Louisville Artist Group Receives $280,000 ArtPlace America Grant

LOUISVILLE, Ky. - July 13, 2015 - PRLog -- Roots & Wings (http://rootsandwingsart.weebly.com/) is among 38 recipients of ArtPlace America’s 2015 National Grants Program. ArtPlace, one of the nation’s largest philanthropies dedicated to creative placemaking, is investing $280,000 in Louisville, KY to further integrate arts and culture into the field of community planning and development. ArtPlace selected Roots & Wings from a pool of nearly 1,300 applicants nationwide.

Roots & Wings will work to link Appalachian, West African and urban arts in Louisville’s “Zones of Hope,” culminating in a theater production that will exhibit local cultural assets/heritage and engage young people as advocates for equitable development in these neighborhoods.

"For the Roots & Wings members, the national recognition of the ArtPlace America grant is a high honor and a real validation of the years they have been working on their craft," said Stacy Bailey-Ndiaye, co-director of Roots & Wings and founder of Bridge-Kids International (http://www.bridge-kids.org/).

"It is rewarding to see a project which began last year in Smoketown as part of the YouthBuild/IDEAS Creative Innovation Zone receive its own funding and recognition," said Theo Edmonds, Bailey-Ndiaye's co-director of Roots & Wings and also co-founder of IDEAS (http://ideaslouisville.com/). "Our growing eco-system of artists-led projects are beginning to extend into other parts of our city and state to serve and empower more communities. This is one of the things that we hoped to achieve when we started in Smoketown. Now we can say it is real."

Kim Baker, President of Kentucky Center for the Performing Arts said, "We are beyond thrilled to be a part of this prestigious grant which will allow ground breaking work to be done in our community. Roots & Wings will be a powerful example of how the arts can change lives and build neighborhoods."

"The Board of the African American Heritage Foundation (KCAAH) is proud to serve as one of the anchor partners to a project that will position artists at the center of on-going community development initiatives in West Louisville," said Aukram Burton of Kentucky Center for African American Heritage. "I am confident that Roots & Wings will ignite a dialogue in our community which will result in positive social and community change.”

Excerpt from grant announcement poem written by Roots & Wings:

Who are we??

We are grateful,

We are an entity that pushes for others to be inspired by their struggles and to build from them.

We are Lyrical Leaders

Bondage breakers

Humble teachers

Mind Regulators

We are deeply rooted; purpose manifested…ripened fruit all from the same fertile tree

We are legs, hands, hearts and minds dipped…in ink, in passion, in justice, in community,

We…are Roots and Wings, and make magnificence from the things we were and weren’t handed…and just in case you were wondering….WE GOT THE GRANT!

Roots & Wings was created with the support of Bridge-Kids International and IDEAS. Other key partners include the Kentucky Center for African American Heritage, Kentucky Center for the Performing Arts, and Metro Louisville’s Office for Safe and Healthy Neighborhoods.

Follow Roots & Wings on Facebook (https://www.facebook.com/rootswingsart), Instagram (https://instagram.com/rootswingsart), and their website (http://rootsandwingsart.weebly.com/) and with #RootsWingsArt

This is the second year in a row that ArtPlace has awarded a creative placemaking grant to a Louisville-based initiative. In 2014, ArtPlace awarded a $250,000 grant to YouthBuild Louisville/IDEAS to support the Creative Innovation Zone (http://ideaslouisville.com/news/youthbuildideas-create-25-new-jobs-for-young-adults-in-smoketown/) in Louisville’s Smoketown neighborhood.

In addition to the Roots & Wings project in West Louisville, another Kentucky organization, Appalshop (https://www.facebook.com/Appalshop) (Whitesburg, KY), was also chosen this year to receive a $450,000 grant from ArtPlace America.

In a joint statement, representatives of Roots & Wings and Appalshop noted that, “It is significant that two grass-roots, artist-led efforts in historically disinvested Kentucky communities (West Louisville and Appalachia) are collectively bringing $730,000 in new, national investment into our state's creative economy this year. For two Kentucky projects to be chosen among ArtPlace America's 38 grantees for 2015 is an indication of the growing influence of the voice of Kentucky-based artists within the national creative placemaking conversation. We look forward to supporting each other in these transformational projects over the next 18-months.”

“Investing in and supporting the arts have a profound impact on the social, physical, and economic futures of communities,” said ArtPlace Executive Director Jamie L. Bennett. “Projects like these demonstrate how imaginative and committed people are when it comes to enhancing their communities with creative interventions and thoughtful practices.”

"The National Grants Program is actively building a portfolio that touches each of the sectors and stakeholders that make up the community development field,” said ArtPlace’s Director of National Grantmaking F. Javier Torres.  “Last year, ArtPlace developed a Community Development Matrix to help us better evaluate our success on this front.  So, we're thrilled that this year's 38 grantees represent a dynamic spectrum of creative approaches and partnerships in community development that expand the dimensions of our portfolio."

This year’s ArtPlace America grantees were selected from nearly 1,300 applicants across 48 states and the District of Columbia.  Grants range from $50,000 to $500,000 with an average of $265,000.

"Each one of these grants supports a geographic community: a collection of people who live, work, and play within a defined circle on a map,” continued Torres.  “In each case, a community development challenge or opportunity was identified by local stakeholders; and these 38 grantees are serving as conduits for their community's desires by leading arts-based solutions through their projects."

To view the complete list of 2015 ArtPlace grantees, go to www.artplaceamerica.org.

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About ArtPlace America

ArtPlace America (ArtPlace) is a ten-year collaboration of foundations, banks, and federal agencies that exists to position art and culture as a core sector of comprehensive community planning and development in order to help strengthen the social, physical, and economic fabric of communities. Visit www.artplaceamerica.org for more information.