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Thursday, October 21, 2021

Elizabeth Alexander on arts philanthropy and justice

 


Giving Done Right podcast explores social and racial justice in arts funding with Elizabeth Alexander, award-winning poet and president of The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, and hosts Phil Buchanan and Grace Chiang Nicolette of Center for Effective Philanthropy.

Listen here.

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DISCLAIMER: In addition to my work on InfiniteBody, I serve, at Gibney, as Senior Director of Curation and Editorial Director. The postings on this site are my own and do not necessarily reflect the views, strategies or opinions of Gibney.

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Cynthia Oliver and Dormeshia are 2021 Doris Duke Awardees

Cynthia Oliver (photo: Ian Douglas)

Dormeshia (photo: AK47 Photography)

 

Congratulations to two of our stellar dance artists--Cynthia Oliver and Dormeshia--who are among seven winners of the 2021 Doris Duke Awards announced today by the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation!

Other 2021 awardees include saxophonist/composer Wayne Shorter, pianist/composer Danilo Pérez, pianist/composer Kris Davis, theater director Lileana Blain-Cruz, and actor/writer/director Teo Castellanos.

The annual Doris Duke Award, the largest national award to individuals in the performing arts, provides artists in theater, dance, and jazz with an award of $275,000.

“We are thrilled to award this year’s cohort of exceptional artists with this support,” said Maurine Knighton, program director for the arts at the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation. “With the knowledge that these performing artists excel in their forms, we recognize that they deserve funding that trusts them to best determine how to invest in their own futures. These awards are intended to enable artists with the freedom to create the way that artists are meant to create: freely, organically and without restrictions.”

Read more about the Doris Duke Artist Awards and the 2021 Doris Duke Artists here


About the Doris Duke Artist Awards


The Doris Duke Charitable Foundation designed the Doris Duke Artist Awards to invest in exemplary individual artists in contemporary dance, jazz and theater work who have demonstrated their artistic vitality and ongoing commitment to their field. The award is not a lifetime achievement award. Rather, it is a deep investment in the creative potential of dedicated artists. The foundation aims to empower Doris Duke Artists through the freedom of unrestricted support to take creative risks, explore new ideas, and pay for important professional and personal needs not typically funded by the project-related grants that dominate arts funding. While the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation initially conceived the Doris Duke Artists Awards as part of a larger $50 million special initiative that finished in 2017, recognition of the program’s importance in helping artists thrive spurred the foundation to cement a place for the flexible awards in its core strategy to support the arts.


About the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation


The mission of the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation (DDCF) is to improve the quality of people’s lives through grants supporting the performing arts, environmental conservation, medical research and child well-being, and through preservation of the cultural and environmental legacy of Doris Duke’s properties. The Doris Duke Charitable Foundation focuses its support to the performing arts on contemporary dance, jazz and theater artists, and the organizations that nurture, present and produce them. In 2015, the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) awarded the foundation with a 2014 National Medal of Arts, presented by President Barack Obama, in special recognition of DDCF’s support of creative expression across the United States and “bold commitment” to artistic risk, which has helped artists, musicians, dancers and actors share their talents and enriched the cultural life of the nation. For more information, please visit www.ddcf.org.

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DISCLAIMER: In addition to my work on InfiniteBody, I serve, at Gibney, as Senior Director of Curation and Editorial Director. The postings on this site are my own and do not necessarily reflect the views, strategies or opinions of Gibney.

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Alice Sheppard wins Neilsen prize, plans fund for disabled artists

 

Alice Sheppard (photo: Beverlie Lord)

Congratulations to dance artist Alice Sheppard who has just won the Craig H. Neilsen Foundation's 2021 Neilsen Visionary Prize!

Sheppard will direct 100% of the prize money--$1 million--towards support for other disabled artists. This fund will address disabled artists' need for equipment, access, care, travel and other resources related to training, development, and creation.

Sheppard, artistic director of world-renowned Kinetic Light, expressed gratitude to the Neilson Foundation: "Through this honor, they emphasize the fact that disability is not a deficit; it is a powerful creative and cultural force....I dedicate these funds to disabled artists. We do not move alone. We are interdependent, collective, and communal.”

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DISCLAIMER: In addition to my work on InfiniteBody, I serve, at Gibney, as Senior Director of Curation and Editorial Director. The postings on this site are my own and do not necessarily reflect the views, strategies or opinions of Gibney.

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