2007 Annual Report

National Endowment for the Arts
II National Endowment for the Arts

GRANt HiGHliGHtS

The National Endowment for the Arts 

is a public agency dedicated to supporting 

excellence in the arts, both new and established; 

bringing the arts to all Americans; and providing 

leadership in arts education. Established by 

Congress in 1965 as an independent agency of the 

federal government, the Arts Endowment is the 

nation’s largest annual funder of the arts, bringing 

great art to all 50 states, including rural areas, 

inner cities, and military bases.
 2007 Annual Report i

Dear Mr. President:

It is my pleasure to submit the Annual Report of the National Endowment for the 

Arts for Fiscal Year 2007. 

Since its establishment in 1965, the Arts Endowment has awarded more than $4 

billion in grants to organizations and artists residing in communities large and 

small in all 50 states and the six U.S. jurisdictions. Throughout its history, the NEA 

has played a transformative and sustaining role in the development of regional 

theater, opera, dance, orchestras, museums, and other arts—both contemporary 

and traditional—that Americans now enjoy. 

The activities highlighted in this report illustrate the Arts Endowment’s continuing 

commitment to a nation in which artistic excellence is celebrated, supported, and 

available to all Americans. 

Sincerely,

Dana Gioia

Chairman
Sir Edward Burne-Jones’s The Council Chamber, 1872-92, part 

of the Delaware Art Museum’s pre-Raphaelite collection that was 

displayed in 2007 with assistance from an NEA grant. 

Photo courtesy of Delaware Art Museum
contents to come

Chairman’s Statement ............................................................1

National Initiatives.................................................................7

State and Regional Partnerships............................................15

Lifetime Honors...................................................................19

National Medal of Arts, 19

NEA Jazz Masters Fellowship, 20

NEA National Heritage Fellowship, 21

Grant Highlights (state-by-state listing)................................23

Literature Fellowships........................................................ 127

National Council on the Arts...............................................135

Financial Summary ............................................................ 137

Appropriations History ......................................................139

Credits...............................................................................140

Contents
iv National Endowment for the Arts

Grant Highlights

Video art by Bill Viola floats above 

the Los Angeles Philharmonic, 

conducted by Esa-Pekka Salonen, 

during the orchestra’s 2007 

revival of The Tristan Project, 

a concert staging of Wagner’s 

Tristan and Isolde.

Photo courtesy of Matthew Imaging
 2007 Annual Report 1

chairman’s statement

I

n 2007, the National 

Endowment for the Arts (NEA)

made historic progress in its 

efforts to bring the best of arts and 

arts education to all Americans. Our 

national initiatives continued to 

expand across all 50 states, reaching 

more individuals, schools, and 

communities than ever before. 

Our grant programs again funded 

strong projects in every state and 

Congressional district. Our widely 

read research reports shaped public 

discussion in significant ways on the 

arts, literacy, and education.

Artistic excellence and 

broad democratic reach 

In fiscal year (FY) 2007 the NEA 

awarded $100.3 million in grants. 

Due to the catalytic nature of 

these grants, each dollar awarded 

generated, on average, six dollars 

from other sources, triggering an 

investment of approximately $600 

million for the arts from private 

donors and public, nonfederal 

sources. 

Seventy million people, including 

6.5 million children and youth, 

benefited from NEA programs, 

exclusive of television and radio 

broadcasts. Those 70 million 

citizens enjoyed 34,000 concerts, 

readings, and performances; 4,000 

exhibitions; and 10,000 artist 

residencies in schools and other 

locations. Some of these exceptional 

programs are featured in the 

following pages. 

In 2007, for the third consecutive 

year, we achieved our goal of 

reaching every community in the 

United States––with many grants 

once again going to organizations 

that had never before received NEA 

support. The continued success of 

this ambitious program guarantees 

the democratization of arts funding, 

especially in underserved areas.

Partnerships 

Everything the NEA does, we do 

in partnership. From our grant 

awards and national initiatives to 

research and events, the NEA 

works with hundreds of 

organizations to pool funds and 

expertise to advance the arts and 

arts education.

Poetry Out Loud

One program in particular 

demonstrates how the NEA 

brings together partners to 

make extraordinary experiences 

possible for young people. Poetry 

Out Loud: National Recitation 

Contest encourages high school 

Chairman’s Statement

2006 Poetry Out Loud Massachusetts 

State Champion Vinh Hua recites a 

poem during the U.S. Postal Service 

first-day-of-issuance ceremony for 

the Henry Wadsworth Longfellow 

commemorative stamp to celebrate 

Longfellow’s 200th birthday. 

Photo courtesy of U.S. Postal Service
2 National Endowment for the Arts

chairman’s statement

students to learn about great 

poetry through memorization, 

performance, and competition. The 

program is a partnership with the 

Poetry Foundation, the state and 

jurisdictional arts agencies, and Mid 

Atlantic Arts Foundation, one of six 

regional arts organizations. 

In this, its second year, Poetry Out 

Loud expanded its activities beyond 

each state’s capital city to include 

more communities. An estimated 

1,000 schools and 100,000 students 

participated in contests across 

the country. The national finals 

were held in Washington, DC on 

April 30 and May 1, 2007, and, like 

2006, were filled with stunning 

performances.

Federal Partnerships

On the federal level, the 

NEA includes 24 agencies or 

departments among its project 

partners. Here are just two examples 

of featured activities in 2007.

Inspirations from the Forest 

brings together the Department of 

Agriculture, the U.S. Forest Service, 

the Smithsonian Institution, and 

several of the NEA’s National 

Heritage Fellows. This traveling 

exhibition explored the ways 

our national forests serve as 

inspiration for artists. In 2007, the 

exhibition visited 14 venues such 

as the Chugach National Forestin 

Cordova, Alaska, and the Gladie 

Cultural-Environmental Learning 

Center of the Daniel Boone National 

Forestin Winchester, Kentucky.

Since 2004, the NEA has 

partnered with the Department of 

Defense and The Boeing Company 

on Operation Homecoming: 

Writing the Wartime Experience, a 

project which preserves the stories 

and reflections of U.S. military 

personnel and their families. On 

March 14, 2007, the NEA presented, 

together with the National Archives, 

the world premiere of Muse of Fire,

a documentary film about wartime 

writing and the creative process 

that was inspired by Operation 

Homecoming. 

Leadership

The National Endowment for the 

Arts is an institution of leadership 

at home and abroad. The agency 

has rebuilt a national consensus for 

the importance of the arts and arts 

education in the U.S. Congress, the 

arts community, and the media. 

Key among the NEA’s leadership 

activities in 2007 were projects 

in research, arts education, and 

international exchange.

Timely Research

To Read or Not To Read, a 

comprehensive analysis of reading 

patterns of children, teenagers, 

and adults in the United States, was 

published in November 2007 and 

Nathan Jackson, a totem pole carver from Ketchikan, Alaska, and 1995 NEA National 

Heritage Fellow, demonstrated his carving at the Salmon River Festival in Wenatchee, 

Washington, as part of the Inspirations from the Forest project. 

Photo by Dorey Butter, Smithsonian Institution
 2007 Annual Report 3

cHAiRMAN’S StAtEMENt

immediately garnered national 

attention. The report relies on the 

most accurate data available, which 

consists of large, national studies 

conducted on a regular basis by U.S. 

federal agencies, supplemented by 

academic, foundation, and business 

surveys. 

The three key fi ndings of the 

report are:

• Americans are spending less 

time reading.

• Reading comprehension skills 

are eroding.

• These declines have serious 

civic, social, cultural, and 

economic implications.

It is vital that the national 

conversation about this issue moves 

forward. The NEA cannot solve the 

problem on its own. However, what 

we can do, and did do in response, 

was to expand The Big Read.

The Big Read 

This national reading program, 

conducted in partnership with 

the Institute of Museum and 

Library Services and regional 

arts organization Arts Midwest, 

encourages literary reading by 

asking communities to come 

together to read and discuss one 

book. The Big Read reached a 

signifi cant milestone in June 2007 

with 117 communities joining 

The Big Read family, making 

it the largest federal literature 

program since the Works Progress 

Administration of the 1930s and 

‘40s (with the exception of the 

Armed Services Editions initiative 

during World War II). In addition 

to reaching 117 communities, the 

program boasted at that time a 

reading list of 12 classic novels and 

had distributed 189 grants totaling 

more than $2.7 million in 42 states 

and territories.

