On December 1, 2008, MTA buses in downtown Baltimore will reserve the front seat of each bus in honor of civil-rights pioneer Rosa Parks. The buses will also display a timeline of the Montgomery Bus Boycott, inspired by Parks' refusal to take a seat in the back of a city bus on December 1, 1955. The tribute is part of Maryland Humanities Council's "Sitting Down to Take a Stand—Remembering Rosa Parks," a four-month-long celebration that includes a tour of a 1950s-era bus equipped with an exhibition about Parks from the archives of the AFRO-American newspaper; a 1956 radio interview with Parks; and a performance by actress Gwendolyn Briley-Strand from her one-woman Rosa Parks show -- all at Baltimore's Lexington Market. The project Web site offers the Boycott timeline and podcast interviews with Maryland civil-rights leaders. [LINK] Posted by Linda Frye Burnham

The Alliance for Artists Communities has announced that a new funding category will be established in 2009 at the National Endowment for the Arts. While the NEA won't announce it or post guidelines until after January 1, the agency plans new funding for "Artist Communities." The program will be overseen by NEA Director of Presenting Mario Garcia Durham. According to a letter from outgoing NEA Chair Dana Gioia to Alliance members (and posted on their Web site as a pdf), one of his objectives during his tenure has been to "to bring greater recognition to living artists. ... I have always understood the critical role that Artist Communities play in American Culture. You are a unique field whose main focus is on the individual artist. You play an irreplaceable role in this nation's artistic creativity and vision." More when we know it. [LINK] Posted by Linda Frye Burnham

OneWorld Classrooms invites classes, schools or groups to participate in the 2008/2009 K-12 International Art Exchange. "Through the program, participating students share their own culture as they learn about cultures from all around the world - by sharing their artwork," says OneWorld's Paul Hurteau. Each participating class/school/group submits 30 pieces of student artwork to be sent by OneWorld to a variety of schools around the world, and each group gets 30 pieces back. Participation fee for U.S. classes/schools/groups is $50 per exchange; registration form is available at OneWorld's Web site. OneWorld Classrooms is a nonprofit that has involved over 8,000 classrooms worldwide since 1999. More than 40 countries have participated, from Albania to Uganda. [LINK] Posted by Linda Frye Burnham

Strike Anywhere Performance Ensemble is "celebrating artists who are driving social change" with "NETnite," an evening in N.Y.C. showcasing ensemble theaters. Four theaters, members of the Network of Ensemble Theaters, will present their work and conduct dialogues with the audience, November 22, 2008, at the The Performance Project @ University Settlement. Included: New York's Bond St. Theatre, a physical-theater company that will present "Theatre in Areas of Conflict," about their work in Afghanistan, India and Kosovo, and video from "Beyond the Mirror," a collaboration with Exile Theatre of Kabul; New York's Coatlicue Theatre Company, sisters Elvira and Hortensia Colorado, who weave stories about issues affecting the Indigenous, Chicano and Mexican communities, incorporating the Nahuatl language; Connecticut's Hartbeat Ensemble presenting "Rich Clown, Poor Clown, Beggar Clown, Thief," about poverty in Hartford; and Strike Anywhere, a N.Y. Brechtian company. [LINK] Posted by Linda Frye Burnham

Animating Democracy has announced a new field resource: "The Arts and Civic Engagement Tool Kit: Planning Tools and Resources for Animating Democracy in Your Community." The dvd is $35 from the Americans for the Arts online store. Says AD's Barbara Schaffer Bacon, “Developed originally as a workshop companion, the Toolkit is for artists, cultural organizations and community partners who are planning new arts-based civic engagement ventures and those trying to be more intentional in their civic engagement work. The principles and processes offered reflect the practices of seasoned practitioners shared and observed through Animating Democracy Field Lab learning exchanges.” Also, AftA is giving away copies (in bulk) of AD's original publication "Animating Democracy: The Artistic Imagination as a Force in Civic Dialogue." Call 202-371-2830 or e-mail mdelvecchio@artsusa.org to order free copies. [LINK] Posted by Linda Frye Burnham

The date for the next convening has been set and deadlines for text submissions have been extended for the Community Arts Convening and Research Project. The 2009 convening will be held at California State University Monterey Bay, April 19, 20, 21, says MICA's Ken Krafchek, project director and managing editor of "Community Arts Perspectives." Deadlines for submissions to the 2009 round of texts for the project have been extended, he says. "Abstracts previously due November 15 are now due December 8. The 2-5 page texts previously due December 1 are now due December 22. These texts will be posted on MICA’s Project Web site no later than January 28. Texts for the convening will now be vetted no later than January 21 and authors notified soon after. Final convening texts are now due March 23 – to be posted on MICA’s Project Website no later than March 31."   [LINK] Posted by Linda Frye Burnham

