Past
Grantees

The Jerome Foundation awarded $1,000 to the National Campaign for Freedom of Expression, Washington, D.C., in general support of its 1995-96 activities. The National Campaign for Freedom of Expression informs and educates the arts community, the general public and individuals in leadership and policy-making positions about free expression issues through advocacy, publications, reports and conferences.

A grant of $20,000 was awarded to the Native Arts Circle, Minneapolis, Minnesota, in support of the Artists Support Grants Program, The Storytelling Series and the Capacity Building Project. The Artists Support Grants Program enables artists to acquire tools, equipment and materials to create their art. The Capacity Building Project is designed to strengthen burgeoning art organizing in the Morton, White Earth, Leech Lake, Red Lake and Lake Reservations. Funds were also authorized for The Storytelling Series, a three-site initiative for the Circle, which brings Native traditional and contemporary storytellers together to share their art and knowledge with local and regional audiences.

A grant of $15,000 was authorized for THE NEW MUSIC-THEATER ENSEMBLE, St. Paul, Minnesota, to support the Composer-Librettist Studio and Rough Cuts. The mission of the Ensemble is to explore the dynamics of individual and communal integrity through the creation, development and production of new operas and other forms of music-theater. The Composer-Librettist Studio, first developed in 1984, is an intensive two-week studio focusing on the process of collaboration. Composers and librettists are taken through a series of exploratory assignments that deal with the challenges of writing for the music-theater form. Rough Cuts is a monthly series of work-in-progress presentations, dialogues between artists and audiences, and explorations of the creative process. Most of the work featured is created by Minnesota and/or New York City emerging artists.

New Radio and Performing Arts, New York City, received a $14,500 grant to commission five artists to create new work for its World Wide Web project Turbulence. New Radio and Performing Arts seeks to stimulate and advance the publics awareness of innovative work in the arts by producing and promoting experimental work for radio and live performance; and by encouraging and participating in the development, production and distribution of high quality audio recordings. The five artists supported by the Jerome Foundation award are Harris Skibell, Maryanne Petit, Jonathan Giles, Christina Baczewska and Laurel Wilson.

The NEW YORK MILLS ARTS RETREAT AND CULTURAL CENTER, New York Mills, Minnesota, received an 18-month grant of $18,000 for the Artist Residency Program. The Cultural Center is a place where artists of all disciplines may concentrate on their work while sharing their creative energies with the community. Located 180 miles northwest of the Twin Cities, the Center is housed in a small rural community in which visiting artists are provided private living quarters as well as studio space. Resident artists integrate themselves into the community by facilitating a variety of creative projects, thereby enriching the life of the New York Mills area.

THE NEW YORK NEW MUSIC ENSEMBLE, received $7,000 to support the commissioning of a new work by composer Melinda Wagner. The mixed ensemble of six players presents an annual concert series in New York City and tours in the United States and abroad. Its repertoire is dedicated to 20th Century music, featuring a mix of classics with newly commissioned pieces. During the 20 years of the Ensembles history, it has commissioned over 60 new works.

The NEW YORK THEATRE WORKSHOP, New York City, received $15,000 in support of the participation of emerging playwrights in developmental programs. The Theatre produces challenging, unpredictable and diverse work. The Play Development Program serves both established and emerging writers. It includes a reading series of new plays, a summer residency program, playwrights fellowships, staged works-in-progress, studio productions, and an annual mainstage season of four to six new works. The Workshops purpose to build and maintain a comprehensive creative process for writers.

The STAIRSTEP FOUNDATION, St. Paul, introduces and reinforces the life-giving values that sustain African and African-American people. It implements strategies which enable African-Americans to see each other as multifaceted humans rather than impersonal statistics. Stairstep is acting as fiscal agent for the NORTH COMMUNITY MURAL PROJECT, led by a strong committee of volunteers who are cultivating strategies for the use of art in making the North Minneapolis community a healthier place in which to live. The Mural Project, one of the primary activities of the committee, is to be a collaboration of three generations of artists, organized under the title Celebration of Life. Dr. John Biggers, master muralist, will create an original image for a North Minneapolis mural, based on multiple visits to the Twin Cities, dialogue with local youth and artists, and historical and pictorial materials supplied by the committee. Local artist organizers are Ta-Coumba Aiken and Seitu Jones, who will organize a mural team consisting of youth and emerging artists. This mural will be the first image to be painted on a freeway sound wall in the State of Minnesota. Each day, 34,000 people drive past the particular intersection where this wall is located. Jerome Foundation was pleased to offer support for this intergenerational endeavor which will contribute to the development of local emerging artists.

The NORTHERN CLAY CENTER, St. Paul, Minnesota, received $20,000 to support the 1997 Jerome Ceramic Artist Project Grants. The Northern Clay Center is a regional organization whose purpose is the advancement of the ceramic arts. Its mission is to promote excellence in the work of clay artists, provide educational opportunities for artists in the community, and encourage the publics appreciation and understanding of the ceramic arts. The Project Grants Program advances, artistically and technically, the work of emerging ceramic artists in Minnesota by offering project grants to individuals selected by an independent jury. Project funding may allow an artist to experiment with new techniques and materials, work or study with a mentor, purchase equipment to facilitate a particular investigation, or subsidize studio rental. Approximately five awards are made each year, often culminating in an exhibition of new works by the selected artists.

