The Center for Art and Public Life creates community partnerships using the arts to address issues of social justice, diversity, community development, and education. Our programming is woven across disciplines at California College of the Arts and serves the diverse populations of the San Francisco Bay Area. The Center's mission is to create community partnerships based on creative practice that serve the college and the diverse population of Oakland, San Francisco, and beyond.
Services to the Field
Find information on a vast array of organizations that are supporting the work of arts for community, social, and civic change through services to the field—information, tools and resources, networking, advisory support, membership opportunities and more!
The Center for Artistic Activism is the home for artists, activists and scholars to explore, discuss, reflect upon, and strengthen connections between social activism and artistic practice. The Center for Artistic Activism facilitates projects and strengthen networks. Their goal is to make more creative and more effective citizen activists.
The Center for Arts Policy (CAP) at Columbia College Chicago evolved from a series of forums (“Democratic Vistas”) that began in 1994, emerging from a concern about the ways the arts had become a political football in the country’s “culture wars.” An early and ongoing concern of the center was to consider how the arts contribute to the practice of democracy.
Help in creating sustainable, participatory arts organizations in small and rural communities.
The Center for the Study of Art & Community (CSA&C) works with clients to develop arts-based partnerships that address the following question: How can the arts help build caring, capable, and sustainable communities? We believe the arts can only flourish when the power of the creative process becomes a vital and accepted part of all aspects of community life. At a time when many of our most valued cultural institutions are at risk, CSA&C is working to establish new working relationships between the arts and the broader community.
Chicago Artists Resource (CAR) is a program of the Chicago Department of Cultural Affairs that provides resources for Chicago artists working in dance, literary, music, theatre and visual arts. CAR hosts a searchable database on its web site where Chicago artists can post their artwork and experiences through Artist Story or Arts Professional Story. Resources are organized by artistic discipline and also include links to local and national organizations, educational and career opportunities, and business resources for operating an arts organization. .
Chicken & Egg Pictures is a hybrid film fund and nonprofit production company dedicated to supporting women filmmakers who are as passionate about the craft of storytelling as they are about the social justice, environmental, and human rights issues they are embracing, translating and exploring on film.
Conscious Alliance partners with colleges and musicians to hold food and fundraising drives to raise awareness of poverty and hunger in America, especially on Native American Reservations. Conscious Alliance has also expanded its efforts to provide food to areas effected by disasters. Art is the incentive to inspire people to make food or monetary donations. Artists donate poster designs that are printed by Conscious Alliance and given to contributors attending concerts. This profile courtesy of Air Traffic Control.
Creative Counsel partners with the arts and entertainment industry, visual artists and curators, musicians, writers, and other creative professionals to connect audiences to causes that matter. As an organization showcasing innovative work at the intersection of the creative arts and advocacy, one of Creative Counsel’s key resources is the 1000 Voices National Archive, a curated collection of dynamically linked video stories told by social change leaders across the country.
Crossroads Institute for Art, Learning, & Community works with children, youth, and adults throughout the United States to spread knowledge and build capacity regarding the use of the creative arts for learning and social change. For its first five years, Crossroads Institute was focused on the completion of a ten-year effort to research, create, and publish its seminal publication, Beginner’s Guide to Community-Based Arts (New Village Press, 2005).
DESIGN 21: Social Design Network’s mission is to inspire social consciousness through design by connecting people and organizations who want to explore ways that design can positively impact our communities. The Design 21 Network features a database with links to member designers and design organizations and to design projects organized by social theme and design type. The network also highlights design competitions that allow members to create solutions to social challenges along with a forum for non-profits to request design assistance.
EFFECT is a social enterprise that aligns consumer purchase decisions and socially responsible behavior with marketing a brand. The marketing approach involves focusing on the quantified social impact which grows brands in both the short and long term by authentically building brand attributes and increasing brand loyalty. MusicMatters is a division of EFFECT and was one of the founding ventures that revolutionized social change in the music industry. This profile courtesy of Air Traffic Control.
Featured Artists Coalition (FAC) is based in the United Kingdom, but exists to ensure that all musicians gain more control of their music and a fairer share of the profits generated in the digital age. FAC's goals are for Fairness, artists receiving a fair deal, Transparency, artists knowing what happens with their work, and Equality, artists treated as equal partners in the business deals that involve them. FAC accomplishes these goals by guiding artists, negotiating with companies and organizing events. This profile courtesy of Air Traffic Control.
freeDimensional advances social justice by hosting activists in art spaces and using cultural resources to strengthen their work. freeDimensional believes that art spaces are a vital part of civil society and are in a unique position to support activists and culture workers-in-distress while engaging their local communities around key issues. freeDimensional works with the global arts community and specific partners to protect critical voices by providing safe haven in artist residency apartments (Creative Safe Haven) and quick-response funding (Creative Resistance Fund).
Future of Music Coalition (FMC) works to ensure that musicians have a voice in the issues that affect their livelihood. One of these issues is artist engagement as it relates to creating sustainable local cultural communities and training musician advocates. Additional issues include radio, internet and telecommunications policy, copyright, and artist compensation. The annual Policy Summit provides forums for discussion about issues at the intersection of music, technology, policy, and law. Musicians are informed of policies and technology developments through the monthly newsletter.
Games for Change provides support, visibility, and shared resources to individuals and organizations using and designing digital games for social change. The web site features Game Channels, a database of exemplary games that engage contemporary social issues in meaningful ways to foster a more just, equitable and/or tolerant society. These games have been created by cross-disciplinary teams from around the world. Profiles include age appropriateness, description, and a link to play. Games in development are showcased in the annual Games for Change Festival.
Good Film is a project of Channel 4 BRITDOC Foundation, a London-based foundation that supports documentary filmmakers worldwide. The web site, goodfilm.org, is an online tool that links filmmakers to nonprofit and funding organizations to develop partnerships for each stage of the filmmaking process. Films are searchable by topic areas of: Arts, Culture and Sport, Education, Environment, Health, Human Rights, Humanitarian, Participation, and Poverty.
The GRAMMY Foundation was established to cultivate the understanding, appreciation and advancement of the contribution of recorded music to American culture. The GRAMMY Foundation fulfills this mission through GRAMMY in the Schools programs that engage both high school and college students and through Preservation and Advancement Initiatives that raise public awareness of the urgent need to preserve our nation's recorded sound legacy. This profile courtesy of Air Traffic Control.
Grantmakers in Film and Electronic Media (GFEM) serves as a resource for grantmakers who fund media content, infrastructure, and policy as well as those who employ media to further their program goals. GFEM believes that media play a vital role in shaping, framing, and catalyzing public discourse and culture. Our goal is to advance the field of media arts and public interest media funding.
Grantmakers in the Arts (GIA) serves grantmakers by creating a forum for discourse about topics relevant to the arts. Programs and activities of GIA include: an annual conference which includes an Arts & Social Justice pre-conference; GIA Reader, which features articles on topics of interest to arts grantmakers; Phone Forums which are one-hour presentations on topics of interest to arts and culture funders; and research and publications.