Allocation Of NEA American Rescue Plan Act Funds Announced: Arts Commission To Augment Operating Support Programs And Partner With Oregon Folklife Network To Fund New Works By Folk And Traditional Artists (Photo) -08/02/21
Salem, Oregon – Eighty percent, or $655,500, of the $805,000 allocated to the Oregon Arts Commission through National Endowment for the Arts American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) funds will be used to increase FY2021 operating support grant awards for Oregon arts organizations of all budget sizes across the state, the Arts Commission announced today. The remaining $150,000 will augment an existing partnership with the Oregon Folklife Network to support the creation of new work by folk and traditional artists and cover program coordination costs.
“Unrestricted operating support is what arts organizations need most right now, to help them rebuild,” said Arts Commission Executive Director Brian Rogers, “We have hosted a number of listening sessions with arts organizations in recent weeks and that is the constant theme. We are grateful to the NEA for enabling us to allocate the funds in the way that is most meaningful to the statewide arts community.”
Two Arts Commission programs provide operating support; the Operating Support Program, for organizations with budgets over $150,000; and Small Operating Support, for organizations with budgets under $150,000. Operating Support grant awards will increase by a total of $558,500, with ARPA awards ranging from $2,500 to $10,000 depending on an organization’s fiscal size. Small Operating grant awards will increase by $97,000 – potentially allowing the individual grant awards to small arts organizations to double in size.
The Folk and Traditional Arts Recovery Program, to be administered by the Oregon Folklife Network, will provide stipends of $5,000 artists for the creation of new work to 15 Oregon folk and traditional artists who use a range of art forms to represent and express Oregon’s diverse ethnic, sacred, occupational and regional cultural arts. Application details will be announced soon.
“Our folk and traditional artists are critical keepers of our cultures,” said Rogers. “We recognized they had not yet been a focus of our relief funding programs and so enlisted the support of our partners at the Oregon Folklife Network to develop this initiative.”
Rogers added that he and other members of the Arts Commission team continue conversations with other funders to explore additional recovery funding for individual artists from all disciplines.
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Oregon Arts Commission
The Oregon Arts Commission provides leadership, funding and arts programs through its grants, special initiatives and services. Nine commissioners, appointed by the Governor, determine arts needs and establish policies for public support of the arts. The Arts Commission became part of Business Oregon (formerly Oregon Economic and Community Development Department) in 1993, in recognition of the expanding role the arts play in the broader social, economic and educational arenas of Oregon communities. In 2003, the Oregon legislature moved the operations of the Oregon Cultural Trust to the Arts Commission, streamlining operations and making use of the Commission’s expertise in grantmaking, arts and cultural information and community cultural development.
The Arts Commission is supported with general funds appropriated by the Oregon legislature and with federal funds from the National Endowment for the Arts as well as funds from the Oregon Cultural Trust. More information about the Oregon Arts Commission is available online at: www.oregonartscommission.org.
Oregon Folklife Network
The Oregon Folklife Network is the state of Oregon’s folk and traditional arts program. Administered by the Museum of Natural and Cultural History at the University of Oregon, OFN comprises a network of partners working to document, support, preserve, and celebrate the diversity of Oregon’s living cultural heritage.
