Brewer Road Artstation

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ArtStation Sedona

A partnership to develop the City of Sedona’s Brewer Road Ranger Station into a leading creative facility, artist-in-residence program, and community cultural center

D R A F T: Prepared by Eric Holowacz, Executive Director

November 2015

RANGER STATION MASTER PLAN PROPOSAL: S e d o n a A r t S t a t i o n This document outlines a proposed new Creative Placemaking partnership between the City of Sedona and the nonprofit organization, Sedona Arts Center, to activate and program the Brewer Road Ranger Station as a new creative park and environment for the people of Sedona. Extending its 60-year history as a cultural and artistic development facility, the Arts Center proposes to establish and manage the 3.4 acre park and historic properties as the new Sedona ArtStation. Core activities would include community use, an artists-in-residence program, ongoing arts and educational facilities, and site-specific creative development of the park environment — including stewardship of community partnerships, public use, and historic preservation. The outline that follows represents a major opportunity to expand the creative profile of our City, connect our community with creative elements from around the world, and expand the provision of local arts-based experiences for everybody.

Expanding Sedona’s Creative Connections

Advancing Our City’s Creative Life From the mid-20th century, Sedona Arts Center has fostered and championed the creative life of Sedona.

Founded by artists and community leaders in 1958, the nonprofit organization has continued to grow and expand cultural opportunities for residents and visitors at its campus in and around the historic Art Barn.

The Brewer Road Ranger Station, with its historic buildings and grounds in the ‘Heart of Sedona’ have the potential to become a new kind of creative park and civic amenity. The Arts Center’s plan begins with activation of the site through the development of a new Artist-in-Residence program, public gathering and meeting spaces, and new venue for community arts and cultural activities. The design of this proposed ArtStation park will honor the history of the site and incorporate the arts in a relaxing natural setting—while adding, over time, bespoke creative elements and amenities. The result City of Sedona - Sedona Arts Center Partnership Proposal

Sedona Arts Center, one of the Verde Valley’s leading nonprofit organizations, has been activating the community with creative development, arts education, and cultural opportunities for almost 60 years.

will be a small civic space, imbued with artistic elements and programming, that advances our City’s creative life. Sedona Arts Center’s management of ArtStation at Brewer Road would ensure a strong sense of community, support for external users and partners, sensitive environmental development, and new public enjoyment of the park. The ArtStation plan proceeds from two over-riding objectives:

As an anchor in the ArtStation plan, a new Artist-inResidence program would invite and host creative people and producers from all over the world to our community. This would be programmed with Sedona’s arts, culture and heritage organizations in mind, and serve to better connect them to partners, resources, and creative opportunities. Residents would live for one week to three months in the Ranger House, and be supported fully by Arts Center staff. An average of ten visiting artist residencies might be hosted each year.

Building a New Creative City Facility The other primary objective of ArtStation is ensure a diverse and ongoing series of cultural opportunities on site. Once renovated, the Barn and grounds would be activated by community arts programming, creative activities, gatherings and community partners, and special event rentals—all managed by the Arts Center’s staff. In addition, both the Artist-in-Residence program and potential funding sources would be leveraged for unique future additions to the park. These would include new amenities, historic interpretation for the site, murals and public art, and creative projects meant

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The Brewer Road Ranger Station has significant historical importance to the people of Sedona.

ArtStation will preserve that, and build new creative, artistic, and cultural elements around it.

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City of Sedona - Sedona Arts Center Partnership Proposal

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History of Brewer Road Ranger Station From the early 20th century onward, the Brewer Road site has been an important part of Sedona’s history, community, and sense of place. It is ripe for Creative Placemaking...

1959-2005 1934-1935 1905-1917 The Sedona Ranger Station is established in 1905, and the residency house is built in 1917. That building follows a standard plan for a “ThreeRoom Ranger Dwelling.” The cottage was expanded in the 1930s when a porch was added. This outdoor area was enclosed sometime after 1985.

It is believed that the house is the oldest standing building in the City. The Ranger Station is now one of four sites in the City that are on the National Register of Historic Places.

