. It takes innovation, creative thinking to deploy new ideas when older soltuions aren’t working.The unique skills and ideas of local residents - the ability for us to adapt old knowledge to new demands - are crucial to the future of America’s communities. Social networks and relationships are the fuel that power this system. Large organizations using traditional models of community maintenance are mostly keeping issues from getting out of control, but are rarely solving problems completely. Smaller citizen groups, driven by passion and rooted in social connectivity, can solve problems. This notion is the essence of true democracy.
The Broken Windows Brigade intends to unite the community to support the ongoing work of the Chattanooga Police Department and provide resources to help citizens develop true solutions to local issues concerning crime. While money is important and government intervention is necessary, the people are the way to true solutions.
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Tennessee Arts Commission Workshops Thursday, September 08, 2011
On Thursday October 6th, CreateHere will host the Tennessee Arts Commission’s annual workshop for Tennessee teachers and teaching artists, and Performing Arts workshops for artists and organizations. We’re delighted that TAC will hold its Chattanooga area workshop at 55 Main Street, one of nine locations across Tennessee where the classes will be held this fall. There will be two types of classes offered by TAC on the afternoon of October 6: Arts Education, geared toward teachers and teaching artists, and Performing Arts, open to organizations and individual artists.
Arts Education
TAC will host two different Arts Education workshops: an overview of Arts Education grants and programs and an informational session about applying to the Teaching Artist Roster. The workshops will follow consecutively beginning at 4 PM and conclude at 6 PM, lasting an hour each. These workshops are informational meetings workshops for Tennessee teachers and teaching artists and are mandatory for new teaching artists who are interested in applying to the Commission’s Teaching Artist Roster. The workshops will provide participants with information on: the Artist-in-Residence Handbook; AE grant opportunities; the grant application process; applying to the roster; and AE programs including Arts360°, Poetry Out Loud, and ArtistCorps TN.For more information about the Arts Education workshops, please contact Ann Brown at ann.brown [at] tn.gov or (615) 532-5939 to register for a workshop.
To find out more information about the Tennessee Arts Commission Arts Education initiatives, click here.
Performing Arts
There will be three different Performing Arts workshops: an overview of new Individual Artist Fellowship application requirements, an informational session about applying to the Tennessee Performing Arts Presenter (TPAP) roster and a Performing Arts Overview of existing Touring Arts (TOUR) grants, and a Performing Arts Overview for for new and existing Performing Arts constituents who have questions about existing programs and grant processes. The workshops will follow consecutively beginning at 3 PM and conclude at 6 PM, lasting an hour each. These workshops are informational meetings for performing arts presenting organizations interested in applying to the Tennessee Performing Arts Presenter (TPAP) roster, individual artists from the disciplines of dance, music and theater interested in learning about new fellowship requirements and how they affect the application process, and new or existing constituents who have questions about existing programs and grant processes.The 4 PM to 5 PM session: Applying to the Tennessee Performing Arts Presenter (TPAP) roster is specifically for Tennessee presenting organizations who want to apply to the TPAP roster and those organizations that currently are included on the roster and would like assistance in building their profile. An overview of existing Touring Arts (TOUR) grants will be included in this session.
Please contact Hal Partlow at hal.partlow [at] tn.gov or (615) 532-9801 for information on Performing Arts workshops.
To find out more information about the Tennessee Arts Commission Performing Arts initiatives, click here.
