Dance
New Hazlett Theater offers a CSA for the performing arts
You're probably heard of community-supported agriculture, and if you're a regular Creative Exchange reader you have most likely also heard of community-supported art – you can even download our…
2 Years of Creative Exchange!
It’s hard to believe, but Creative Exchange just turned 2! The platform was launched in 2014 in response to the question, “How do we support a movement around the power of local art and artists on a…
BOOM Concepts is a creative hub that reflects the faces of the community on Pittsburgh's Penn Ave.
D.S. Kinsel, co-founder of Pittsburgh's BOOM Concepts, is a painter, installation artist, event maker, and art curator. He says he is always trying to make sure that his art is relevant to and a…
Building Equity in the Arts in Denver
Suzi Q. Smith was excited to bring her daughter to her first opera. A prominent Denver poet and teaching artist, Smith grew up listening to classical opera; she trained as an opera singer for two…
World Dance Party
Are you looking to build connections between elders and young people? Do you want to strengthen ties between neighbors of different ethnicities? Do you want people to have a space to have fun and…
ArtsWave Cincinnati is the oldest and largest united arts fund in the country
Funding sources for many arts organizations tends to be a hodgepodge of foundation, government, corporate, and patron support, which makes ArtsWave Cincinnati remarkably unique – it is the Greater…
Bringing People to Play in Urban Green Spaces
In 2013, Springboard for the Arts launched the Artist Organizers (AOs) pilot program as part of Irrigate’s artist-led community development. Supported by the Surdna Foundation, the pilot planted…
Verb Ballets is a dance company for the community
Verb Ballets is a contemporary ballet company based out of Shaker Heights – just north of Akron – and performing all over Northeastern Ohio. A repertory-based company without a…
ARTLAB J moves with Detroit
Detroit might not be the first city you think about as having a significant dance presence, but you should really think again. Between major performance theaters like the Detroit…
Mad King Thomas are the most earnest postmodern dance group probably ever
There is a pretty hard line between the high brow and lowbrow in art and culture. Postmodernists like to toy with that line. Mad King Thomas likes to play jump rope with it. …
YEPAW encourages youth to pursue lifestyles of excellence through the arts
Youth Excellence Performing Arts Workshop (YEPAW) got its first start when founder and artistic director Leslie Barnes had a conversation with a friend who claimed that the youth…
Arab American National Museum is the first and only museum of its kind
The metro Detroit area is an area rich with cultural institutions that celebrate the heritage, history, legacy, and continued contributions of artistic, cultural, and intellectual…
The Kelly Strayhorn Theater welcomes the community into their home
The Kelly Strayhorn Theater is a performing arts and cultural center in Pittsburgh's East Liberty neighborhood. Named for two of Pittsburgh’s most celebrated talents in the last…
Arts for Learning teaches valuable life skills through paid arts internships
Miami's Arts for Learning (A4L), a nonprofit organization dedicated to advancing teaching and learning through the arts, launched nearly 15 years ago with a vision of connecting…
Allied Media Conference incorporates all varieties of media to incite social change
This is the first in a series of artist profiles featuring the work of artists around social justice, policing, and activism. Look for more profiles in the coming weeks. The Allied Media…
Haleem Rasul is teaching the world to Jit
Haleem "Stringz" Rasul is a dancer, designer, and filmmaker born and raised in Detroit. The dancers in his family were on his father's side, and Rasul was inspired by his late cousin who, he says,…
Hattie Mae Williams brings guerrilla dance performances to public places with Tattooed Ballerinas
Hattie Mae Williams grew up in Miami and attended the New World School of Arts magnet high school where, she says, she learned a lot about how to use art as a way to promote social change. She then…
Open-air Social Dance Series
"How come there is no public dancing in Chicago?" That was the question in 1997 that prompted the creation of the first SummerDance, an outdoor, public, free dance series in parks in Chicago. Since…
TU Dance makes modern dance accessible to a diverse community in St. Paul
TU Dance, a professional dance company and dance education center located in St. Paul, was founded by Uri Sands and Toni Pierce-Sands in 2004. Initially called Space TU Embrace, the organization…
Asian Arts Initiative shepherds community engagement and integration in Philly's Chinatown North
Gayle Isa started working at the Painted Bride Art Center in Philadelphia in 1993. This was in the aftermath of the infamous Rodney King verdict and the riots in Los Angeles that followed. Racial…
Welcome to Creative Exchange (again)
"I believe in the magic of storytelling, not only for teller but also the listener," says agrarian artist Nikiko Masumoto, who lives and works in California's Central Valley. "The possibility of…
Cleo Parker Robinson: Denver's modern dance pioneer
Cleo Parker Robinson grew up in Five Points, where her company resides today, and has been immersed in the mystique of the arts since birth -- her mother played with the San Diego Symphony and she…
It takes a ballet company: Thomas Armour Youth Ballet teaches life skills along with dance
The Thomas Armour Youth Ballet (TAYB) was established over 60 years ago in 1951 by renowned classical ballet dancer, Thomas Armour. Originally called the Miami Ballet, the for-profit school and…
Artists as community leaders
What a journey! Three years ago, Springboard for the Arts launched Irrigate, a creative placemaking project in partnership with the City of Saint Paul and the Twin Cities Local Initiatives Support…
GroundWorks builds movement from the ground up
GroundWorks Dance Theatre is a contemporary dance company founded in 1998 by Artistic Director David Shimotakahara. The company primarily splits its performance time between Akron and Cleveland with…
Artists U teaches artists how to make a life
The hardest thing about making a life as an artist is actually making a life as an artist. That's where Artists U comes in. Andrew Simonet is a choreographer and a writer who directed the Headlong…
Ryan Myers-Johnson founded Sidewalk Festival of Performing Arts to showcase alternative arts
When Ryan Myers-Johnson left Detroit after graduating from the Detroit School of Arts in 1999, she was already planning her return. At first she didn't go far -- just down the…
Experimental performance group The Hinterlands explores the outer limits of identity
In contemporary usage, "hinterland" is defined as "an area beyond what is visible or known." And this is why Richard Newman and Liza Bielby named their experimental performance group, headquartered…
From show pigs to Prokofiev: Bobby Wesner gets inventive to support Neos Dance Theatre
One of the biggest challenges most artists face is funding. A person might be one of the most talented people in their field but without the right funding opportunities, that potential will never be…
All the world's a stage: Nichole Canuso Dance Company creates "experiential" dance performances
You are one of six people in a room inside the Power Plant Productions basement, where a labyrinthine art installation has been constructed. You are each given a set of headphones to wear, and then…