The 2000 sq. ft. Ranger Station Barn is constructed by the CCC, using Forest Service plans . It includes a secondstory hayloft at the east end of the building. The interior of the barn is modified for use as storage, workshops, and offices by the Forest Service.

USFS/Delia Hart Pumphouse is built circa 1935 by the CCC to pump water from Oak Creek to the community. The Pumphouse is located to the east of the ranger station between SR 179 and Oak Creek, and is connected to the Ranger Station by a series of water pipes. The Pumphouse was in use until 1950.

City of Sedona - Sedona Arts Center Partnership Proposal

The administration building is built in 1959, south of the barn (and is currently in poor condition and not considered historically significant).

In 1999, the Ranger House and barn are designated as City of Sedona Historic Landmarks by the City's Historic Preservation Commission.

In 2005, the U.S. Forest Service auctions a 21-acre parcel for $8.4 million, and a condition of purchase was a Preservation Covenant that insures that the house and barn are preserved and their historic character maintained in perpetuity.

2014-2015 2008-2010 In 2008, the Ranger House, Barn, and Pumphouse are listed on the National Register of Historic Places.

The Ranger Station buildings are cited for their significance to the history of Sedona, the Forest Service, and the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC). At the state level, the Ranger Station is acknowledged as one of the earliest standing stations in Arizona.

In 2010, the 21-acre lot is split into 3 parcels as a result of the bankruptcy and liquidation of property owner, ILX Resorts.

In 2014, the City of Sedona purchases the 3.4 acre parcel on Brewer Road which includes the historic barn and house. Over the following 18 months, the City holds planning sessions, convenes community meetings, and invites ideas for the future use of the property.

After extensive consultation and dialog, a preferred park begins to take shape. The primary objectives involve community events and gathering space, parkland and natural environment, stewardship of the historic buildings, passive recreation, and programming that ensure a “city animated by the arts.”

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An artist find time and space at MacDowell Colony, America’s oldest artist-in-residence facility.

ArtStation will follow that model, and join over 300 other creative residencies now in operation.

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City of Sedona - Sedona Arts Center Partnership Proposal

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What is an Artist Residency?

Communities across America have developed visiting artist programs and artists’ colonies as a way of supporting culture, creativity, and connections.

This overview from the Alliance of Artists Communities explains how…

Artists' communities, colonies, and residency programs — places providing artists of any discipline with dedicated time and space to develop their work — have their roots in Europe. They began as gatherings of painters, writers, and composers seeking community with each other. In the US, similar models appeared in the late 19th century, beginning as informal efforts to create workspace and a collegial atmosphere for art.

In the early 20th century, these endeavors became more formalized, with the first colonies in the US: Byrdcliffe Art Colony, The MacDowell Colony, OxBow, and Yaddo — all grounded in the belief that artists need time, space, and privacy to incubate new ideas and nurture their creative practice. These early programs offered immersion in a creative space unfettered by the demands of everyday life and with limited interaction with the public. By the 1930s, similar residencies had arisen far from the colonies of the northeast, like Hambidge Center for Creative Arts & Sciences and Mantalvo Arts Center.

The late 60s brought a second growth spurt for the field, supported by a rise in cultural activities, interest in art, and the social movements of the time.

A proliferation of new artist-founded organizations began in both rural and urban areas, as the nonprofit sector as a whole expanded. Many academic and professional venues offered opportunities for creative work, though they often required other commitments in exchange for time and workspace. New residencies formed to support new work, including Fine Arts Work Center, The Millay Colony, and Ragdale.

City of Sedona - Sedona Arts Center Partnership Proposal

Community models emerged in the late 1970s placing a greater focus on collaboration rather than solitude, like Atlantic Center for the Arts. This shift led to stronger support for theater and dance as well as exploring connections between artists, their communities, and other fields. The Exploratorium linked art with science; Headlands Center for the Arts was designed to spark collaborations that promote new approaches to environmental stewardship, foster community-building, and provide a catalyst for social change.