Friday Workshops for Working Children at the Townhouse Gallery in Cairo, Egypt, is among the recipients of the 2008 Coming Up Taller awards, a program of the President's Committee on Art and Humanities that honors "after-school arts and humanities programs that promote educational achievement and productive lives." Laura Bush announced the winners at the White House, November 14, honoring young people from communities across the U.S., China, Egypt and Mexico; each program receives $10,000. The Friday Workshops provide creative activities to some of Egypt's 300,000 children who work six-day weeks and receive no schooling. They do workshops in various art forms with resident artists, workshop leaders and social workers, and take trips outside the city. Advanced students have begun to introduce workshop activities into their own neighborhoods. The program, now three years old, currently has 30 children enrolled. (Click to "Outreach.") [LINK] Posted by Linda Frye Burnham

Brooklyn, N.Y., residents, community activists, developers and politicos will discuss the social ecology of their borough, December 4-7, 2008, after performances of "Brooklyn at Eye Level." The musical theater piece, based on interviews with Brooklynites, looks at the rapidly changing face of Brooklyn, centering on the Atlantic Yards project. It's a project of the Obie-winning N.Y. theater company The Civilians in collaboration with Urban Bush Women, Michael Hill's Blues Mob, neo-soul singer Grace Kalambay and local youth from Atlantic Terminals, Brooklyn Tech and elsewhere. Each performance is followed by discussions with special guests. Development of the piece included a number of community labs to help participants "create expressions of how their neighborhoods work and how they can participate in changes that affect their everyday lives." (Thanks, Caron Atlas.) [LINK] Posted by Linda Frye Burnham

CAN's Bookstore has added "Cold War Exiles in Mexico: U.S. Dissidents and the Culture of Critical Resistance" by Rebecca M. Schreiber, just published. The book from University of Minnesota Press details how the Cold War culture of political exile in the 1940s and 1950s precipitated the flight of many U.S. writers, artists and filmmakers to Mexico. As Schreiber recounts, among the first exiles to arrive were African-American visual artists Elizabeth Catlett, Charles White and John Wilson, followed by people blacklisted from Hollywood, like Dalton Trumbo and Hugo Butler. Schreiber examines the artists’ work with the printmaking collective Taller de Gráfica Popular and the screenwriters’ collaborations with filmmakers such as Luis Buñuel, as well as the influence of the U.S. exiles on artistic and political movements. [LINK] Posted by Linda Frye Burnham

Human-rights experts will be on hand at the Pasadena, Calif., Library, December 11, 2008, for a panel discussion, "Human Rights and Us: Getting the Message Out." It accompanies an international poster exhibition, "Human Rights: Student Voices," making its U.S. debut in the library December 10, 2008-January 4, 2009. Organized by Art Center College of Design and sponsored by France Los Angeles Exchange (FLAX), the show premiered this summer at UNESCO headquarters in Paris, marking the 60th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights adopted there in 1948. Art Center students were challenged to dissect and represent the declarations through visual images. The exhibition and discussion are part of Designmatters, an Art Center collegewide initiative exploring the social and humanitarian benefits of design and responsible business. View the posters online at Design 21. [LINK] Posted by Linda Frye Burnham

Today CAN brings you Arlene Goldbard's introduction to "The Curriculum Project Report: Culture and Community Development in Higher Education." Sponsored by Imagining America: Artists and Scholars in Public Life, The Curriculum Project was initiated by Jan Cohen-Cruz, Dudley Cocke and Goldbard because, she says, "we agreed that with the evident upsurge of community cultural development (CCD) in higher education, with more courses and programs being added every semester, this was an opportune time to engage our colleagues in thinking about the big questions." They realized that effective CCD education had to maintain a balance of skills training, community engagement and scholarship, anchored by commitment to “a social order of justice permeated by love.” Goldbard includes choice quotes from the hundreds of interviews the project did with practitioners, educators, funders, consultants, community partners and students. The report itself is downloadable from the IA Web site. [LINK] Posted by Linda Frye Burnham

Four Native American documentaries are coming up on public television, thanks to Native American Public Telecommunications and its producing partners. "March Point" (with Independent Lens) premieres November 18. It follows three Swinomish teens who make a film about the threat their people face from two local oil refineries. "Waterbuster" (with American Public Television) is about a 1950s damming project that displaced the Fort Berthold Reservation in North Dakota. "Weaving Worlds" (with Independent Television Service) is a portrait of economic and cultural survival through the creation and often political sales of Navajo rugs. "Oceti Sakowin: The People of the Seven Council Fires" (with South Dakota Public Broadcasting) incorporates interviews from leading Lakota, Dakota and Nakota historians and tribal leaders to share the origin of the Oyate (the people). Check your local public TV station for show times. [LINK] Posted by Linda Frye Burnham

