St. Claude Main Street Announces Arts-based Community Engagement Awardees
St. Claude Main Street is pleased to announce the awardees of the Arts-based Community Engagement RFP, a program within the organizations ArtPlace programming. After reviewing forty-eight proposals, the St. Claude Main Street Community Arts Advisory Board chose nine proposals and awarded a total of $35,000. These programs will all take place between January 2013 and August 2013 in and around the St. Claude Avenue community. The programs are diverse and speak to the various cultures in the St. Claude-area neighborhoods. These awards will provide the seed funding for many of these initiatives and the proof-of-concept that is necessary to secure the sustainable funding that they all deserve.
The nine awardees are as follows:
- 9th Ward Seminole Hunters and Chad Moore Studio Collaboration
o This program will provide community members with a behind the scenes experience on designing a Mardi Gras Indian patch with Big Chief Demond Melancon of the 9th Ward Seminole Hunters, and local music and visual artist Chad Moore. Saint Claude area schools will also have access to an authentic Mardi Gras Indian presentation on Indian practice (chants and drum circle), and a history lesson on the Mardi Gras Indians with all 9th Ward Seminole Hunters including sewing lessons.
- Talking on St. Claude; Eve Abrams
o Talking on St. Claude engages diverse members of the St. Claude community using the simple tools of conversation and audio recorders to create and share stories, which connect us to one another and our changing neighborhood.
- Big Class; Doug Keller
o Big Class will offer free creative writing programming, workshops, and after school tutoring for area students at Antenna Gallery/Press Street headquarters.
- Faubourg St. Roch Improvement Association & Faubourg St. Roch Project
o A series of community events and discussions of race incorporating film, interactive workshops, art therapy, culinary experiences and all forms of visual and theatrical expression.
- Arts in Education; Gretchen Faust
o A community-based youth program in the heart of the St. Claude Arts District to provide local youth with a creative outlet and a safe space to spend their after school hours. The program will be supported through guest artist workshops that will provide vocational skills, such as welding/brazing, basic carpentry, film/photography editing, sound production, computer programming, and site analysis for public installation. The program will culminate with the students curating a public exhibition at Antenna Gallery of their own work.
- New Orleans Youth Music Arts Program; Matthew Shilling
o The New Orleans Youth Music Arts Program, will teach both at-risk and creative youth ages 13-17 music production and recording while giving them hands-on experience, infusing an appreciation of local culture, and engaging them in their community.
- New Orleans Community Printshop
o The New Orleans Community Printshop will partner with St. Claude Main Street to create an after-school program for the youth in their direct neighborhood to explore printmaking with our teaching artists and use the printshop as an educational resource. For their last project, the kids involved in the program will work collaboratively to create a poster for a local community organization that they choose as a group.
- The 7th Ward Boys and Girls Garden (BGG); Keslie Box
o An after-school culinary arts program with goals to grow a neighborhood culture with access to local, healthy, and sustainable food, foster environmental stewardship and community engagement, and promote the long-term health of our neighborhood’s future generations.
- Project Create; Jordan Frankel
o Project Create: Young Designers is a mentor program between skilled seamstresses/fashion designers and high school students interested in learning how to sew, the basics of fashion design, and more specifically, how to design and sew their own prom dresses.