An increase in urban residencies, such as Bemis Center for Contemporary Arts and Capp Street Project, began to appear in cities and offered artists another form of sanctuary in contrast to the earlier rural retreats. Industrial buildings and museums became the backdrop for inspiration and supported large-scale work and art projects, in addition to the traditional live-work spaces offered at other residencies. On-site gallery spaces and public programs provided a connection to the local community.

Since the 1990s, the field has continued to evolve in response to social movements, with newer residencies serving artists whose work revolves around the sciences, environmental art, and social justice. The Arctic Circle, an annual expeditionary residency program, is a nexus where art intersects with science, architecture, and activism — an incubator for experimentation and collaboration around the central issues of our time. The Artist Residency field continues to diversify and expand.

The traditional infrastructure of residency programs has been more recently transformed, showing the adaptive nature of the programs. New models can be deeply rooted in a specific place, even without having facilities. Vermont Performance Lab secures studio and performance space unique to each artistin-residence and fosters collaborative art-making between guest and the community. Colorado Art Ranch finds hosts in various towns to donate or rent their facilities. And the field also includes alternative outposts like PLAND (Practice Liberating Art through Necessary Dislocation) that invites artists and others to their beyond-the-grid site in the New Mexico desert to experiment together with collective living and art-making.

Today, the field has grown from 60 known residencies in 1990 to 500 in the United States and over 1,500 worldwide. They span a range of models from those that preserve the traditional format of seclusion to those that embrace community engagement and exploration. They are located on working ranches, warehouses, museums, factories, hotels, churches, and sailing vessels; in remote rural areas, small towns, suburbs, and cities; and they serve artists of all disciplines and nationalities.

Artist residencies are one tool to activate and revitalizing local communities around creativity — often bringing artists, cultural activities, and new businesses into underdeveloped or unused areas.

But the core values of the field remain a constant — to nurture the creative process and strengthen the artist's voice in society. Sedona Arts Center’s plan for ArtStation would expand our community’s potential to do just that.

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A visiting artist paints Oak Creek as part of the Sedona Arts Center’s 2015 Plein Air Festival. ArtStation will expand our community’s capacity to host, collaborate, and forge new creative opportunities year-round.

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Ranger Station Park Planning

Following more than a year of community consultation, the below aspects were identified as the City’s goals and objectives in developing the Brewer Road Ranger Station. The Sedona Arts Center’s plan would serve these primary goals through arts, culture, and heritage programming...

Build a Sense of Community

Honor the History of Place

Create Public interactions

Remain a Quiet Oasis

Sedona Arts Center has grown up with the community, and fostered local creativity for over five decades. Our campus in Uptown, based in and around the historic Art Barn, is animated by the arts almost every day of the year.

The ArtStation development, under Sedona Arts Center’s leadership, would also preserve the important historical nature of the park and the buildings.

To activate ArtStation, the Arts Center staff and board would develop a plan for diverse arts programming — including workshops, free events, and creative development opportunities in keeping with our organization’s heritage.

ArtStation is a small and historical site, and ArtStation would honor that by maintaining a passive park, with low-impact activities and events.

The development of ArtStation would provide a community platform to expand our organization’s scope. It would foster efforts to collaborate, grow, and enhance Sedona’s sense of place, creative community, and our connections with the world beyond the Verde Valley.

It would be our organization’s intention as key partner, to serve as stewards of the City’s objectives and goals regarding history, community, and use.

Programming of ArtSpace would intentionally focus on the preservation and interpretation of this site’s heritage — and its role in our City’s development.

More specifically, we would pilot new site-based programs and community activities that revolve around sense of place, the character of the Ranger Station, and the park as community asset.

The focus will be placed on the historic character, creative enhancements, and arts activities of an appropriate scale to the grounds, facilities, and neighborhood.

Over time, the Brewer Road ArtStation can become an iconic expression of our creative community and a unique experience for our City’s visitors.

