Please reach out if you have any questions or concerns.

We saw the creative ways that the first IPA cohort navigated these challenges and the positive impacts that the projects have had. As such, we understand that community engagement may require different approaches. ZSR recognizes that we are launching this initiative during a spike in the COVID-19 pandemic and believes that the health and safety of your community is of utmost importance.

The community engagement aspect of these grants is just as important as the art installations themselves, and ZSR is looking for communities that will authentically involve a cross-section of people, groups and organizations in telling, discussing and perhaps even producing the story(ies) depicted in the art. The Inclusive Public Art initiative aims to diversify the voices included in the decision-making processes about art in public places and is intended to spark healthy dialogue. The partnership, which includes $1 million from both the Mellon Foundation and ZSR, will support commemorative and artist commissions specifically focused on underrepresented narratives and communities. – announced a $2 million partnership to expand and continue our Inclusive Public Art initiative across North Carolina. Mellon Foundation – the largest supporter of arts and humanities in the U.S. Combined with the national reckoning regarding public art, monuments and race, the Foundation wanted to explore how art could serve as a starting place for people to engage in important - even difficult and courageous - conversations about their communities’ past, present and future. After an impactful inaugural IPA cohort of 10 grantees, we know that this effort can catalyze community conversations that result in a shared and fuller understanding of our common history - and common bonds - as North Carolinians.ĭuring the Foundation’s yearlong listening and learning tour across North Carolina, it was evident that legacies of racism and segregation are pervasive in many communities we visited, but are not often discussed in public unless there is a major issue involving race. Our investment in inclusive public art is intended to share stories of diversity, equality, inclusion and equity as they relate to the people and places of North Carolina, especially those whose stories are often untold or under told.

Smith Reynolds Foundation (ZSR) believes that art can open the door to conversation.

Arts letters express free