The recently proposed budget from the Trump Administration calls for the elimination of the National Endowment for the Arts, the National Endowment for the Humanities, and the Institute of Museum and Library Services, and severe cuts to the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. These are all programs that support America’s creativity and curiosity, and whose funding […]
Since 2006, Springboard for the Arts has been helping artists navigate the healthcare system. We currently offer vouchers to community clinics, emergency relief funds, and MNsure navigation in our Artists’ Access to Healthcare program. When we began our work, artists were twice as likely as the general population to be uninsured in Minnesota, a number […]
Springboard for the Arts is an artist-led organization, and as artists, we know that we need to do the work in order to see the results we want. When things are tough we always go back to our guiding principles and our tools and try to see what we can build. More than ever we […]
By Carl Atiya SwansonPublished on Creative Exchange, 10/12/2016.“I feel like I just got a million dollars worth of advice!” That’s what one artist commented after downloading the Work of Art toolkit.Since the Work of Art toolkit launched as a free resource in December 2015, it has been downloaded from Creative Exchange almost 2,000 times. It […]
By Nikki HuntPublished on Creative Exchange, 10/3/2016After three years helping artists get health insurance through Springboard for the Arts’Artists’ Access to Healthcare program, I should be overjoyed that our country’s uninsured rate is at an all-time low. But, I can’t bring myself to celebrate because I know that simply having health insurance isn’t enough. We […]
The staff and artists of Springboard for the Arts are shocked and saddened by the events of the past week – the killings of Alton Sterling in Baton Rouge, Brent Thompson, Patrick Zamarippa, Michael Krol, Michael Smith and Lorne Ahrens in Dallas, and Philando Castile in Falcon Heights, right here in our home state of […]
By Carl Atiya SwansonPublished on Hyperallergic, 5/10/2016.Creative Exchange celebrates artists and their creative power to shape communities, reimagine what is possible and move social justice forward with a new collection of features and stories, Field Notes from Creative Exchange.Dedicated to helping communities mobilize the creative force of artists to solve local challenges, Creative Exchange is […]
By Laura ZabelPublished on Stanford Social Innovation Review, 2/8/2016Springboard for the Arts, the nonprofit where I work, just gave away its oldest program and most reliable earned income stream. We took the curriculum from our artist-entrepreneur training course, packaged it into a free toolkit, and we’re giving it to anyone who wants to start and […]
By Carl Atiya SwansonPublished on Hyperallergic, 2/6/2016Springboard for the Arts offers Work of Art, a free workbook and video series, for individual study or use by artist groups, organizations, and schools, to help artists develop practical business skills.“How am I going to make a creative living and also have a life?” This question can be daunting […]
By Laura ZabelPublished on Creativz.us, 2/2/2016In the years since Investing in Creativity, the Urban Institute’s 2003 report on the support structure for U.S. artists, a lot of things of have changed, many of them for the better. More than ever before, through nonprofits (including the one where I work, Springboard for the Arts) and education […]
By Laura Zabel Published on National Committee for Responsive Philanthropy, 1/27/2016 Every city has just six artists. Or six community leaders. Or six innovators. I’m kidding … maybe your city has seven. I make this joke because in just about every community I visit, there are about six people that show up on everyone’s list […]
By Laura Zabel Published on The Guardian, 2/15/2015 From income inequality and unemployment to poverty, education and healthcare, communities around the world are facing critical challenges that require creative ideas and solutions. Any of these challenges could use an artist’s mind, a creative question or a critical thinker to help us find our way to […]