About Sedona Arts Center Inspired by the natural beauty of Sedona, Egyptian sculptor, Nassan Gobran and a group of local visionaries recognized the need for a place where artists could work, teach, and learn together. In 1958, they established Sedona's first art center, Canyon Kiva. A few years later, they purchased the old Jordan Apple Packing Barn, now known as the Art Barn, which quickly became Sedona's creative and social hub.

During the early 60s Sedona was rich with artists, city refugees, and entrepreneurs who foresaw the area's potential and participated in its development. Through all the dramatic growth and demographic changes, the Arts Center remained one of the cultural constants, even though it experienced its own series of changes.

In 1961, the name was changed to the Sedona Arts Center and officially re-opened with a celebration attended by 300 guests. Memorable cultural events and activities followed. 1994 saw further expansion with the addition of a new building to house an art gallery, classrooms, and the community theatre (founded in 1970). The School of the Arts, a key program of the Arts Center, now brings thousands of people to our City and provides creative development for students and emerging talent.

Today the Sedona Arts Center is a living legacy of the founders' vision. As one of Northern Arizona's oldest nonprofit organizations, we continue to be a gathering place to explore creative potential, discover new arts opportunities, and celebrate the work of local artists, performers, writers, and thinkers. The ArtStation represents an opportunity to develop the City’s next great cultural facility, activated by creative people, partners, and a community that continues to foster the arts in extraordinary ways.

City of Sedona - Sedona Arts Center Partnership Proposal

Ensure Sustainable Design

Sedona Arts Center, in its stewardship of the Art Barn and current Uptown campus, seeks to improve sustainable practices, lessen our environmental impact, and serve as a model for other arts facilities in the 21st century.

This ethic would carry over to the development of ArtStation, which would proceed with environmentally sensitive projects, materials, and practices.

Board of Directors Kath Gilliam — President Holli Ploog— Vice President Jim Peterson — Treasurer Lewis Guthrie — Secretary John Heyer Kathy Levin Sonya Malkhassian Dennis Ott Pam Frazier

Staff Eric Holowacz - Executive Director Shirley Albrecht Vince Fazio Liz Gregg Kelli Klymenko Sharon Manke Jenny Reed Joseph Schibler Cyndi Thau and dozens of wonderful volunteers from Sedona and the Verde Valley!

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A small artist residency cottage designed by Rural Studio at Auburn University, achieved for a budget of $20,000. ArtStation would establish connections and incorporate innovative design solutions for the park.

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City of Sedona - Sedona Arts Center Partnership Proposal

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ArtStation Phase 1:

ArtStation Phase 2:

ArtStation Phase 3:

Following the establishment of a new partnership, the City of Sedona funds and manages the rehabilitation of the historic Brewer Road House and Barn. Sedona Arts Center provides ongoing advice regarding site needs, program development, marketing and promotion, and new community partnerships.

Sedona Arts Center initiates Artist in Residence programming at the House, and begins branding, promotion, and community engagement efforts for the park. A staff member is positioned on site to support day to day operations.

Sedona Arts Center begins programming the Barn with community arts events, cultural activities, and external user events. Funding is identified to support growth, future programming, and desired historical preservation, improvements, and enhancements to the park.

In order to develop, activate, and manage the Brewer Road ArtStation, Sedona Arts Center seeks a public-private partnership with the City of Sedona that would result in a few key aspects and ensure strong community use and enjoyment.

The City of Sedona would commit CapEx budget towards the renovation of the historic properties, the demolition of non-contributing properties, the preparation of the grounds and utility services, and the basic improvements desired by the community, future users, and intended ArtStation programming.

The City would oversee, with ready advisory support from Sedona Arts Center’s board and staff, the contracting and management of the CapEx improvements, according to a timeline to be determined. The key Phase 1 objective is to prepare the Ranger House as an Artist-in-Residence facility, and ready the Barn for use as creative work space and future community programming.

During this phase, Sedona Arts Center would build a framework to brand, announce, promote, and administer the Artist-in-Residence program, the early activation of ArtStation, and the initial partnerships for future community programming and external use of the park and facilities. This would include planning for public use as rental for special events, meetings, and non-arts activities.