Today's commuters nationwide were delighted to find out that while they were sleeping, the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan had come to an end. That's according to 1.2 million copies of a 16-page "Special Edition of the New York Times," dated July 4, 2009, and dropped at six pickup locations where thousands of volunteers stood ready to pass them out on the street. Articles in an exact replica of The New York Times also announce the establishment of national health care, the abolition of corporate lobbying, a maximum wage for C.E.O.s and a recall notice for all cars that run on gasoline. The organizers of the spoof are connected to some degree to sophisticated pranksters The Yes Men, says Ed Pilkington in the U.K.'s Guardian (11/12/08). A PDF is online at: http://www.nytimes-se.com/pdf. [LINK] Posted by Linda Frye Burnham

The American Camp Association's Camping Magazine for November/December 2008 is themed "The Art of Camp," spotlighting the arts in camping experiences in the U.S. The issue, readable online, features "More Than An Art Camp: The Bauen Story" by Bauen Camp's Jessica Holt; "The Art of Camp: How Arts Programs Fuel Self-expression and Youth Development" by Stephen Wallace, Cape Cod Sea Camps; "Back to Where You Once Belonged: Risk and Choice at a Creative Arts Camp" by psychologist Michael Thompson; "Add Some Music to the Mix" by Chris French, YMCA; "Green Corps: Being Green ... Artfully" by arts advocate Dee Billia; "The Sound of Music" by Lance Ozier, Project Morry; and "Put Poems in Your Pockets: Why Use Poetry at Camp?" by national camp-staff trainer Faith Evans and poet David Markwardt. Much "how-to" is included. [LINK] Posted by Linda Frye Burnham

'Witness: Photographers, Journalists and Social Workers Respond to Tragedy' is a panel discussion in New York City, December 3, 2008, by the Open Society Institute (OSI) The discussion at Columbia University School of Social Work (CUSSW) will examine pitfalls and ethical challenges when documenting stories about communities or individuals who have been through traumatic experiences and will explore "ways to strengthen the impact of documentary practice, sharing knowledge and practices of inclusion across disciplines." The event, sponsored by OSI's Documentary Photography Project, features Bruce Shapiro, Dart Center for Journalism and Trauma; Grace Christ, CUSSW; Jack Saul, Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health; and Donna DeCesare, University of Texas School of Journalism. DeCesare's exhibition, "Sharing Secrets: Children's Portraits Exposing Stigma," part of OSI's Moving Walls 12 photography exhibition, is currently on display at CUSSW. [LINK] Posted by Linda Frye Burnham

In 2009-2010, Exit Art’s subterranean venue, Exit Underground, will present five exhibitions for its new initiative SEA (Social Environmental Aesthetics). SEA’s central mission is "to provide a vehicle through which the public can be made aware of socially and environmentally engaged work, and to provide a forum for collaboration between artists, scientists, activists, scholars and the public" through exhibitions, performances, panels and a permanent archive. SEA uses a curatorial model called ConceptPlus, which begins with a theme or concept that is then publicized through a call for proposals. The exhibitions and their entry due dates are: "Vertical Gardens" (January 15, 2009), "End of Oil" and "America for Sale" (both February 15, 2009) and "Consume" and "Contemporary Slavery" (both March 15, 2009). Exit Art is a 25-year-old cultural center in New York City founded by Directors Jeanette Ingberman and Papo Colo. [LINK] Posted by Linda Frye Burnham

Today CAN brings you the new issue of Community Arts Perspectives: a Publication of the Community Arts Research and Convening Project. Issue six of the peer-reviewed periodical includes "Safe Spaces Community Creations: The Mosaic Wall Project" by Mari Gardner; "Reform or Enrichment: Policy Mandates and Program Goals in Community Youth Arts" by Lori Hager; "Finding Our Wings: A Community Documentary Program" by Kirsten D’Andrea Hollander; "Insights from Arts and Civic Engagement: 13 Profiles" by Rebecca Lena Richardson; "Community Spectacle: A Place of Magic" by Molly Ross; and "The Circle Is Already Listening: Littleglobe’s Collaborative Creative Process" by Molly Sturges. CAP is co=published by CAN and Maryland Institute College of Art. [LINK] Posted by Linda Frye Burnham

