We are excited this week to have launched #ArtsCreateHope, a new social media campaign designed to remind the public that the arts are essential to the fabric of our lives. The arts create joy, learning, community, jobs, and belonging—and most of all, especially in these turbulent times, they create hope. We hope you will watch and share our short, uplifting video with your networks and friends, and please take to social media to share your stories of how the #ArtsCreateHope for you. We could all use a little lift from each other!

In case you missed any of it this week, you can also revisit the keynote from this year’s Public Art & Civic Design Conference on the future of monuments and public art, given by Paul Farber of Monument Lab; listen to a podcast on philanthropy and social justice with Andrew W. Mellon Foundation President Elizabeth Alexander; and read about a new social media campaign featuring unsung heroes of the suffrage movement from the 19th century to now. Last but not least, please join us in congratulating our President and CEO Bob Lynch for being named a top nonprofit executive (for the sixth time!) by The Nonprofit Times.

#ArtsCreateHope

Can you remember a time when we’ve needed the arts more? As we struggle each day with the pandemic and fight harder for racial equity, the arts are there to support us. We listen to music, we read, we make chalk drawings with our kids. We play video games, we dance in our living rooms, and watch movies and TV. We practice the guitar, take Instagram photos, and we create posters to carry in protest. The arts are working overtime in every community, household, and family, doing what they do best: connecting us, giving us needed moments of joy, and most of all creating hope. Spread the word and find ways you can support the arts right now at www.ArtsCreateHope.com. #ArtsCreateHope

News Room

Elizabeth Alexander: How Arts and Culture can Carry Us Through Pain
Dr. Elizabeth Alexander is the President of the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, the country’s largest funder of arts and culture. This year, they’re working with a grantmaking budget of $500 million, every dollar of which will go towards social justice projects. On the NBC news podcast “Into America,” host Trymaine Lee spoke with Alexander about pain, philanthropy, and poetry.

Celebrate the 100th Anniversary of the 19th Amendment with #19SuffrageStories
The Smithsonian, National Archives, and Library of Congress have launched a social media campaign for the month of August, #19SuffrageStories, to bring stories of suffragists and their fight for voting rights to social media. The campaign marks the centennial of the 19th Amendment and features stories of suffragettes who often have been overlooked.

Americans for the Arts President and CEO Robert L. Lynch Listed as Top 50 Executive in Nonprofit Sector by The NonProfit Times
Lynch was named to the 2020 NPT Power & Influence Top 50, an annual list in its 23rd year highlighting the nonprofit sector’s top working executives for innovation and influence on the broader sector. This is the sixth year Lynch has been recognized by the publication for his leadership for Americans for the Arts.

Video

Keynote: Paul Farber, “On Power and Participation”
From the Public Art & Civic Design Conference in June, Monument Lab co-founder Paul Farber offers reports of urgency and purpose for the field of public art in the midst of sweeping protests against anti-Black racism, police brutality, and the carceral state, and shares his wishlist and action items for the next generation of monuments.

#ArtsCreateHope
The arts are working overtime in every community, household, and family, doing what they do best: connecting us, giving us needed moments of joy, and most of all creating hope. #ArtsCreateHope