Sedona Arts Center would also begin research towards external funding and sponsorships in support of future ArtStation programs, residencies, and projects. A Development plan would be established, in partnership with the City, to outline the external resources and timing of funded activity.

Upon completion of Phase 1, Sedona Arts Center and the City of Sedona would invite the public and special guests to the Grand Opening of ArtStation, and the launch of a new creative era.

City of Sedona - Sedona Arts Center Partnership Proposal

The second phase of ArtStation would involve the heavy program of Artist Residencies and partnership building —including initial visiting artists. Creative people and cultural managers from across America and around the world would be invited, sponsored residencies would be established, and the Brewer Road ArtStation would join the 300+ programs currently active in the Alliance of Artists Communities.

The City of Sedona would continue to fund and manage the key operational aspect of the site, such as utilities, grounds maintenance, and security. City staff and department managers would provide ongoing feedback and direction for the further development and activation.

The Arts Center staff would maintain a regular presence on site, in order to oversee facilities use, programming, and robust community involvement.

Our presence would set the stage for local partnerships and would ensure that community groups, organizations, and special events are accommodated by the park and facilities.

The Arts Center would also budget for and manage a level of community arts programming, such as free workshops, lectures, demonstrations, tours, and open houses—to activate the facilities in an ongoing, fully supported manner.

As a final aspect of Phase 2, a small number of the ArtStation residencies would be specifically developed for the planning and development of new park amenities and site-based projects. Artistsin-Residence would include creative people from across the country, including landscape architects, industrial designers, muralists, and artists who work in the public realm. The result would be new early-stage projects and proposals to enhance the park and further define Brewer Road ArtStation as creative environment and Sedona heritage site.

Phase 3 would see Brewer Road ArtStation fully activated as a community park and unique cultural facility. With the Artist-in-Residence programming up and running, investment and focus would be placed on the community use of the Barn and the management of grants and funded improvements.

Sedona Arts Center would introduce, evaluate, and grow programming that would include arts workshops and classes, history lectures and presentations, and even small-scale performing art and film events. And we would secure external funding to build capacity and support users.

The facilities, primarily the Barn and grounds, would be fully available to the public and local organizations for use as a meeting site, special event venue, and gathering place. These uses could be scheduled and supervised by the Arts Center, who would maintain a regular presence on site.

ArtStation as a brand, and as part of the City of Sedona’s investment in creative placemaking, would be marketed on a wider level—with the intention of building a nationally recognized brand for our community’s cultural vibrancy and connections. Targeted, specific-purpose residencies would continue at the Ranger House, and the results would generate further collaborations, projects, and creative enhancements.

During this phase, new Artist-in-Residence partnerships would also be formed to support the growth and development of other local institutions.

The Film Festival might use ArtStation to host a film director or producer; Chamber Music Sedona might invite and host an American composer to create a new suite of music while in residence; Red Rock High School might host a sculptor and develop a new public art project for its campus; the Arizona poet laureate might spend a month at ArtStation and create new works in and about Sedona.

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An artist at work in a residency studio. ArtStation would bring the worlds’ most interesting creative people to Sedona, offer them time and space, and facilitate new connections for our community.

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City of Sedona - Sedona Arts Center Partnership Proposal

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I. Artist in Residence Program

II. Community Arts Center

III. Park and Special Event Site

Sedona Arts Center’s management of ArtStation would involve three main programming areas around the notion of Creative Placemaking. The first, both chronologically and fundamentally, is the establishment of a world-class visiting artist program—proceeding from the models mentioned earlier in this document and fostered by the national Alliance of Artists Communities, and the international organization Res Artis.

The vision for ArtStation is built around the idea of establishing America’s next great Artist-inResidence community, and rich Creative Placemaking, at the historic heart of Sedona. And it involves an ongoing sensitivity to the heritage of the Brewer Road Ranger Station, the needs and relationships with the local community, and the City of Sedona’s Community Plan.

The third objective of ArtStation is to serve as a place for the community — individuals, organizations, corporate entities — to present their own events. Weddings, functions, community meetings, and cultural activities would be served by ArtStation through the management of a rental process.

