Chicago Artists Coalition is hosting Fractured Atlas for a presentation on fundraising, the Fractured Atlas Fiscal Sponsorship Program and how it can benefit Chicago artists and organizations on Monday, April 8th.
The session is designed for anyone who is interested in using fiscal sponsorship including individuals, emerging organizations, the general public, currently sponsored projects, and potential applicants to the Fractured Atlas fiscal sponsorship program. It will explore the benefits and use of Fractured Atlas’ fiscal sponsorship program as a fundraising tool. The session will include an overview of fiscal sponsorship and how to apply, how to use the tools within the program, and an introduction to fundraising.
The session is 90 minutes in length and is presented by the Program Director of Fiscal Sponsorship, Dianne Debicella.
When: April 8th, 2010, 6:00 - 8:00pm
Where: CAC Coalition Gallery (2010 W. Pierce, Chicago, IL 60622)
Admission to this event is $10 for non-members, $5 for Members of CAC or Fractured Atlas.
RSVP and purchase tickets by emailing Alyson at alyson@caconline.org or calling 773-772-2385.
Refreshments & light hors d’oeuvres will be provided. Sign up now - space is limited!
I would like to take this opportunity to keep you up-to-date on the City of San José’s fiscal situation and encourage you and your neighbors to stay informed and participate in the budget process.
The City of San José continues to face significant fiscal challenges. After eight straight years of budget reductions, there are no easy [...]
Scientific studies have shown how music enhances children’s early language, math and reasoning skills. Because my son and I enjoyed family music classes from the time he was nine months old until age 3-1/2, I know firsthand that play-oriented music classes provide young children with tremendous opportunities for growth, development, socialization and, most importantly, fun! Brenda Haynes certainly agrees, and with her fiscal sponsorship from Fractured Atlas, she’s made it possible for many kids in Central Missouri who are physically or emotionally challenged, financially or educationally disadvantaged, who have physical disabilities, or who have lost a parent to experience the joy of music with their families.
Brenda, please tell us about the mission of your Central Missouri Music Outreach Program.
Our mission is to provide funds to children in the community so that they may attend developmentally appropriate music and movement classes.
What is your background in music? How did music shape your life?
I come from a family of musicians and singers. I played piano and clarinet as a child, and sang in the choir and performed in plays throughout high school. I believe that music is an integral part of our daily life and can be used to help modify everything from mood to behavior to learning!
What prompted you to form an organization?
I was offering grants to families who had need, and found myself in a situation where I had more and more families asking for help! These are families who are committed to bringing their children to class and participating in home activities and I couldn’t turn them away, but I also couldn’t afford to pay out of pocket for materials for all of them. I had some families with businesses who provided scholarships, but not in the quantities that I was receiving requests for.
What services do you provide and how many children have you helped?
Children come to weekly classes where they socialize, bond with their parents, learn and have fun! I receive such wonderful feedback from parents about how the program has helped their children experience success, and has helped them as parents be better teachers to their children. I have served more than 50 children in the last three years. Many of them have been in the program for that entire time. These children may be experiencing economic hardship, a loss in the family, developmental delay, etc.
How important is music to early childhood development?
Early, positive, age-appropriate experiences with music can have a remarkable and research-proven impact on children’s learning, including language and literacy skills (e.g., vocabulary, comprehension, listening, expression); social and emotional development; mathematics and pattern-recognition skills; and even ability to plan, guide, and self-regulate behavior.
What has been your greatest success to date?
My greatest success has been seeing the amazing learning gains in the classroom. Children with severe disabilities are talking for the first time, taking steps when their parents were told they’d never walk… Also a huge success is seeing families break through barriers with their children, barriers that they had previous thought insurmountable.
What motivated you to become a member of Fractured Atlas? How has your membership helped you to achieve your goals?
I was looking for a way to bring in more funding to my program so that more children in need could participate, and my fiscal sponsorship now makes it possible for donations to our organization to be tax-deductible. Last year I was able to fund materials for more than 20 children.
What’s next on your professional horizon?
I would like to eventually turn my program into a non-for-profit organization, bringing programming into even more children’s lives.
For more information, visit the Central Missouri Music Outreach Program’s website.
Sigh, reading is soooo boooooring.If you make it to the second paragraph of this article, congratulations, you have a higher attention span than most of the Twitter-verse.
But does your audience?In the age of YouTube, how do you harness the power (and traffic) of video to market yourself, your project, your company?Web video as marketing tool is spreading faster than you can say Vimeo and you can’t afford to ignore it.
So take these tips from a few of my particularly video-savvy clients and creative contacts on the why, what & how of video marketing:
I’m particularly impressed with the creative publicity idea currently being executed by Chasten Harmon of Space on White.In order to get the word out about her gorgeous new Tribeca rehearsal & performance studios in Manhattan, she just launched a video contest open to any theatre, dance, artistic company, that asks them to submit a video answering the question “what would you do with Space on White as your blank canvas?”The prize:80 hours of free space – a $1500 value.
So what’s in it for Space on White?Creative engagement of their target audience, traffic to their website, and positive artistic association with the space. The potential rentals from creative companies are worth the investment to Chasten. She’s even taken it a step further and organized a finale event on April 1 inviting all entrants to the space for an industry trend panel with Broadway producer Andy Sandburg, Fractured Atlas man-about-town Adam Natale, and yours truly.It’s a win all around.
The most common type of video you’ll want to create, however, will be to capture a more general audience’s attention.This is where content and quality must come into play.
Re content: keep it relevant, keep it brief, keep it captivating.The biggest problem I run into with clients is that what they’re proud of is not necessarily what is going to turn on an audience.That your play spent a year in development may not resonate with a non-theatre person, but that you traveled to Nigeria to research the subject probably will.Tell a story, but think anecdote, not novel.
Most of what I’ve learned about video quality has been from Brad Holbrook, founder of ActorIntro and AuthorIntro.With 20+ years of experience in TV journalism and an Emmy to show for it, he took his expertise in video and creating captivating interviews to create a suite of video services to help artists market themselves, like personalized interviews and project promos.
Brad’s least-favorite FAQ is “why can’t I just do it myself?”Ugh.Every piece of marketing is an indication of the level of quality of the product.So if your video is amateur, guess what that tells the viewer?The online audience has seen enough video to know the difference between webcam and High-Def.If your video is to introduce yourself to arts/entertainment industry, quality video, audio, and editing become that much more vital.
Web series producer Thom Woodley of Dinosaur Diorama offers this advice:
“I think the two most common mistakes people make when making internet video both have to do with production quality. One mistake people make is assuming that because you’re making content for the (very) small screen, you don’t have to pay attention to necessary things like lighting, sound, etc. It’s just like regular filmmaking, you make as good as humanly possible, so that one day it can outlive its website. Of course, people are going in the other direction too, and spending hundreds of thousands of dollars more than they need to, to give it a slick ‘feature film’ look. And more often than not, it’s unnecessary. You have to match the look to your story.”
Get started with these do’s and don’ts of video marketing:
Don’t be intimidated by video
Do be true to your personality and product
Do use the best quality video and sound possible for your project
Don’t use a flipcam or webcam unless it fits the story you’re telling
Do engage your audience
Do repost your video on social media sites once it’s live
Don’t assume your video closes when your production does
Do keep it brief
Don’t include internal details unless they’re widely captivating
Do stay on top of online marketing trends to stay ahead of the game.
(Got great video?Post a link in the comments section here.)