In partnership with SIRIUS 

XM Radio, the NEA is producing 

a steady stream of The Big Read 

“moments” (as well as radio shorts 

on the NEA Jazz Masters) that are 

being aired by SIRIUS XM on 12 of 

its channels including CNN, Take 

5, Oprah and Friends, and Fox 

News. These 60-second, minifeatures highlight an author, book, 

or musician through interviews, 

musical excerpts, and readings. 

Entertaining and informative, these 

segments put the arts back into the 

public conversation.

The NEA announced in August 

the launch of The Big Read on 

SIRIUS XM, a daily, national drivetime show devoted to presenting 

and discussing great American 

novels. It is the perfect marriage 

of art and technology and helps 

make one of the largest literary 

programs in American history even 

bigger. Joining me for the premiere 

episode of The Big Read on SIRIUS 

XM was Mrs. Laura Bush, honorary 

chairperson for The Big Read. 

the NEA research report, To 

Read or Not To Read, provided 

a comprehensive analysis of 

reading patterns of children, 

teenagers, and adults in the 

United States. 

Galina Alekseeva, chairman Gioia, and Vladimir tolstoy at a special presentation of 

leo tolstoy’s The Death of Ivan Ilyich at the NEA in Washington, Dc. 

NEA File Photo
4 National Endowment for the Arts

chairman’s statement

Mrs. Bush also participated in a 

panel on April 16, 2007, to discuss 

Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird at 

the Barnum Museum in Bridgeport, 

Connecticut. She noted, “Our 

country’s literary classics help to 

define us as a nation, and bring 

people of many backgrounds 

together by expressing our shared 

ideals.” I would add that reading, 

aside from its power to ignite 

the imagination, is essential to 

maintaining the cultural, civic, and 

economic fabric of our lives. 

The State Department has 

recognized the potential of The 

Big Read to serve as a vehicle 

for cultural diplomacy. Big Read 

programs were initiated between 

the U.S. and Russia in 2007. Russian 

communities read Harper Lee’s 

To Kill a Mockingbird, while U.S. 

participants read Leo Tolstoy’s 

The Death of Ivan Ilyich. More 

international Big Reads are planned 

for Egypt and Mexico in 2008.

Arts Education

The NEA continued to pursue its 

leadership role in arts education. In 

addition to the growing popularity 

among teachers and students 

of Poetry Out Loud, the NEA’s 

curriculum materials for jazz and 

Shakespeare were used and lauded 

by an extraordinary number of 

teachers. 

NEA Jazz in the Schools 

is a Web-based curriculum 

(www.jazzintheschools.org) 

and toolkit designed for high 

school teachers and students to 

explore jazz as an indigenous 

American art form and as a 

means to understand American 

history. The free curriculum, 

produced in partnership with 

Jazz at Lincoln Center, contains a 

wealth of materials, including short 

videos, musical excerpts, period 

photographs, student activities, and 

Mrs. Laura Bush delivers remarks at The Big Read event in Bridgeport, Connecticut.

Photo by Carl David LaBianca
 2007 Annual Report 5

chairman’s statement

assessment methods. 

To date, 15,000 teachers from 

almost 12,000 schools have ordered 

the toolkit, sharing those materials 

with other teachers to reach more 

than seven million students. 

The numbers for Shakespeare in 

American Communities toolkits are 

even more impressive. Forty-three 

thousand teachers representing 

25,000 schools and libraries 

ordered the materials, sharing 

them with colleagues to reach more 

than 19 million students across the 

country.

The NEA also led the way in 

developing model arts education 

programs with its Education 

Leaders Institute. Announced in 

March 2007, the institute gathers 

teams of school leaders, legislators, 

policymakers, educators, 

professional artists, consultants, 

and scholars from up to five states 

at a three-day conference to discuss 

a shared arts education challenge 

and devise strategies to advance arts 

education in their respective states. 

The first institute was held in March 

2008, and the second is underway as 

of this writing.

International Programs

The NEA’s leadership in the 

international arena took several 

forms in 2007. As part of the State 

Department’s Global Cultural 

Initiative, the NEA manages 

International Literary Exchanges 

in which funding is awarded to 

U.S. presses through a national 

competition to publish foreign 

works in English. In addition, the 

participating foreign countries 

produce a volume of U.S. writing, 

making U.S. literature more widely 

available in other languages. 

This year, two new countries, 

Northern Ireland and Pakistan, 

joined Mexico and Russia (also 

featured in 2006) in the program. 

The three participating presses 

and their books are Dalkey Archive 

Press at the University of Illinois 

Urbana-Champaign publishing 

Best of Contemporary Mexican 

Fiction and Contemporary Russian 

Poetry: An Anthology; Eastern 

Washington University Press of 

Cheney, Washington, publishing the 

Pakistani volume; and Wake Forest 

University Press of Winston-Salem, 

North Carolina, publishing The 

New North: Contemporary Poetry of 

Northern Ireland. 

In December 2006 I was honored 

with unanimous confirmation 

Students participate in an Idaho Shakespeare Festival “Shakespearience” workshop 

as part of NEA’s Shakespeare in American Communities initiative.

Photo by Troy Maben

from the United States Senate to 

serve a second term as chairman 

of the National Endowment for the 

Arts. This report will demonstrate 

the good work that the NEA has 

supported, the fine programs it 

has created, and the leadership it 

continues to exercise for this great 

nation that deserves great art.

Dana Gioia

Chairman
6 National Endowment for the Arts

Grant Highlights

JoAnn M. Hunter as 

Lola and Chris Peluso 

as Joe Hardy in Music 

Theatre of Wichita’s 

2007 American 

Masterpieces 

production of Damn 

Yankees.

Photo by Mark Maack, 

Netappz Creative 

Solutions
 2007 Annual Report 7

national initiatives

The National Initiatives 

program began in 2003 as a 

way for more Americans to 

experience the richness of the arts. 

Partnering with local communities, 

presenters, and state and regional 

arts agencies, the NEA is bringing 

high quality arts programming 

and educational activities to 

communities with limited access 

to the arts. The following pages 

highlight just a few of the activities 

that comprise these special 

initiatives in FY 2007.

American Masterpieces

American Masterpieces: Three 

Centuries of Artistic Genius 

supports performances, 

exhibitions, tours, and educational 

programs on the best of American 

arts. Activities take place in 

communities in all 50 states. In 

2007, the NEA awarded American 

Masterpieces grants in dance, 

choral music, musical theater, and 

visual arts. For the first time, in FY 

2007, organizations also were able 

to apply for American Masterpieces 

funding in the chamber music and 

presenting disciplines. These grants 

will be awarded in FY 2008. 

Seven visual arts organizations 

received grants totaling $1,000,000 

to support touring exhibitions such 

as Craft in America (Craft in America, 

Inc.) and American Impressionism: 

Paintings from the Phillips Collection

(Phillips Collection). NEA support 

enabled many of these exhibitions 

to tour to the nation’s small and 

midsized museums, for which the 

cost of these shows is generally 

prohibitive. 

The NEA also provided American 

Masterpieces support to the 

choral music field with grants to 

six organizations that presented 

choral music festivals, totaling 

$420,000. These projects featured 

a variety of activities, including 

master classes, workshops, 

lectures, and performances. In 

addition, Conspirare, Providence 

Singers, and Seattle Pro Musica–– 

organizations that received FY 2006 

American Masterpieces grants–– 

were given additional funding to 

support festival-related recording 

and radio broadcast projects.

American Masterpieces: Dance 

grants were given in FY 2007 

through a partnership with regional 

arts organization New England 

Foundation for the Arts. Twentytwo grants, totaling $634,875, 

were given for the reconstruction 

and touring of American dance 

masterworks such as Cleo Parker 

Robinson Dance Ensemble’s 

reconstruction of Katherine 

Dunham’s Ragtime and Philadanco’s 

tour of Talley Beatty’s Southern 

Landscapes. In a second component, 

which supports reconstruction 

projects by college dance 

programs, 25 higher education 

organizations–– including Harvard 

University, the University of Hawaii 

at Manoa, and the University 

of Kansas––received grants of 

$10,000 each to reconstruct work by 

celebrated choreographers such as 

Mark Morris and Liz Lerman.

