Voices from the Field Blog

It’s the most wonderful time of the year—if you work for or support one of the 564 municipalities in New Jersey. The League of Municipalities is once again taking over Atlantic City for its 111th Annual NJ League Conference this November 17-19, and ArtPride New Jersey has the distinct honor of ensuring that arts and culture has a place in the important conversations around how municipalities can...

“There are not a lot of communities that have a professional regional theater in their area. Our mission at Passage Theatre Company is to create and produce socially relevant theater that resonates with our community. We make theater for Trenton about issues that matter to Trenton, tackling current event topics and things that are in the mind of people today to specifically create community...

At ArtPride New Jersey, we believe the stories behind public investment matter just as much as the dollars themselves. That's why we're continuing to spotlight the transformative impact of the NJEDA A.R.T. Phase II grant program and the organizations putting these resources to work in communities across New Jersey. As the state's arts advocacy organization, our mission is to advance, promote, and...

Voices from the Field has covered the benefits of the A.R.T. Phase II Grant before, and we are at it again. The breadth of assistance this grant has provided to the arts sector across the state should not be underestimated. Thirty-nine different organizations have grown thanks to the fifteen-million-dollar subsidy. This article aims to highlight another such organization, the Monmouth Museum...

NJEDA’s recent initiative is dedicated to funding and investing in the arts, specifically in regard to their grant ventures A.R.T. Phase I, A.R.T. Phase II, and the C.A.F.E. Program. At the time, the recipients for the $15 million A.R.T. Phase II grant had not yet been announced but we are excited to share that thirty-nine organizations across New Jersey were awarded significant grants under the...

This past November 3, Jersey City voted to create an Arts and Culture Trust Fund, becoming the first municipality in New Jersey to create a dedicated tax to support the arts. The trust will create funding sources for arts organizations in the city, and will support arts organizations and artists that benefit the culture, well-being, and economy of Jersey City, as well as provide increased...

As I walked into my classroom at Columbia High School the morning of January 28th of this year, I noticed a call notification on my phone: NJSCA. I knew I wouldn’t be able to answer it until after my morning classes, but I had an oddly positive feeling. I tried to tamp down expectations, and got absorbed in my teaching. In that way, I got to enjoy the tremble of excitement a second time when I...

I recently had the opportunity to plan and co-host a Council of New Jersey Grantmakers (CNJG) funder briefing in collaboration with New Jersey State Council on the Arts. The session featured nationally recognized philanthropy thought-leaders Holly Sidford and Edwin Torres. They spoke about inequities in philanthropic giving to arts and culture organizations, and although the session focused on the...

Did you attend an arts event last year? A performance, exhibit, music festival, or poetry reading? If you did, you are in great company. New Jersey nonprofit arts groups drew more than 7.5 million people to their programs in 2015—that’s four times more than all New Jersey professional sports events! And those same groups and audiences generated a half billion dollars for the state’s economy. When...

According to Arts & Economic Prosperity 5 – a national economic impact study released June 17 by Americans for the Arts– the nonprofit arts and culture sector in New Jersey is a $519.8 million industry, supporting 14,342 full-time equivalent jobs and yielding $41 million in local and state government revenue. ArtPride worked with Americans for the Arts and five local partners–Cape May, Cumberland...