Past
Grantees

David W. Butler, Minneapolis, MN, $2,000 (Completion). Neighbors Mural. Finishing funds for a 26-minute video documentary on youth artists completing the fourth and final panel of the We Claim Our Lives mural, part of the Phillips Neighborhoods Safe Art project.

Two years of subsidy, totaling $32,000, were awarded to Circle Repertory Company, New York City, in support of its Literary Department and playwright development programming. Founded in 1969, Circle Rep provides a nurturing artistic environment for theater professionals to develop collectively and produce new work for the stage, exploring concerns and interests relevant to contemporary American audiences. Circle Rep serves audiences and artists through a five-play annual mainstage season, an extensive playwright development program, specialized education and outreach projects, and targeted community activities. The theater's guiding philosophy is a commitment to the development of individual writers rather than specific projects, which has attracted Jerome Foundation support since 1977.

Coffee House Press, Minneapolis, Minnesota, received a two-year grant of $36,000, to support the publication of seven books by emerging American authors in 1995 and 1996. Coffee House maintains both active letterpress and tradebook programs. The mission of the press is to promote exciting, vital and enduring authors of the current time; to delight and inspire readers; to increase awareness of and appreciation for the traditional book arts; to contribute to the cultural life of the writing community; and to enrich our collective cultural heritage.

Adam Cohen received funding to produce Voyage to El Xino, an extended series of filmed image-poems about cities here and abroad. The film will be a portrait of Barcelona's Barrio El Xino, shot as the city implements the last stages of a massive redevelopment plan that is radically altering the character of both this neighborhood and the city center. This portrait will be framed within the context of larger issues of history and urbanism symbolized by the housing projects and urban sprawl on the edge of the city-themselves products of earlier cycles of economic change and displacement.

Videomaker AMELIE COLLINS received support to spend five weeks in Montevideo, Uruguay, to distribute a completed documentary about Uruguayan women artists titled Las (In)Visibles. This work explores important Uruguayan social concerns: the harsh economy, rigid gender roles and the continuing effect the brutal dictatorship of the 70s and 80s has had on creative expression. Collins will meet with various Uruguayan artists and develop collaborative work with Jorge An in video, photography, theater and magic lantern films. Collins is also making a documentary video about Ans philosophy and work.

COMPAS, St. Paul, Minnesota, received a grant of $5,000 toward the planning and development of the 1997 National Conference of the National Assembly of Local Arts Agencies. This national nonprofit organization represents local arts agencies working to develop an essential place for the arts in Americas communities. The organizations are on the front-line of activity, vested with the responsibility to further local, cultural and artistic interests, and insure access to them.

The Jerome Foundation Directors authorized $7,000 to the Minnesota Dance Alliance, Minneapolis, Minnesota, acting as fiscal agent for Concrete Farm, a collective of seven dancers/choreographers: Stephanie Dumaine, Susan Scalf, Winona Sorensen, Kelli Tennyson, Morgan Thorson, Kristin Van Loon and Arwen Wilder. Funding will support a two-month period of rehearsal and development time for the choreographers, in a retreat setting.

Cecelia Condit, Milwaukee, WI, $10,000 (Production). Book of Love. A 60-minute videotape, which will weave the violence, capture and escape that has been a recurring in theme in Condit's mothers life into the fairy tale, Rapunzel.

The Minnesota Dance Alliance, Minneapolis, Minnesota, as fiscal agent for Corning Dances & Company, received $7,000 to support the 1995-96 season of Corning Dances & Company. Immediately following the Company's summer season, Beth Corning will begin work on the second part of a trilogy, to be premiered in March of 1996. Titled Painted Windows, it will be based on the paintings of Mark Chagall, and will explore family and community.

The Council on Foundations, Washington, D.C., is constituted by independent and corporate foundations and giving programs, community foundations, operating foundations and public and foreign foundations. Its mission is to promote responsible and effective philanthropy, secure and maintain public policy supportive of philanthropy, promote the growth of organized philanthropy, and support and enhance cooperation among grantmakers. The Jerome Foundation authorized a membership and general operating support grant of $5,600.