In the musical theater category, 16 

organizations received grants—for 

a total of $700,000—to support 

productions of classic works from 

the American musical theater 

repertoire such as the Tony Awardwinning musical Can Can and the 

National Initiatives
8 National Endowment for the Arts

national initiatives

Jazz Age musical Lady, Be Good!

The Music Theatre of Wichita 

received an American Masterpieces 

grant of $40,000 to support a 

production of Damn Yankees. 

Serving Kansas’s largest city and 

surrounding areas primarily, the 

theater’s summer season features 

five full-length musicals over ten 

weeks. According to Producing 

Director Wayne Bryan, “Because 

Kansas is quite far from Broadway, 

many of our patrons do not have 

an opportunity to see a ‘Broadway 

musical.’ Therefore it is our goal 

to bring an equivalent experience 

to them.” An audience of more 

than 12,000 saw the show, which 

also provided employment for 74 

theater artists and musicians and 

internships for 19 young people.

The Big Read

Administered by regional arts 

organization Arts Midwest, The 

Big Read is the NEA’s national 

reading program that offers 

communities the opportunity to 

come together to read, discuss, 

and celebrate classic American 

literature. In FY 2007, The Big Read, 

which is the literary component of 

American Masterpieces, reached 

communities in 41 states, Puerto 

Rico, and the District of Columbia. 

Grants of $5,000-$40,000 were 

awarded in two grant cycles to 189 

communities to host celebrations 

of one of 12 titles from The Big Read 

library, including Ray Bradbury’s 

Fahrenheit 451, Amy Tan’s The Joy 

Luck Club, and John Steinbeck’s 

The Grapes of Wrath. Participating 

communities received Reader’s 

Guides featuring author biographies 

and discussion questions, Teacher’s 

Guides including lesson plans and 

reproducible handouts, and Audio 

Guides with readings from the 

novel and commentary from public 

figures such as Robert Redford and 

Colin Powell and Big Read authors 

such as Bradbury and Tan.

In FY 2007, the Institute of 

Museum and Library Services, which 

provides leadership and funding 

for the nation’s 17,500 museums 

and 122,000 libraries, became the 

NEA’s lead federal partner for the 

project. Support for The Big Read 

was provided by the W.K. Kellogg 

Foundation for a matching grant 

initiative that encouraged support for 

local Big Read programming from 

area community foundations. The 

Big Read in the Pacific Northwest was 

supported, in part, by a grant from 

the Paul G. Allen Family Foundation. 

The Boeing Company continued 

to support the program in military 

communities. 

California’s Fresno County 

Public Library, with a service area 

of approximately 6,000 square 

miles, received an FY 2007 Big 

Read grant to host a celebration 

of Amy Tan’s The Joy Luck Club. 

The library programmed more 

than 100 activities over six weeks, 

including three kickoff events: a 

read-a-thon of the novel featuring 

local celebrities, a Chinese New 

Year celebration, and a lecture 

and reading by Amy Tan that drew 

a crowd of 3,000. Additional 

events included Chinese cultural 

programs, such as calligraphy 

instruction and a tea ceremony 

demonstration, and youth 

programs, such as Chinese New 

Year preschool story times. 

Big Read activities were held 

throughout the area at senior 

residences, schools, and veterans 

hospitals as well as at library 

branches. The library further 

expanded its reach into the 

community through a partnership 

with Comcast, which filmed several 

Big Read events for broadcast on a 

local cable channel. 

According to Roberta Barton, 

the library’s public information 

officer, “The Big Read has truly 

become one of our signature events 

with everyone asking, ‘What are 

we reading next?’ even before the 

current campaign has ended.”

Fresno City College President Ned 

Doffoney with Amy Tan, author of The 

Joy Luck Club, at a Big Read book 

discussion in Fresno, California. 

Photo by Roberta Barton, Fresno County 

Public Library
 2007 Annual Report 9

Grant Highlights

Great American Voices 

FY 2007 was the third and final 

year of Great American Voices 

(GAV), a program that sent 

professional opera companies out 

to perform classic songs from opera 

and musical theater at military 

installations nationwide. Since the 

initiative began, in cooperation 

with OPERA America and with the 

generous support of The Boeing 

Company, 24 professional opera 

companies performed at 41 bases 

across the country. Performances 

were offered at no cost to the base or 

to audience members. In addition 

to the performances, participating 

artists conducted school visits and 

pre-concert briefings to familiarize 

each community’s youth and adults 

with these musical genres. In total, 

more than 30,000 individuals 

benefited from GAV activities, and 

more than half a million dollars was 

awarded to support the project.

Los Angeles Opera Company 

received a Great American Voices 

grant of $10,000 to support two 

days of opera and musical theater 

performance and educational 

activities for children and adults 

at Marine Corps Air Ground 

Combat Center Twentynine Palms 

in California in March 2007. On 

the first day of their residency, a 

team of LA Opera artists worked 

with students from Twentynine 

Palms High School to prepare a 

performance for the local elementary 

school. Following the rehearsal, 

students chose to participate in a 

two-hour master class in either 

vocal techniques or staging and 

movement. 

The following day, the teens 

performed alongside the opera 

company’s artists in a 45-minute 

program attended by 250 

elementary school students. That 

evening LA Opera presented a 

concert to more than 500 of the 

base’s residents and families, 

showcasing selections from Porgy 

Pianist Daniel Faltus accompanies bass-baritone Cedric Berry of Los Angeles Opera in concert at the Marine 

Corps Air Ground Combat Center at Twentynine Palms. 

Photo courtesy of Marine Corps Air Ground Combat Center at Twentynine Palms
10 National Endowment for the Arts

national initiatives

and Bess, Showboat, Don Giovanni, 

and Rigoletto, among other works. 

Plácido Domingo, general director 

of LA Opera, said the project was 

particularly significant for the 

company. “In addition to allowing 

us to give something back to those 

serving their country and to their 

families, Great American Voices 

also enables us to bring the magic of 

opera to many people for their first 

experience with live performances. 

We are delighted that the relationship 

continued beyond the initial 

residency, when we welcomed a large 

number of enthusiastic students 

from Twentynine Palms High School 

to our production of La Bohème

last season, and we look forward to 

inviting more students to see Carmen

later this year. We are so grateful to 

the NEA for making this relationship 

possible for us.”

NEA Arts Journalism 

Institutes

“Arts journalists are facing 

challenging times, as are newspapers 

nationwide,” said Chairman Gioia, in 

regards to why the agency established 

the NEA Arts Journalism Institutes in 

2004. The institutes allow journalists 

brief sabbaticals from their 

newsrooms and busy freelancing 

lives to focus on the arts themselves 

by attending performances, talking 

about the arts, and writing reviews 

under the tutelage of some of the 

country’s top arts writers.

The two-week institutes are 

offered in three disciplines at three 

of the country’s leading universities: 

Columbia University hosts the 

classical music and opera institute 

each fall; University of Southern 

California’s Annenberg School 

for Communications hosts the 

theater and musical theater institute 

each winter, and Duke University 

partners with the American Dance 

Festival to host the dance institute 

each summer. As of 2007, 259 

journalists from all 50 states and 

Washington, DC have attended the 

institutes.

Writers, reporters, critics, 

editors, and broadcast producers 

who attend the institutes are 

immersed in performances, 

panels, discussions, and hands-on 

classes. They take voice lessons 

at the Metropolitan Opera, have 

lunch with actors from landmark 

theater productions, and see 

three internationally acclaimed 

dance companies perform in one 

day. Fellows are also challenged 

to hone their own writing skills 

through craft classes and writers 

workshops. The list of prominent 

critics who have mentored NEA 

Arts Journalism Institute fellows 

includes John Lahr (The New Yorker), 

Michael Phillips (Chicago Tribune), 

and Terry Teachout (The Wall 

Street Journal).

San Antonio Express News

staffer Deborah Martin, one of 

60 journalists who attended an 

institute in FY 2007, said that the 

program has had an enormous 

impact on her professional life. “It’s 

no exaggeration to say that things 

I learned during the fellowship 

pop into my head every day. ... 

Since returning from LA, I have 

made a conscious effort to make 

myself more approachable. I’ve 

had conversations with directors 

during intermission, and I’ve made 

Author and music historian Joseph Horowitz leads a writing workshop at the NEA Arts 

Journalism Institute at Columbia University in New York City.