Otis College of Art and Design is undertaking "A Public Center of One’s Own: The Woman’s Building’s Contribution to the Arts in Los Angeles." Otis has been awarded a $130,000 grant from The Getty Foundation to create the Woman's Building project as part of "Pacific Standard Time: Art in L.A. 1945-1980," the largest collaborative initiative ever undertaken by museums in the region. The Woman’s Building was a major site of feminist art activity, especially during the 1970s, and has a significant role in art history. Research will begin in 2009, culminating in a scholarly exhibit and catalogue in 2012. It will include roundtable discussions among scholars and artists who took part; a timeline and a list of artists involved; and Otis educational programs connected to the exhibition. Leading the project are artists Sue Maberry and Meg Linton of Otis. [LINK] Posted by Linda Frye Burnham

The City of Baltimore, Md., has unveiled a 30-year plan to transform a 100-acre area north of Penn Station into a $1-billion "regional crossroads of culture," says Edward Gunts in the Baltimore Sun (10/30/08). The planned Charles North renewal area includes the state-designated Station North arts-and-entertainment district. Planners see it as more than "a typical neighborhood revitalization struggle"; they envision the area the way it was 100 years ago - as a regional center. In addition to new housing, shopping and park areas and "Asia Town," plans include a design district where architects, planners, artists and others could have offices, showrooms, galleries and meeting space; a center for design students working on urban projects, shared by MICA, Morgan State University and and U. of Maryland; and high-density housing, including a "live-work-study tower." (Thanks, Cultural Policy Listserv). [LINK] Posted by Linda Frye Burnham

The Business Committee for the Arts, Inc. (BCA) announces THE BCA TEN: Best Companies Supporting the Arts in America. The awards were presented by BCA, FORBES Magazine and Americans for the Arts on October 30, 2008, at a black-tie gala at the American Museum of Natural History in New York City. This national list was initiated by BCA in 2005 to recognize ten companies that have exhibited exemplary recent support through grants, volunteer programs, matching gifts, local partnerships, sponsorships and board membership. The Ten for 2008 are: Anadarko Petroleum Corporation, Houston; Brown-Forman Corporation, Louisville; Emprise Bank, Wichita; First Tennessee, Memphis; H&R Block, Inc., Kansas City; Limited Brands, Inc., Columbus; Northwestern Mutual, Milwaukee; Sweetwater Sound, Inc., Fort Wayne; Wachovia, Charlotte; and Zions First National Bank, Salt Lake City. Read online about their contributions to the arts in their communities. [LINK] Posted by Linda Frye Burnham

The San Francisco Arts Commission Gallery just opened "This Place Called Poetry," a multimedia exhibition about "young people finding and claiming their place." The show is an installation featuring portraits of 11 young San Francisco writers who developed their poetic voices in WritersCorps, a creative-writing program serving 15,000 urban youth. throughout the city since 1994. Visitors to the gallery can view short films, listen to audio recordings, respond to writing prompts and even exhibit their own writing. Multimedia artist Katharine Gin and sound artist Kjell Nordeson have been working with the poets for a year to create the portraits. The show runs November 7, 2008-January 24, 2009, with a reception November 13. You can watch a four-minute trailer of the films on the WritersCorps Web site. [LINK] Posted by Linda Frye Burnham

"Nuestras Historias, Nuestros Sueños/Our Stories, Our Dreams" is a traveling documentary exhibit by Student Action with Farmworkers (SAF). It's part of a project by SAF that includes a publication and a multimedia Web site based on collected stories about the experiences of Latino immigrants. The exhibition shows in Durham, N.C., November 13, 2008–January 4, 2009, in the Krebs Gallery at Duke University's Center for Documentary Studies, a partner on the project. Immigrants illuminate their reasons for coming to the U.S. and the obstacles they face once they arrive. In particular, the project focuses on farmworker families in the Carolinas and their dreams for the future, their traditions, their educational aspirations and their challenges as they try to pursue higher education. A November 13 panel discussion includes project participants who shared their stories and those who documented them. [LINK] Posted by Linda Frye Burnham

Downtown Durham, N.C., has become a bit brighter thanks to artist Brett Cook, says National Public Radio. Tune in on the Web to listen to Cook talk to WUNC's Frank Stasio on "The State of Things" about "Face Up: Telling Stories of Community Life," a documentary/public art project that grew out of local conversations about neighborhood goals in Southwest Central Durham. The project blended an artist's residency with collaborative documentary exploration and art making in community settings. Cook was a visiting artist at Duke University's Center for Documentary Studies and he joined Stasio on September 12, 2008, to talk about the intersection between art and social engagement. [LINK] Posted by Linda Frye Burnham