The EUGENE ONEILL THEATER CENTER, New York City, received a two-year grant of $24,000 in support of the participation of New York City and Minnesota-based playwrights in the 1996 and 1997 National Playwrights Conference. The National Playwrights Conference provides professional support, encouragement, guidance and opportunities to playwrights who need to develop their work in a nonthreatening environment. A company of actors, directors and designers, known for their commitment to new works, is assembled to bring the playwrights works to life at the conference.

Multimedia artist JIM OCKULY will travel to France, Switzerland and Austria. Foremost in his plan is a visit to the Ars Flectronica Center in Lint, Austria. This Center operates ongoing programs installations and other projects dedicated to the arts, sciences and evolving digital technology. He will also spend time in Paris working with Xavier Perrot, a pioneer in the area of hypermedia

OPERA EBONY, New York City, received a grant of $8,000 in support of a composers commission and a workshop production. Funding is dedicated toward the development and production of a new opera titled The Meetin, by composer Pamela Baskin Watson. The libretto is based on a short play about a mother and child by Langston Hughes. The music will be composed in jazz and gospel idioms, fused with a classical foundation.

A grant of $5,000 was awarded to OPERA MILLENNIUM, Minneapolis, Minnesota, in support of the chamber opera Goddess Songs, which incorporates music and multicultural dance forms to explore the myths of seven Greek goddesses. Written by composer Marjorie Rusche, the opera is scored for womens chorus, flute, oboe, bassoon, piano and percussion. Founded in 1994 by Artistic Director Angela Malek, Opera Millennium is committed to making contemporary opera accessible to a broad audience.

Amy S. Ostergaard, Minneapolis, MN, $6,000. For the production of "White Wash", a short narrative film told through the eyes of a young African American girl who hopes to be made white by her baptism so she'll finally "fit" into her adoptive white family.

The SOUTHERN THEATER, acting as fiscal agent for a new entity, PANGEA WORLD THEATER, received a commitment of $8,000 in support of Pangeas fall production. This multidisciplinary work will be based on Persian poet Farid Uddin Attars classic work Conference of the Birds. In addition to the production of this collaboratively developed piece, Pangea will offer artists workshops and a speakers series, if funding permits. The Pangea World Theater is committed to producing international works which illuminate the universal human condition, end divisiveness and celebrate differences. It will use multi-national casts to celebrate a secular, cross-ethnic vision of tolerance and human rights.

REBECCA PETERSEN, Executive Director of A Center for the Arts in Fergus Falls, Minnesota, will visit the Flynn Theatre in Burlington, Vermont. At the Flynn, she will have an opportunity to work with a group of administrators in a performing arts organizations similar to her own. She will visit other presenters, including college and community theater groups. This journey is designed to feed her future work.

Writer ROGER PINCKNEY received subsidy to gather material for Blue Water, Green Grass, fictionalized account of an amateur smuggling ring responsible for importing Jamaican marijuana into Port Royal Sound in the 1980s. He will record interviews with former smugglers, attorneys, law officers and retired federal judge, in Columbia and South Carolina, and access court documents.

A commitment of $8,000 was made to AMY PIVAR DANCES, New York City, support of the companys 1996-97 season. The collaborative team of choreographer Amy Pivar and psychotherapist and writer Freda Rosen creates dance/theater that embodies and celebrates a powerful voice and vision for women. Funding will be directed, in part, to six short studies, each exploring the struggles of particular women who have been inspirations to Pivar in her quest for self-determination.

PLAYWRIGHTS HORIZONS, New York City, received a two-year grant of $34,000 in support of the New Theater Wing. Playwrights Horizons is a writers theater dedicated to the support and development of new American playwrights. The New Theater Wing supports work through every stage of its evolution, tailoring assistance to the needs of each individual writer. The Wing supports a reading series of 30 to 35 plays a year, a commissioning program, the African American Playwrights Unit, and a comprehensive script review process.

The POWDERHORN PARK NEIGHBORHOOD ASSOCIATION in Minneapolis, Minnesota, received a grant of $9,000 to support Crepuscule in Powderhorn Park. This neighborhood association builds connections among Powderhorn Park residents, and brings together the diverse population to improve the neighborhoods economic and cultural environment. Crepuscule is under the direction of Douglas Ewart, a composer, musician, visual artist and instrument maker. Ewart will create a suite of music and lyrics derived from community-based issues. He will teach Powderhorn Park youth how to construct wind and percussion instruments from everyday discarded items. He will develop a programmatic scheme for the performance piece and involve professional musicians as pod leaders. Each pod will be a mix of amateur musicians, students from the instrument making workshops, lay persons located in various parts of Powderhorn Park and professional musicians. The focus will be on producing sounds that coincide with or embellish the naturally occurring sounds of wind, water and trees. Crepuscule is a cultural bridge.