Photo by Milton Moore
 2007 Annual Report 11

national initiatives

it a point to get out to shows that 

I’m not reviewing myself just to 

see them. And I’ve noticed a shift 

in the way that I’m received—more 

folks are coming up to me at shows 

and chatting, and I’ve gotten a lot of 

stories that I might have missed out 

on because of that.”

NEA Jazz Masters 

The NEA established the NEA 

Jazz Masters Fellowships in 1982 

to honor those musicians who 

throughout their lifetimes have 

made significant and lasting impact 

in the field of jazz. In 2004, the 

agency created a new national 

initiative around the award to better 

support the great American art 

form of jazz. The initiative includes 

touring, festivals, television and 

radio recordings, and school 

programs, bringing jazz to millions 

of adults and children in all 50 

states.

From 2005-2007, the NEA 

helped to build and expand the 

audience for jazz in the United 

States through NEA Jazz Masters 

on Tour (JMOT), a touring program 

in partnership with Arts Midwest 

that reached an audience of more 

than 165,000 in all 50 states, the 

District of Columbia, and the U.S. 

Virgin Islands. JMOT afforded 

opportunities for 27 NEA Jazz 

Masters to reach new audiences 

through performances, master 

classes, clinics, lectures, and other 

outreach activities. Building on 

that program, NEA Jazz Masters 

Live will debut in 2008, bringing 

NEA Jazz Masters to venues such 

as the Kennedy Center for the 

Performing Arts in Washington, 

DC; the American Jazz Museum 

in Kansas City, Missouri; and the 

Monterey Jazz Festival in California 

for performance and educational 

activities. 

The NEA also continued to 

develop the next generation of 

jazz masters and aficionados 

through NEA Jazz in the Schools, a 

five-unit, Web-based curriculum 

and DVD toolkit for use by high 

school teachers that juxtaposes the 

history of jazz with the timeline of 

American history. Jointly developed 

with Jazz at Lincoln Center, the 

curriculum includes nearly 100 

music samples, a DVD, and lesson 

plans, which complement subjects 

from band lab to history. As of 2007, 

more than 11,000 educators have 

requested copies of this curriculum, 

potentially bringing the music of 

NEA Jazz Master George Wein (left) 

performed with his band and special guest 

NEA Jazz Master Frank Wess (center) on 

sax for the announcement of the new 

class of NEA Jazz Masters in New York 

City in October 2007. 

Photo by Tom Pich
12 National Endowment for the Arts

national initiatives

jazz to some 5.6 million students 

nationwide. A recent survey of more 

than 500 teachers who have used 

the toolkit revealed that the majority 

of these teachers taught English/

language arts, followed by art and 

history/social studies teachers. 

The curriculum is also available 

on an interactive Web site 

(www.neajazzintheschools.org)

to reach even more teachers and 

students.

In 2007, the NEA again partnered 

with SIRIUS XM Radio to air Jazz 

Moments, 60- to 120-second 

vignettes featuring first-person 

anecdotes, musical samples, and 

historical information on NEA 

Jazz Masters. More than 100 

Jazz Moments aired as interstitial 

programming on SIRIUS XM 

channels and featured behindthe-scenes glimpses from NEA Jazz 

Masters, such as Herbie Hancock 

speaking about first becoming 

interested in jazz, Toshiko Akiyoshi 

on the influence of legendary 

pianist Bud Powell, and Chico 

Hamilton on being dedicated to the 

music.

Operation Homecoming

Launched in April 2004, Operation 

Homecoming: Writing the Wartime 

Experience provided workshops 

by nationally known writers at 

domestic and overseas military 

bases representing all four branches 

of the U.S. Armed Forces. In 

partnership with the Department of 

Defense and with generous support 

from The Boeing Company, 59 

workshops were held at 27 military 

installations, with 24 writers leading 

sessions for more than 6,000 

individuals. 

In March 2007, the NEA released 

Muse of Fire, a documentary film 

inspired by the workshops. Helmed 

by Red Car Productions, the film 

featured readings and interviews 

with troops and their families 

who participated in the program, 

commentary from renowned writers 

who taught Operation Homecoming 

writing workshops, and recitations 

by actors Kevin Costner and 

Stephen Lang of work from the 

Random House anthology Operation 

Homecoming: Iraq, Afghanistan, and 

the Home Front in the Words of U.S. 

Troops and Their Families. Muse of Fire 

premiered March 14, 2007, at the 

National Archives in Washington, 

DC. U.S. Representatives Todd 

Tiahrt (Kansas-4th District), 

Joseph Knollenberg (Michigan9th District), and Tom 

Tancredo (Colorado-6th 

District) all attended. The 

film has since screened 

at venues including the 

Atlanta History Center in 

Georgia and at a special 

Veteran’s Day NEA event 

with Representative Tiahrt. 

A second film inspired 

by the program, Operation 

Homecoming, premiered 

in April 2007 on the 

PBS series America at a 

Crossroads. Produced 

by the Documentary 

Group, Operation 

Homecoming was 

nominated for an 

Academy Award and won two Emmy 

Awards in 2008.

In May 2007, Operation 

Homecoming program director 

Jon Peede and anthology editor 

Andrew Carroll visited U.S. 

military installations in Central 

Asia to present Operation 

Homecoming activities. They led a 

discussion on wartime writing, and 

distributed copies of the Operation 

Homecoming anthology at Manas 

Air Base in Bishkek, Kyrgystan. At a 

military hospital at Baram Airfield 

in Afghanistan, Peede and Carroll 

screened Muse of Fire and taught 

several writing workshops. In 2008, 

the NEA will present a second 

phase of Operation Homecoming 

workshops at Department of 

Veterans Affairs medical centers, 

military hospitals, and affiliated 

centers in communities around 

the country.

U.S. Representative Todd Tiahrt (Kansas-4th 

District) introduced the premiere of Muse of Fire

at the National Archives. 

Photo by Michael G. Stewart
 2007 Annual Report 13

Grant Highlights

Poetry Out Loud

“I have never seen such enthusiasm 

from students for poetry before. 

This is absolutely the best time I 

have had teaching poetry to my 

students in my 25-year career. 

They discovered the power of words 

through this activity.” So stated 

one participating teacher of Poetry 

Out Loud: National Recitation 

Contest, an NEA national initiative 

created in partnership with the 

Poetry Foundation and the state 

arts agencies to encourage the 

study of great poetry through a 

dynamic recitation competition. 

Participating high schools receive 

free standards-based curriculum 

materials, including print and 

online poetry anthologies, a 

teacher’s guide, and a CD of recited 

poems featuring well-known actors 

and writers. 

In 2007, more than 150,000 

students from more than 1,000 

schools took part in Poetry Out Loud 

competitions at the classroom, 

school, district, or regional levels, 

culminating in a state final. Each 

of the 51 champions from each 

state and the District of Columbia 

received $200 and an all-expenses 

paid trip to compete in the national 

finals in Washington, DC. Each state 

champion’s school received $500 

for the purchase of poetry books for 

the school’s library.

On April 30 and May 1, 2007, the 

champions and their chaperones 

converged on the nation’s capital 

for semifinal and finals rounds 

coordinated by the MidAtlantic 

Arts Foundation, a regional arts 

organization. After three regional 

semifinals on April 30, the top 12 

students advanced to the May 1 

finals. As part of the two-day event, 

the high schoolers also greeted 

members of Congress at a Capitol 

Hill lunch and toured the city with 

their chaperones.

Amanda Fernandez, a senior at 

D.C.’s Duke Ellington School for the 

Arts, ultimately took top honors as 

the 2007 Poetry Out Loud National 

Champion. She wowed the judges, 

which included 2006 Poetry Out 

Loud National Champion Jackson 

Hille, with dramatic, poignant, and 

commanding recitations of work 

by Wilfred Owen, Anne Sexton, 

and Sterling A. Brown. Fernandez, 

who received a $20,000 college 

scholarship and enrolled at New 

York University, characterized her 

participation in Poetry Out Loud as 

“the most nerve-wracking, intense, 

exciting, and rewarding experience 

of my life.” 

Branden Emanual Wellington 

of Indiana took second place and 

received a $10,000 scholarship, 

while Alanna Rivera of Virginia 

placed third and received a $5,000 

scholarship. The remaining nine 

finalists each received $1,000 

scholarships, and the schools of all 

12 finalists received $500 for the 

purchase of poetry books.

Several of the state champions, 

including Fernandez and 

2007 Poetry Out Loud National Champion Amanda Fernandez, a senior at Duke 

Ellington School for the Arts in Washington, DC. 

