Cook Inlet Housing Authority

Nov 09, 2021

The Cook Inlet Housing Authority (CIHA) is a tribally designated housing entity serving the Cook Inlet region, including Anchorage, Alaska. The agency develops, owns, and operates a large portfolio of affordable housing throughout the region. Serving not only tribal members and other Alaska Natives and Native Americans but also the diverse population of greater Anchorage. CIHA identified the need to use arts and culture to encourage residents’ involvement in local planning and design to unify them. Collaboration with local artists and experimentation in activating space, creative placemaking, and problem-solving demonstrates CIHA's strategic intent to infuse their work with novel strategies and insights. They are guided by Alaska Native values and the Community Development Investments program provided the staff the opportunity to incorporate those values into activities and practices that enhanced their capacity to meet residents’ housing needs more effectively and to build genuine community.

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Art Against Racism

30 May, 2023

Art Against Racism is a virtual arts exhibition which aims to lift up the tremendous array of creative works made in support of the Black Lives Matter movement. In doing so, project organizers hope that the exhibition will serve as an archive of the national artistic response to this historic moment.

Increasing Vaccine Confidence With Youth's Artwork - La Raza Youth Leadership Institute

30 May, 2023

La Raza Youth Leadership Institute hosted an art contest for youth ages 12-19 with the goal of motivating Latinx youth to get vaccinated. Three winners were chosen, and the first place winner's artwork was displayed on buses and in bus stop shelters near a number of schools. A phone number is included with the artwork for youth to call to receive more information about vaccines.

Perception Isn't Always Reality by Saint Louis Story Stitchers Artists Collective

22 Jul, 2022

Saint Louis Story Stitchers Artists Collective's Perception Isn't Always Reality engages BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, People of Color) teen and young adult artists to reevaluate messages they may have received about Covid-19 and vaccinations and to reevaluate the sources of the information. Through their own brand of urban storytelling that involves collaborative work in hip hop music and krump dance, spoken word, videography, photography, and podcasting, the artists will produce a challenging body of work for the public to experience on urban canvases such as the sides of city buses and on air waves.

Saint Louis Story Stitchers Artists Collective

22 Jul, 2022

Based in St. Louis, Missouri and incorporated in 2014, the Story Stitchers Artists Collective uses a collaborative model to create social justice art. The mission of Story Stitchers is to document St. Louis through art and word and to promote understanding, civic pride, intergenerational relationships, and literacy. Story Stitchers works to promote a better educated, more peaceful, and caring region through the creation and dissemination of original art.

Healing Wings project helps residents process COVID-19 grief through art

21 Jul, 2022

The product of a collaboration the Potters' Guild of Las Cruces and Mesilla artist Josh Switzer, The Healing Wings project was developed to gave people in Las Cruces who were affected by the Covid-19 pandemic a chance to honor those lost during to COVID-19. Las Cruces community members were invited to paint clay-sculpted wings to hang on a metal tree. The wings gave the community members an artistic outlet to share their griefs or honor loved ones. The project also included a sculpture comprised of metal boxes, where people could write their experiences of grief on a paper and then put it in the box. Once the boxes are full, organizers plan to burn the notes as a symbol of letting go.

The Madisonville Community Studio

21 Jul, 2022

The Madisonville Community Studio is an ongoing project co-created by Madisonville residents and Design Impact to explore key questions about the inclusiveness of neighborhood changes. The project is supported by the Kresge Foundation. To improve interracial relationships in Madisonville and increase Black residents’ power, influence, and representation in the neighborhood’s development decisions.