Intermedia Arts, Minneapolis, Minnesota, as fiscal agent for CreArte, received $15,000 to support the 1995 Da de los Muertos event and the 1995-96 operating budget of CreArte. It aims to preserve the cultural legacy of Chicano and Latino artists in Minnesota, and to develop young artists within the community. CreArte will serve artists in the visual, dance, music, folk, literary and interdisciplinary fields. Preliminary plans call for an artists registry, an exhibition series, promotion, a mentor program and a gathering place. Artists will create Ofrendas as part of the Da de los Muertos installation at the Lyndale Avenue location of Intermedia Arts.

Creative Time, New York City, received a two-year commitment of $24,000 to support the participation of emerging artists in the CityWide program. Creative Time was founded in 1973 as a direct outcome of artists explorations in works which went beyond the physical capabilities of theaters, galleries and concert halls. Criteria for selection, by review panels convened throughout the year, are artistic quality and project feasibility. Funding will also be directed toward a new program, CyberWide, which promotes creative work in the field of interactive media.

A grant of $10,000 was pledged to FORECAST, St. Paul, Minnesota, to support a pilot program of workshops for regional glass artists. Conceived by glass artist Dick Huss and art critic and curator Mason Riddle, this initiative encompasses a workshop and residency program for regional glass artists and artists working in other media who are interested in glass. The project will generate educational opportunities, increase skill levels, expose artists to new techniques, stimulate critical dialogue, increase visibility for glass art and build a market for it.

Artist BETSY DAMON received support to spend six weeks in Chengdu, China, to design a Living Water Garden in collaboration with Chinese artists and architects on the Fu-Nan River. In 1994, the City of Chengdu initiated a program to clean the Fu-Nan River and develop the riverfront. Damons water park will consist of sculptures that facilitate the cleansing of water, integrated with wetlands. The park will emphasize the relationship of water and health with works that show the history of the river when it was healthy. Damon expects to learn a great deal from her time in China.

A two-year grant of $45,000 was awarded to the Minnesota Dance Alliance, Minneapolis, Minnesota, in support of Dancer Pool and related programming. The Alliances mission is to support and foster dance in Minnesota. With a membership of over 330 independent choreographers, dancers, teachers, companies and presenters, the Dance Alliance offers a wide variety of services and resources. Dancer Pool supports rehearsal fees for dancers working with independent choreographers. Jerome has funded this activity since 1982.

Dennis Darmek, Milwaukee, WI, $4,000 (Production). Gaijin Diary. A 20-minute personal video portrait of contemporary Japan in which Darmek will continue his exploration of cultural dichotomies using his instincts as a documentary street photographer along with his artistic sensibilities.

Laura M. Davis, Minneapolis, MN, $4,500 (Completion). Womens War. For the completion of a 30-minute videotape, made in collaboration with Nigerian artists and village women, on the 1992 reenactment of the 1929 "womens uprising" against British colonial rule.

VENUS DE MARS, a multidisciplinary artist, received a grant to spend 14 days in New York working with Meredith Monk in the development of a new hour-long performance work which they will create

A grant of $15,000 was given to Intermedia Arts Minnesota, Minneapolis, acting as fiscal agent for artists Venus de Mars and Diane Torr. de Mars is a Minneapolis-based performance, visual and media artist whose work concerns itself with issues of gender. Diane Torr is a dancer, writer, director and performance artist whose work centers around desire, reinventions of the erotic, celebration of the senses, the gender diaspora and cross-dressing. They will develop and present performance works in a joint evening in the spring of 1996. Torr will also offer a workshop.

The Minnesota Project for Contemporary Language Arts, St. Paul, Minnesota, publishes books through Detour Press. Jerome funding of $3,000 will support the production of a book by Erik Belgum, a composer and writer. The purpose of The Minnesota Project for Contemporary Language Arts is to publish writing and conduct related activities that play significant roles in expanding the literary culture of the Upper Midwest.