Photo by James Kegley
14 National Endowment for the Arts

national initiatives

Wellington, later reprised their 

winning recitations at the Poetry 

Pavilion at the September 2007 

National Book Festival.

Shakespeare in 

American Communities: 

Shakespeare for a 

New Generation

In FY 2007, the NEA continued 

Shakespeare for a New Generation, 

the second phase of its innovative 

Shakespeare touring program, 

Shakespeare in American 

Communities, in partnership 

with Arts Midwest. Shakespeare 

for a New Generation provides 

professional Shakespeare 

performances and educational 

programs to high school and 

middle school students. 

Thirty-six theater companies 

were selected to participate during 

the 2007-2008 school year, 

each providing performances 

and activities for a minimum 

of 10 schools. By the end of 

the school year, students from 

more than 2,000 schools had 

seen a Shakespeare production, 

and 10,000 toolkits had been 

distributed for classroom use. 

Participating theater companies—

such as The Warehouse Theatre 

(South Carolina), Trinity Repertory 

Company (Rhode Island), and Utah 

Shakespearean Festival—gave 1,100 

performances of 19 of Shakespeare’s 

plays in 1,200 communities in 28 

states and the District of Columbia. 

These performances reached 

approximately 300,000 youth and 

adults, bringing the total number 

of individuals exposed to the Bard 

through the initiative to more than 

1,300,000 through May 2008.

Located in downtown 

Indianapolis, Indiana Repertory 

Theatre (IRT) was designated 

the state’s Theatre Laureate. IRT 

has participated in the NEA’s 

Shakespeare initiative since 

2004, presenting plays such as A 

Midsummer Night’s Dream, King 

Lear, and Hamlet. From September 

26-November 3, 2007, IRT 

presented student matinees of 

Hamlet to 9,200 students and 653 

teachers and chaperones from 

158 public, parochial, and home 

schools. Educational outreach 

included post-performance 

discussions with the cast; classroom 

workshops with teaching artists; 

and study guides with discussion 

questions, historical and social 

context, and theater background. 

According to IRT Artistic Director 

Janet Allen, “We find creating 

Shakespeare for a largely student 

audience to be among the most 

compelling creative acts we do at the 

IRT—bringing vigorous productions 

of Shakespeare to children with 

little opportunity for immersion 

in creative arts unlocks horizons 

for them that extend far beyond 

the magnificence of the play itself, 

and into the realms of creativity 

and self-expression.” With NEA 

support, IRT also presented two 

sessions of Teaching Shakespeare: 

A Workshop for Educators to 

25 teachers. Topics included 

interactive ways to engage students 

in Shakespeare’s language, and 

Shakespearean dramaturgy and 

scansion. 

Brian Noffke as the Gravedigger and Matthew Brumlow as Hamlet in Indiana 

Repertory Theatre’s 2007-08 Shakespeare in American Communities production of 

Hamlet.

Photo courtesy of Indiana Repertory Theatre
 2007 Annual Report 15

Grant Highlights

Much of the cultural life 

of America happens at 

the local level. The NEA 

helps support local art activities 

through its partnership with state 

arts agencies (SAAs) and regional 

arts organizations (RAOs). Forty 

percent of the NEA’s funding is 

distributed among these agencies 

to support activities from artist 

residencies in schools to touring 

programs to the promotion and 

presentation of local artists. 

There are 56 official state and 

jurisdictional arts agencies in the 

United States, including one in each 

of the 50 states and in the District 

of Columbia, Puerto Rico, Guam, 

American Samoa, the Northern 

Mariana Islands, and the U.S. 

Virgin Islands. Through the SAAs, 

the Arts Endowment supports 

projects that are meaningful to 

local communities, while at the 

State and Regional Partnerships

Clara Sherman is one of the artists whose work is available at the historic Toadlena Trading Post on New Mexico Arts’s Fiber Arts Trail.

Photo by Claude Stephenson
16 National Endowment for the Arts

Grant Highlights

same time enabling local arts 

organizations to leverage financial 

support from other sources. SAAs 

also partner with the NEA on the 

NEA national initiative Poetry Out 

Loud. 

An example of one of these state 

partnerships is New Mexico Arts’s 

(NMA) Fiber Arts Trail. Spanning 

approximately 1,400 miles in 

three regions, the trail highlights 

the work of more than 250 fiber 

artists working in traditions such 

as weaving, basketry, and quilting. 

The project not only showcases 

the state’s artists, but it generates 

economic health and stability in the 

state’s many rural areas. As NMA 

Executive Director Loie Fecteau 

explained, “We’re a very rural state 

and a poor state economically, but 

we’re rich in cultural traditions from 

the Native-American and Hispanic 

cultures. What we’re looking at is 

increasing income for the artists, 

and at the same time promoting the 

rural economy of New Mexico. Every 

time someone comes to a rural area 

because of our fiber artists they have 

to sleep somewhere, eat something, 

gas up their cars, so it really leads to 

the health and sustainability of our 

rural areas.”

The Arts Endowment also 

serves the public at the state level 

through funding for regional arts 

organizations (RAOs), which 

were created by state arts leaders, 

in partnership with the Arts 

Endowment and the private sector, 

to transcend state boundaries 

and give the public access to a 

George Sotter’s Coastal View, 1948, was part of the exhibition, Painting the Beautiful: American Impressionists Paintings from the 

Michener Art Museum Collection, supported by Mid-America Arts Alliance’s Exhibits USA program. 

Photo by E. G. Schempf, courtesy of James A Michener Art Museum
 2007 Annual Report 17

state and regional partnerships

greater and richer variety of arts 

experiences. These six RAOs work 

with the NEA on initiatives such 

as the NEA Regional Arts Touring 

program, which helps bring quality 

performing artists and companies 

to communities across the country 

with the help of federal, state, and 

private funds. RAOs also partner 

with the Arts Endowment on NEA 

national initiatives such as The Big 

Read (Arts Midwest), American 

Masterpieces (New England 

Foundation for the Arts), and 

Operation Homecoming (Southern 

Arts Federation). 

Headquartered in Kansas City, 

Missouri, regional arts organization 

Mid-America Arts Alliance was 

created to support and stimulate 

cultural activity in communities 

throughout Arkansas, Kansas, 

Missouri, Nebraska, Oklahoma, and 

Texas. Mid-America administers 

programming in the visual arts and 

humanities, performing arts, and 

professional development. Exhibits 

USA, one of Mid-America’s most 

popular programs, enables small to 

midsized museums to host traveling 

exhibitions, lasting from five to 

ten weeks, at reduced rental fees. 

According to Executive Director 

Mary Kennedy McCabe, “Most 

[traveling exhibitions] go to large 

institutions in major metro areas. 

This brings those kinds of arts 

experiences to places that would not 

have them otherwise.” Each exhibit 

includes educational materials 

aimed at students, docents, and 

teachers such as introductory 

readings, artist biographies, gallery 

guides, and lists of speakers who 

have expressed an interest in 

working with exhibition hosts. 

The more than 26 exhibits 

available for rental through the 

program in FY 2007 traveled to 103 

cities and towns across the country, 

reaching more than 350,000 

people. One such exhibit is Painting 

the Beautiful: American Impressionists 

Paintings from the Michener Art 

Museum Collection, which will 

travel to eight small and midsized 

museums through 2009, including 

Wichita Art Museum (Kansas), 

Huntington Museum of Art (West 

Virginia), and Sordoni Art Gallery 

(Pennsylvania.) The exhibit is 

expected to reach more than 48,000 

individuals.

Española Valley Fiber Arts, on New Mexico Arts’s Fiber Arts Trail, offers classes in 

many fiber arts techniques. 

Photo by Diane Bowman
18 National Endowment for the Arts

Grant Highlights

NEA National Heritage Fellow 

Augustin Lira performing at 

the 2007 concert and awards 

ceremony. 

Photo by Michael G. Stewart
 2007 Annual Report 19

lifetime honors

The NEA created lifetime achievement 

awards to bring crucial recognition to 

artists for their contributions to the 

nation’s diverse cultural heritage. Since the 

1980s, the NEA has annually presented these 

awards: National Medals of Arts, NEA Jazz 

Masters, and NEA National Heritage Fellows.

National Medal of Arts

Created by Congress in 1984, the National 

Medal of Arts is conferred annually by the 

president to honor persons and organizations 

that have made extraordinary contributions 

to the excellence, support, growth, and 

availability of the arts in the United States. 