The conversation and use of the Ranger House to support an Artist-in-Residence program is in keeping with many other such programs that have repurposed and rehabilitated heritage properties for use as a facility to host artists, creative people, scholars, and cultural leaders.

Sedona Arts Center’s new Executive Director, Eric Holowacz, has a background in the development and operation of Artist-in-Residence programs. His previous organizations — in South Carolina, New Zealand, and Key West — have included artist retreats, residencies, and colonies. From 2007-2010, he served as founding director of The Studios of Key West, then America’s newest Artist Colony— where he developed the ground-up programming, facilities, marketing, and operations.

He also brings an extensive network of professionals in this field — leaders of wellestablished Artist-in-Residence organizations such as the MacDowell Colony in New Hampshire, Djerassi in Northern California, the Hermitage on Florida’s Gulf Coast, and Hambidge Center in Georgia.

City of Sedona - Sedona Arts Center Partnership Proposal

One key aspect of ArtStation is the development of a robust and diverse cultural facility at the Barn: a place where residents and visitors will enjoy recreation opportunities, a tranquil and creative park environment, arts programming, and opportunities to come together and build community.

Sedona Arts Center brings a nearly 60 year history of serving the Verde Valley in this way. At the core of our nonprofit organization are creative events, collaborations, and diverse arts education opportunities.

Proceeding from the heritage of the Art Barn, our organization would work to create a companion facility, a satellite Art Barn as part of the ArtStation development. Our staff, board, and volunteers would bring their knowledge and expertise to the Brewer Road Ranger Station, and build a new kind of community arts center within the historic setting.

The result would be a park animated by the arts, and a place for people to come together and explore Sedona’s arts, culture, and heritage.

In that way, the facility will be open to all, managed for scheduling, usership, and site restrictions — and these activities would support a robust Creative Placemaking ethic. Sedona Arts Center has a long history of managing community use of its own facilities, which includes theatre, gallery, classroom, and several public meeting spaces — and it brings nine professional staff and dozens of volunteers who have been an integral part of the organization’s current operations.

Management of the park and facilities would be in partnership with the City of Sedona staff, and in accord with the City’s objectives, goals, income expectations, and restrictions. The Arts Center, as a longstanding local organization, would invest its resources, staffing, and knowledge of facilities and programming as a continuous contribution to the City’s Brewer Road amenity.

If successful, this partnership would ensure that the future use of the Brewer Road Ranger Station keeps an equal focus on the creative development of our City, cultural and historical programming, and the need for diverse community access, support, and involvement at the park.

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As our City’s entry into the network of American Artist-in-Residence programs, the Brewer Road Ranger Station setting would be unique

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The Growing National Investment in Creative Placemaking and Active Sense of Place

C R E AT I V E PLACEMAKING DEFINED

Urban Planner Anne Gadwa Nicodemus on Creative Placemaking and How Art Spaces Matter

In creative placemaking, partners from public, private, nonprofit, and community sectors strategically shape the physical and social character of a neighborhood, town, tribe, city, or region around arts and cultural activities.

Creative placemaking animates public and private spaces, rejuvenates structures and streetscapes, improves local business viability and public safety, and brings diverse people together to celebrate, inspire, and be inspired.

just the NEA but also such unlikely suspects as the Departments of Agriculture and Transportation.

With the leadership of Carol Coletta, former CEO of CEOs for Cities, ArtPlace pursues a creative placemaking strategy centered on the still somewhat fuzzy concept of vibrancy and sees mayors and other civic leaders as a key audience for its work.

National Endowment for the Arts Federal Agency ArtPlace believes that art, culture and creativity expressed powerfully through place can create vibrant communities, thus increasing the desire and the economic opportunity for people to thrive in place. It is all about the local.

ArtPlace Major Consortium Funder

Placemaking is a multi-faceted approach to the planning, design and management of public and private space(s) and the people who use them, that leverages the assets of the creative sector — artists, arts and cultural organizations, artsrelated business — along with residents, schools, businesses and local governments, to improve the community’s economic conditions and quality of life. It creates artistic communities with a rich variety of participants and events involving large cultural institutions, small emerging organizations with fresh ideas, community and educational organizations, and artists who flourish in a supportive environment.