"Election Update and Arts in the New Federal Administration" is the title of a November 20, 2008, Webinar by Americans for the Arts. Bill Ivey, former chair of the NEA and newly appointed head of the Obama transition team for arts and culture, will join AftA Government Affairs staff, national arts leaders and elected officials for the Webinar, beginning at 2 p.m. The online seminar will include a review of possible cultural-policy direction at the White House, the newly elected members of Congress and the changes in state leadership and ballot initiatives. The Webinar is free to AftA members; $125 for others. Also, on the AftA Action Fund site you can send a letter of congratulations to the new Obama administration and appeal to them to begin working on their campaign pledges in support of the arts and arts education. [LINK] Posted by Linda Frye Burnham

The morning after the election of Democrat Barack Obama as the 44th President of the U.S., filmmaker Michael Moore sent out an e-mail that talked about artists: "We may, just possibly, also see a time of refreshing openness, enlightenment and creativity. The arts and the artists will not be seen as the enemy. Perhaps art will be explored in order to discover the greater truths. When FDR was ushered in with his landslide in 1932, what followed was Frank Capra and Preston Sturgis, Woody Guthrie and John Steinbeck, Dorothea Lange and Orson Welles. All week long I have been inundated with media asking me, 'gee, Mike, what will you do now that Bush is gone?' Are they kidding? What will it be like to work and create in an environment that nurtures and supports film and the arts, science and invention, and the freedom to be whatever you want to be? Watch a thousand flowers bloom! We've entered a new era, and if I could sum up our collective first thought of this new era, it is this: Anything Is Possible." [LINK] Posted by Linda Frye Burnham

Maryland Institute College of Art in Baltimore launched its new Center for Race and Culture in October with the Third Annual African American Art Conference. The Center will research and investigate the dynamics of race and culture and their relationship to visual-art traditions and practice, aiming to "prepare students for leadership roles in the regional, national and international art world." The conference was the outcome of a meeting inspired and hosted by Henry Louis Gates, Jr., director of the W.E.B. Du Bois Institute for African and African-American Research at Harvard University, to "pay critical attention to the role of the art maker in society and institutions committed to the education, exhibition, research and preservation of cultural heritage and aesthetic agency in the first decade of the twenty-first century." [LINK] Posted by Linda Frye Burnham

"somewhere in advance of nowhere*: youth, imagination and transformation" is a public art project by Evan Bissell underway at Intersection for the Arts in San Francisco. Referencing poet Jayne Cortez’s 1996 book of the same title, the project (through November 22, 2008) investigates and celebrates the social and individual transformative potential of writing, arts education and creative community. It features 18 painted portraits of Bay Area spoken-word poets, ages 15-20, installed citywide, including audio recordings of their poems. (Listen: 415-200-4587 x 10-27.) There's also an interactive exhibition at Intersection with a collaborative drawing wall, recording and reading stations and a resource guide to local art classes for youth. Events include free workshops and civic-engagement opportunities for young people and "Collaborative Aesthetics," a dialogue on the role of creative collaborative processes in building community, facilitated by Brett Cook (November 5). [LINK] Posted by Linda Frye Burnham

Washington National Cathedral is the site of "Resilient Aging for Extraordinary Times," a series of unusual events upcoming from the National Center for Creative Aging. The series on aging, spirituality and creativity, November 23-25, 2008, is co-sponsored by the Cathedral and The Gerontological Society of America. It will include "Creative Aging: The Next Frontier," a Sunday Forum with Gene Cohen, director of the Center on Aging, Health & Humanities at George Washington University; "Aging, Spirituality and the Visual Arts: A Pilgrimage at the Washington Cathedral," a tour of the cathedral with artisans who helped create it; a walk through the labyrinth in the nave of the Cathedral; and "Aging, Spirituality and Creativity," a Cathedral Crossroads Program with Rev. Margee Adams Iddings. [LINK] Posted by Linda Frye Burnham

"Creating Behind the Razor Wire" is a new book by Krista Brune, a collection including the overview article she wrote for CAN about arts and criminal justice. Writer Judith Tannenbaum, in her blog, says of the book: “...an excellent resource for those wanting to know more about prison arts and for practitioners hungry for connection to colleagues. The book’s author, Krista Brune, received a fellowship that allowed her to research dozens of programs across the United States, and this book documents her research. There are essays by people in prison, teaching artists, program administrators, and college students. There’s an advice section from three of us old-timers (Buzz Alexander of Prison Creative Arts Project, Grady Hillman and me), and an extensive program directory and resource list.” The book is only available from Lulu.com [LINK] Posted by Linda Frye Burnham