Unlike other arts awards, the National Medal 

of Arts is not limited to a single field or area of 

artistic endeavor. 

The National Endowment for the Arts solicits 

the public for nominations for the award, which 

are reviewed by the National Council on the Arts 

and then forwarded to the president for final 

selection. The awards, which are non-monetary, 

are presented each year at a special White House 

ceremony. The National Medal of Arts was 

designed by internationally renowned sculptor 

Robert Graham.

Information on submitting a nomination can 

be found on the NEA Web site at www.arts.gov.

Lifetime Honors

National Medal of Arts Recipients

Morten Lauridsen

Composer

Los Angeles, California

N. Scott Momaday

Author

Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, and 

Santa Fe, New Mexico

Roy R. Neuberger

Arts patron

New York, New York

R. Craig Noel

Old Globe Theatre director

San Diego, California

Les Paul

Guitarist, inventor

New York, New York

Henry Steinway

Arts patron

New York, New York

George Tooker

Painter

Hartland, Vermont

University of Idaho 

Lionel Hampton International 

Jazz Festival

Music competition and festival 

Moscow, Idaho

Andrew Wyeth

Painter

Chadds Ford, Pennsylvania

Author N. Scott Momaday receiving his Medal of Arts from 

President George W. Bush. 

Photo by Michael G. Stewart
20 National Endowment for the Arts

lifetime honors

NEA Jazz Masters Fellowship

The NEA has supported jazz, one of 

the country’s most innovative musical 

forms, for most of the agency’s history. 

In 1982 the NEA created the NEA Jazz 

Masters Fellowship, the highest honor 

that our nation bestows upon jazz 

musicians, to recognize those artists 

who have made significant contributions 

to the development and performance 

of jazz. Each year, a one-time award 

of $25,000 is presented from among 

various categories.

Additionally, the A.B. Spellman NEA 

Jazz Masters Award for Jazz Advocacy 

recognizes individuals who have made 

major contributions to the appreciation, 

knowledge, and advancement of the 

American jazz art form as a writer, 

patron, or presenter. 

Candido Camero

Rhythm instrumentalist

Candido Camero is credited with 

being the first percussionist to 

bring conga drumming to jazz.

Andrew Hill

Pianist/composer

The late Andrew Hill spent 40 

years composing, performing, 

recording, and mentoring young 

musicians. He earned acclaim for 

his innovative performances and 

compositions beginning in the 

1960s. 

Quincy Jones

Bandleader

A renaissance man of music, 

Quincy Jones is an impresario, 

conductor, record producer, 

musical arranger, film composer, 

and trumpeter.

Tom McIntosh

Composer/arranger

The unique voice of composer 

and arranger Tom McIntosh can 

be heard in the music of Dizzy 

Gillespie, James Moody, and 

others as well as in Hollywood 

movies, including Shaft.

Joe Wilder

Solo instrumentalist (trumpet)

For 17 years, Joe Wilder performed 

with ABC-TV while building his 

reputation as a popular soloist and 

sideman.

Gunther Schuller

A.B. Spellman NEA Jazz Masters Award for

Jazz Advocacy

Gunther Schuller is a leader 

in both the classical and jazz 

traditions, contributing significant 

musical compositions and writings 

to expand jazz’s horizons. 

NEA Jazz Masters

Chairman Gioia (top left) with NEA Jazz Masters (clockwise from top left) Joe Wilder, 

Gunther Schuller, Joanne Robinson Hill (widow of Andrew Hill), NEA Music and Opera 

Director Wayne Brown, Tom McIntosh, Quincy Jones, and Candido Camero. 

Photo by Tom Pich
 2007 Annual Report 21

Grant Highlights

NEA National Heritage 

Fellowship

In 2007, the NEA celebrated 

the 25th anniversary of the NEA 

National Heritage Fellowships, the 

country’s most prestigious honor in 

the folk and traditional arts. These 

awards celebrate the master artists 

whose artistic expression is at once 

rooted in the collective American 

experience and in the traditions of 

the nation’s many ethnicities. Since 

1982, the NEA has recognized 327 

folk and traditional artists as NEA 

National Heritage Fellows. Twelve 

NEA National Heritage Fellowships 

were given in 2007, with a one-time 

award of $20,000.

Additionally, the Bess Lomax 

Hawes Award is given in recognition 

of individuals who have made major 

contributions to the excellence, 

vitality, and public appreciation of 

the folk and traditional arts through 

teaching, collecting, advocacy, and 

preservation work. 

To mark the program’s silver 

anniversary, the NEA sponsored 

several events, including Living 

Legacies: Portraits of the NEA National 

Heritage Fellows, 1982-2007, a 

portrait exhibit in the Russell 

Senate Office Building featuring 

work by Tom Pich, who has traveled 

the country photographing NEA 

National Heritage Fellows in their 

homes and studios for the past 16 

years. A special NEA publication 

was produced for the anniversary, 

including a DVD-Rom with more 

than 35 hours of video, music, and 

Nicholas Benson

Stone letter cutter and calligrapher

Newport, Rhode Island

Sidiki Conde

Guinean dancer and musician

New York, New York

Violet de Cristoforo

Haiku poet and historian

Salinas, California

Roland Freeman (Bess Lomax 

Hawes Award)

Photo documentarian, author, exhibit curator

Washington, DC

Pat Courtney Gold

Wasco sally bag weaver

Scappoosse, Oregon

Eddie Kamae

Hawaiian musician, composer, filmmaker

Honolulu, Hawaii

Augustin Lira

Chicano singer, musician, composer

Fresno, California

Julia Parker

Kashia Pomo basketmaker

Midpines, California

Mary Jane Queen

Appalachian musician

Cullowhee, North Carolina

Joe Thompson

African-American string band musician

Mebane, North Carolina

Irvin L. Trujillo

Rio Grande weaver

Chimayo, New Mexico

Elaine Hoffman Watts

Klezmer percussionist

Havertown, Pennsylvania

interview segments on the fellows. 

Interviews with the 2007 

awardees, as well as presentations of 

their work, can be found on the NEA 

Web site (www.arts.gov). The NEA 

National Heritage Fellowships were 

supported in 2007 by the Darden 

Restaurants Foundation.

NEA National Heritage Fellows

The finale of the 2007 NEA National Heritage Fellowships concert and awards ceremony. 

Photo by Michael G. Stewart
22 National Endowment for the Arts

Grant Highlights

Dancers Akop and Gaiane Akopian 

starred as Basilio and Kitri in the 

Grand Rapids Ballet Company’s 2008 

production of Don Quixote.

Photo by Andrew Terzes, Terzes 

Photography
 2007 Annual Report 23

Grant Highlights

The following pages highlight 

some of the successful 

projects that the NEA has 

supported in every state. While 

these examples are by no means 

comprehensive, they are highly 

illustrative of the diverse, quality art 

that the NEA funds. 

Grant Highlights

FY 2007 Applications Grants 

Grant Category Received Awarded

Access to Artistic Excellence1 2,570 1,511

Learning in the Arts2 605 197

Challenge America: Reaching 

Every Community 396 242

1 Includes 61 grants for Arts on Radio and Television and 5 grants for Save America’s Treasures. 

2 Includes 25 grants for Summer School in the Arts.

Access to Artistic Excellence

This category funds projects that encourage and support artistic creativity, 

preserve our diverse cultural heritage, and make the arts more widely 

available in communities throughout the country. 

Learning in the Arts for Children and Youth

This category funds projects that help children and youth acquire 

appreciation, knowledge, and understanding of and skills in the arts. The 

focus is on children and youth in the general age range of five through 18 

years old. 

Challenge America: Reaching Every Community

In this category, the focus is on simple, straightforward local projects that 

involve experienced professional artists and arts professionals in small or 

midsized communities where opportunities to experience the arts are 

limited by geography, ethnicity, economics, or disability. 
24 National Endowment for the Arts

GRANt HiGHliGHtS

lives of African Americans during 

the Depression and war years, and 

their triumphs and tribulations. 

In FY 2007, Artemis Media Project 

received an NEA Access to Artistic 

Excellence grant of $5,000 to honor 

these college swing bands from 

the 1930s and 1940s with a onehour, engaging radio documentary, 

Swingtime, featuring music and 

interviews with members from 

these bands. 