Connecticut Office of the Arts State Agency

Creative placemaking is an evolving field of practice that intentionally leverages the power of the arts, culture and creativity to serve a community’s interest while driving a broader agenda for change, growth and transformation in a way that also builds character and quality of place.

Artspace USA Nonprofit Developers

Nullam arcu leo, facilisis ut

The story begins in 2009 with the arrival of Rocco Landesman as the National Endowment for the Arts’s new chairman. A leading Broadway producer, Landesman immediately started doing what producers do so well — cobbling together resources.

He met with the heads of other, better-funded federal agencies to pound the table about how the arts can catalyze strategic, cross-sector partnerships and advance missions in education, health and human services, housing, rural development, and transportation. He and his savvy senior deputy, Joan Shigekawa, envisioned a new initiative.

They drew inspiration from the Social Impact of the Arts Project (University of Pennsylvania), the Arts and Cultural Indicators Project (Urban Institute), and the Reinvestment Fund’s “creativity and neighborhood development” community investment strategies. Working through the Mayors’ Institute on City Design (an NEA leadership initiative in partnership with the United States Conference of Mayors and the American Architectural Foundation), they tapped Ann Markusen — economist and urban planning professor — to research a white paper to underpin their new initiative. The result, Creative Placemaking, not only provided the foundation for the new NEA grant program, Our Town, it also helped spark the creation of the ArtPlace funding consortium.

ArtPlace is remarkable both for the sizable amount of the dollars invested and for who is at the table.

Between 2011 and 2012, ArtPlace invested $26.9 million in creative placemaking initiatives across the country. Eleven top national foundations, including Ford, Knight, and Rockefeller, comprise the consortium. Six major financial institutions have capitalized a $12 million loan fund. Federal agencies participate as strategic (nonfinancial) partners, not

Functioning as parallel efforts, in communication but on separate tracks, ArtPlace and the NEA’s Our Town have risen to the top as the main funders and policy shapers of the burgeoning creative placemaking field. Kresge Foundation, William Penn Foundation, and others expect that creative placemaking will be a significant area of emphasis in the coming years.

The Rise of Creative City Partnerships Because of creative placemaking, arts stakeholders are now eligible for new resources, and that momentum appears to be growing. Since the NEA spearheaded a change in thinking, diverse federal agencies are advocating policy shifts for more flexible and holistic approaches to meeting locally identified priorities. In some cases, this means that arts stakeholders are now explicitly eligible to apply for community development dollars, such as the Department of Housing and Urban Development’s Sustainable Communities grant program. Local governments are also thinking about arts and cultural activities in new ways. Our Town’s grant application deserves partial credit because it requires a public sector and nonprofit partner (one of which must be arts related); as a result mayors have been besieged with partnership queries from arts constituents. Pushing arts and cultural players to climb out of their silos represents one of creative placemaking’s most important effects.

A Firm Focus on Community Creative placemaking emphasizes public benefit over private enrichment. It is almost always activated by local community, driven by sense of place. Economic arguments couched in terms of vibrant communities resonate more with people than dollar impacts and jobs created. Creative placemaking often “brings diverse people together to celebrate, inspire, and be inspired,” but physical and economic revitalization outcomes also appeal to those who don’t agree that the arts’ and culture’s intrinsic value makes them deserving of broadbased support. " 13

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Sedona Arts Center is a leading cultural nonprofit in Northern Arizona. We were founded almost 60 years ago to make the arts a vital part of life in the Verde Valley. We offer diverse educational and cultural programs and services that advance the arts, improve quality of life, and support economic prosperity. We serve as a creative resource, partner, and driver of arts programming within our community. And we will always promote and advance the work of the artists, performers, creative producers, and educators around us. Thank you for supporting our mission and vision.

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City of Sedona - Sedona Arts Center Partnership Proposal