Arts Council of Kansas City Inspiration Grant, Kansas City Star by Alice Thorson, “ARTSKC Announces Thousands in Grants,” January 9, 2008

Prominent Kansas City artists Anne Lindberg and Miki Baird headline the just-released list of people who will receive grants from the ArtsKC Fund. They join previous grantees Peregrine Honig, Marcus Cain and Davin Watne, who were named in November to receive awards in the programís Inspiration Grant category. It supports projects and activities of artists and arts professionals.

The fund, a kind of United Way for the arts administered by the Arts Council of Kansas City, also gives grants to arts organizations. In July it announced 46 grants in its Ovation and Catalyst categories to organizations. Ovation grants, which are allotted 70 percent of the ArtsKC Fund, provide general operating support for established not-for-profits such as the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art and the Kansas City Symphony. Catalyst grants, allotted 25 percent, fund arts programs, projects and activities put on by various groups, including the Kansas City Artists Coalition, the Heartland Menís Chorus and the Unicorn Theatre.

Inspiration grants receive 5 percent of the fund. The ArtsKC Fund awarded grants totaling $400,052 in 2007. The four announced in November included $900 to author Debra Di Blasi to attend an April writers conference in California, and $2,500 to filmmaker Rodney Thompson toward production costs for his new documentary on the McFadden Brothers. Honig and Cain, with artist representative Tiffany Thompson, received $5,000 to help take their new exhibition program, SATELLITE Exhibitions, to the Bridge Art Fair in Miami, earlier this month. Watne received $2,500 toward expenses of his March 2008 show at Review Studios Exhibition Space.

The awards announced in December went to seven projects by eight artists, including $2,183 to Baird for her January show at Paragraph Gallery, $1,965 to Sandra van Tuyl for a large-scale temporary public artwork in Blue Springs, and $2,096 toward a community arts project spearheaded by Margaret Shelby and Michelle Bridges.

Lindberg was awarded $1,921 to fabricate a 9-foot articulated drawing table that will enable her to double the size of her work. The remaining grants of about $1,000 each went to composer and musician Kevin Hiatt, scenic artists Misty Pelas and Alice Bracken-Carroll and photographer Charles Stonewall.

Applications for the first of three rounds for 2008 Inspiration Grants will be available from the Arts Council in February; letters of inquiry will be due March 14. For more information, visit ArtsKC.org or call 816-221-1777.

Inspiration_grant.pdf