Swingtime, made in celebration 

of Black History Month, was 

distributed nationally by Public 

Radio International to more than 

75 stations throughout the United 

States with a total audience of more 

than 82,000 people. The radio 

documentary told the story of three 

infl uential bands: the Bama State 

Collegians, Prairie View Co-Eds, 

and International Sweethearts 

of Rhythm, exploring the social, 

musical, and historical legacy of 

the bands and their role in the 

development of American musical 

culture. State-of-the-art recording 

facilities were used and a Web site 

was designed to increase access to 

information about these bands. 

The documentary also included 

Artemis Media Project 

FOlEY

When the Great 

Depression began 

in 1929, it was an 

especially diffi cult time for AfricanAmerican schools and bands to 

exist. The swing bands served as 

a recruitment tool for AfricanAmerican colleges as a whole, not 

just their music departments. 

As swing music became popular 

from coast to coast, these college 

bands were in demand, off ering 

more opportunities for African 

Americans in both education and 

the workplace. In addition, these 

bands’ experiences refl ected the 

Alabama

the all-women international Sweethearts of Rhythm from the 

Piney Woods country life School in Piney Woods, Mississippi, 

were featured in the radio documentary Swingtime. 

Photo courtesy of Institute of Jazz Studies, Rutgers University
GRANt HiGHliGHtS

more current swing music from 

Alabama State University, Piney 

Woods, and Prairie View schools, 

as well as archival interviews and 

music. The late Erskine Hawkins 

of the Bama State Collegians was 

featured in an interview along with 

other band members from that 

time, including trumpeter Clora 

Bryant from the Prairie View CoEds and saxophonist Roz Cron from 

the International Sweethearts. 

Listeners heard fi rsthand what 

life was like during the Great 

Depression, and stories about 

segregation and wartime struggles. 

They gained a new appreciation for 

the music they grew up listening to 

and a better understanding of the 

musicians’ struggles. 

Alabama Dance Council

BiRMiNGHAM

The Alabama Dance Festival 

(ADF), formerly known as 

Alabama Dance Summit, 

celebrated its tenth anniversary in 

2007. More than 400 participants 

and 2,000 audience members came 

to Birmingham for the four-day 

January event. The festival has 

made a commitment to hosting 

workshops and master classes that 

showcase the talents of dancers in 

the local community.

The Alabama Dance Council 

received an NEA Access to Artistic 

Excellence grant of $10,000 to 

help produce this festival, which 

is becoming a focal point for the 

state’s dance community. Dancers 

from all over, of all ages, can attend 

any of 43 master classes taught by 

Alabama dance teachers and a guest 

company. River North Chicago 

Dance Company, under Artistic 

Director Frank Chaves, lent its 

expertise on eclectic contemporary 

dance for the week, teaching 12 of 

the classes and staging fi ve public 

and school performances. 

The dance festival also held 

classes open to non-dancers in 

the Birmingham area. “Swing n’ 

Wings” was a collaboration with 

the Alabama Jazz Hall of Fame—a 

night of swing dance lessons, hors 

d’oeuvres, and live music by Hall of 

Fame artists. The Hall of Famers’ 

talents were integrated into a tap 

dance and jazz-history class during 

the festival as well. Dance education 

classes during the festival were held 

by Anne Green Gilbert, director 

of Kaleidoscope Dance in Seattle. 

Gilbert taught schoolteachers 

her Brain-Compatible Dance 

technique which uses movement to 

increase focus and creativity in the 

classroom.

The dance festival continues 

to increase the diversity of its 

classes. Currently it off ers classes 

in the styles of liturgical (a 

combination of modern and praise 

worship dance), South African, 

belly dance, traditional Indian, 

tango, swing, and Russian, plus 

classical ballet, jazz, and tap. In 

future years, Rosemary Johnson, 

ADF’s executive director, wants 

to off er much more in the way of 

professional development classes. 

“We don’t have a lot of opportunities 

for professional dancers in 

this state, especially for young 

choreographers, so we’re trying to 

address that need,” she said. ADF 

hopes to cultivate Alabama dancers 

and continue to connect the whole 

state in a collaborative week of 

dance festivities. 

River North chicago 

Dance company members 

demonstrate swing dance 

moves during a “Swing 

n’ Wings” session of the 

Alabama Dance Festival. 

Photo courtesy of Alabama 

Dance Council

 2007 Annual Report 25
Grant Highlights

Juneau School District 

Juneau

For nearly 20 years, the 

Juneau School District has 

demonstrated its belief in 

the importance of arts education 

by hosting artist residencies in the 

district’s schools. With the help of an 

FY 2007 NEA Learning in the Arts 

grant of $10,000, the school district 

partnered with Perseverance Theatre 

to allow every ninth-grade student 

in the district a chance to participate 

in Perseverance’s Prologue Program. 

Alaska Content Standards for the 

Arts states that Alaska students 

should “refine artistic skills and 

develop self-discipline through 

rehearsal, practice, and revision.” 

The Prologue program helps the 

students meet this requirement 

through the process of reading, 

interpreting, and performing one of 

Shakespeare’s works.

Beginning on February 4, 

2008, three teaching artists from 

Perseverance worked with 300 

ninth-grade students one to two 

times a week on scenes from 

William Shakespeare’s Much Ado 

About Nothing. Apart from vocal 

and physical acting exercises, 

the students also participated in 

activities that help them connect 

with the emotions and actions in 

the play and become accustomed to 

Shakespeare’s language.

Each class was in charge of 

casting, rehearsing, and performing 

one scene from Much Ado About 

Nothing. After six sessions with 

the teaching artists and a technical 

rehearsal, all of the classes came 

together on March 1, 2008 to 

perform an abridged version of 

their play for family and friends 

on Perseverance Theatre’s stage. 

Following their performance, the 

students returned to the theater to 

see a professional production of the 

same play during a special matinee 

performance. 

For most students, Prologue is 

their first chance to perform on a 

stage. Learning about the artistic 

process demystifies both theater 

and Shakespeare, two topics that 

at the start of the program seemed 

foreign to most students. In addition, 

Perseverance Theater notices that 

those involved in the program 

remain excited by theater and are 

more likely to attend a performance 

again and bring their families. By 

teaching students to appreciate and 

understand theater, Perseverance 

Theater is actively building an 

audience of future theatergoers.

Freshmen students at Juneau-Douglas High School in Juneau, Alaska, bow at the conclusion of performing a scene 

from Shakespeare’s Much Ado About Nothing.

Photo by Barbara Bonner

26 National Endowment for the Arts
Alaska Dance Theatre

ANcHORAGE

Anchorage’s Alaska Dance 

Theatre (ADT) is working 

to increase their public 

image through their residency 

program. In FY 2007, ADT received 

an NEA Access to Artistic Excellence 

grant of $10,000 to bring four 

choreographers to Anchorage 

in 2007-08 to teach classes and 

introduce Alaska’s dancers to new 

choreography. 

In January 2007, John 

Heginbotham, a member of the 

Mark Morris Dance Group and 

an alumni of the School of Alaska 

Dance Theatre, provided modern 

dance classes for ADT students and 

the public. 

This residency was followed 

by one with choreographer Minh 

Tran from Portland, Oregon, 

which resulted in a joint concert 

with his own company and ADT 

in April 2007. Tran’s work often 

combines the Vietnamese folk 

traditions of his homeland with 

contemporary dance, as was shown 

in his piece, Furious Angels, which 

was performed by ADT. Another 

Tran piece, Descending, was restaged 

for dancers from both ADT and 

Tran’s dance company, along with 

live music sung by the Anchorage 

Concert Chorus. This residency 

provided the opportunity to reach 

out to Anchorage’s Asian-American 

population.

Choreographer Annie Arnoult 

Beserra, founder of Striding Lion 

Arts, added another modern 

piece to ADT’s repertory. While 

the piece offi cially premiered in 

February 2008, Midland was given 

an informal showing at ADT in 

June 2007 with an opportunity for 

the public to discuss the process of 

creating a new piece with Beserra 

and the dancers.

Lastly, during the fi rst week of 

Alaska

Sarah Madsen, Brittney 

Otevrel, and Nicole Maple 

in Alaska Dance theatre’s 

Romanian Folk Dances, 

choreographed by toni Pimble. 

Photo by Marc Lester

 2007 Annual Report 27

August 2007, Toni Pimble, artistic 

director of Oregon’s Eugene Ballet, 

recreated a piece, Romanian Folk 

Dances, for three ADT company 

members, and both companies’ 

dancers performed in Silk and 

Steel, which employed multimedia 

eff ects and music from the Middle 

Ages. Both offi cially premiered in 

May 2008.

Providing their dancers and 

their audiences with “fresh, 

innovative, cutting-edge dance” is 

just one benefi t, according to ADT 

Artistic Director Alice Sullivan. 

However, Sullivan also said the 

choreographers “return home 

with the feeling [Alaska’s] not off 

the planet,” and in turn attract 

other choreographers to ADT and 

increase knowledge and respect 

for this dance company within the 

dance world. 

GRANt HiGHliGHtS
28 National Endowment for the Arts

GRANt HiGHliGHtS

Arizona State University 

tEMPE

Broadway musicals, 

contemporary dance, hiphop dance and theater, 

traditional folk arts—programs 

featuring these diverse art forms 

can all be found in Tempe, courtesy 

of Arizona State University (ASU) 

Public Events. In FY 2007, ASU 

received an NEA Access to Artistic 

Excellence grant of $10,000 

to support performances and 

residencies by theater performer 

Peter Reder, Robert Moses’ Kin 

dance company, SITI Company, and 

the Liz Lerman Dance Exchange. 

Over the course of 12 days in 

February 2007, Reder researched 

and wrote a performance based on 

ASU’s Gammage Auditorium, Frank 

Lloyd Wright’s last public design 

building. Billed as a theatricalized 

tour of the building, Guided 

Tour incorporated Reder’s own 

history with that of the theater. A 

mixture of fact and fi ction, Reder’s 

performance examined issues of 

authenticity and personal history.

Contemporary dance company 

Robert Moses’ Kin held 

choreographic workshops for 

both local dance artists and ASU 

students. To reach ASU students 

outside of the dance department, 

Moses spoke with African American 

Studies and History students about 

joining him in creating his piece The 

President’s Daughter, which was then 

performed on March 3, 2007 on 

ASU’s campus. 

SITI Company, a New Yorkbased theater company devoted to 

contemporary theater, provided 

two weeks of intense training for 

ASU acting students and faculty 

and performed Hotel Cassiopeia by 

Charles L. Mees on April 28, 2007.

On October 6, 2007, Liz Lerman 

Dance Exchange presented a 

performance of Ferocious Beauty: 

Genome, in which the choreographer 

explores genetic research through 

dance. Before the performance, 

Lerman’s residency extended 

outside the theater confi nes to 

ASU’s science community through 

two symposiums on genetics 

research and the accompanying 

legal and moral issues. This 

symposium attracted a new 

audience of scientists to the theater 

Arizona Arizona State University Public Events 

presented Siti company’s Hotel Cassiopeia

(featuring from left to right, Ellen lauren, 

Barney O’Hanlon, J. Ed Araiza, Stephen 

Webber, Akiko Aizawa, and leon ingulsrud) 

as part of its 2007 season. 

Photo by Michael Brosilow
 2007 Annual Report 29

Grant Highlights

to see the performance of Ferocious 

Beauty at the conclusion of Lerman’s 

residency. 

Through these diverse and 

talented artists and organizations, 

ASU Public Events was able to 

reach 13,000 people in the Tempe 

area. Incorporating workshops 

and classes broadens participation 

that can’t be achieved through 

performance alone.

John Wesley Powell 

Memorial Museum

Page

Dedicated to collecting, 

preserving, and 

interpreting the history 

of the Colorado Plateau and native 

cultures, the John Wesley Powell 

Memorial Museum was founded in 

1969 by a group of local citizens in 

Page, Arizona. Inspired by Major 

John Wesley Powell, a Civil War 

veteran who was one of the first to 

travel the length of the Colorado 

River, the museum works with the 

Page Tourism Board and the PageLake Powell Chamber of Commerce 

to highlight Native-American 

history through exhibits and 

outreach programs.

On October 6, 2007, the Powell 

Museum hosted a performance for 

the northern Arizona community by 

Robert Mirabal and his band. The 

Powell Museum received an NEA 

Challenge America grant of $10,000 

to present this multimedia event, 

which attracted more than 250 

people. Robert Mirabal is known 

for fusing Native-American music 

with modern influences. For the 

Powell Museum concert he and the 

Rare Tribal Mob used chanting, 

native dancers, cellos, aboriginal 

didgeridoos, flutes, percussion, and 

other world instruments to blend 

native rhythmic approaches with 

modern musical influences.

In a desire to reach out to 

students, the concert was held 

downtown on the Page High School 

campus, and free tickets were 

provided to students at six area 

schools, a large number of whom 

come from the Navajo reservation—

in fact, 22 percent of the audience 

for Mirabal’s performance, both 

students and adults, were Native 

Americans.

Lee Pulsaki, the editor of the local 

newspaper, Lake Powell Chonicle, 

commented, “It doesn’t seem 

possible that a community with 

7,000 people could bring shows 

like these here.” The NEA grant 

allowed the Powell Museum to reach 

out to the community in a way that 

they would not otherwise have had 

the resources to do, and in return, 

they found that the community 

is becoming more aware and 

appreciative of these art programs.

Robert Mirabal brought his blend of Native-American and contemporary music to the John 

Wesley Powell Memorial Museum in Page, Arizona. 

Photo by Andrew Flack
30 National Endowment for the Arts

GRANt HiGHliGHtS

Inter Arts Hot Springs 

Music Festival

HOt SPRiNGS

The opportunity to 

apprentice with a 

professional artist is as 

life-changing as it is rare. 

Participants in the Hot Springs 

Music Festival apprentice program 

know this fi rsthand. 

The Hot Springs Music 

Festival brings more than 24,000 

audience members annually 

to the former resort town in 

Arkansas to experience symphony, 

chamber, opera, and choral music 

performances and master classes. 

Capitalizing on the wealth of 

talented professional musicians in 

town, the festival selects student 

and nonprofessional apprentices to 

rehearse and perform side by side 

with the musicians in concert. In 

2007, an NEA Challenge America 

grant of $10,000 helped the 

program pair 30 mentors with about 

100 apprentices selected from a 

competitive pool of approximately 

300 applicants.

Apprentices live in Hot Springs for 

the duration of the festival, covered 

by a full scholarship. They rehearse 

with the professional musicians in 

multiple ensembles, giving all the 

apprentices a chance to take on a 

leadership role or responsibility. All 

apprentices have a full performance 

schedule, the goal being to totally 

immerse them in a professional 

setting. Laura Rosenberg, the 

festival’s executive director, said, 

“We want to help a generation of 

musicians take an entrepreneurial 

approach to their careers.”

In addition to the performing 

students, apprentices in 

conducting, music recording 

engineers, and arts administration 

also are selected. These students 

get an immersion experience in 

the world of music festivals as 

well. Besides coordinating and 

playing concerts, the apprentices 

attend enrichment seminars 

on the music business, stressinjury prevention, and holistic 

approaches to conquering stage 

fright, among others. The program’s 

comprehensive curriculum is 

making the application process 

increasingly competitive. With 

training programs like those at Hot 

Springs Festival, more and more 

people eager to get involved in the Arkansas music fi eld are paying a visit.

Bassist Kevin Mauldin mentors an 

apprentice during the Hot Springs 

Music Festival in 2007. 

Photo by Bob Nagy
 2007 Annual Report 31

Grant Highlights

Arkansas Repertory 

Theatre Company 

Little Rock

Bob Hupp, artistic director 

of Arkansas Repertory 

Theatre (ART), and 

Rajendra Ramoon Maharaj, a young 

African-American playwright 

and director, have been working 

together for several years. In 

2004, Maharaj directed ART’s 

production of Dreamgirls. He 

felt a strong connection with the 

community and began to talk about 

a possible collaboration with greater 

significance: a new theatrical 

work commemorating the 50th 

anniversary of the Little Rock Nine’s 

resolve to desegregate Central High 

School.

In developing the show, Maharaj 

took his cues from the creators of 

The Laramie Project, the 2000 play 

about a small Wyoming town where 

tensions mounted after a gay college 

student was brutally murdered. 

Maharaj spoke with nearly 100 

present and former members of 

the Little Rock community. From 

those transcripts and archival media 

accounts, he compiled an account of 

September 1957 that was historically 

accurate, dramatically compelling, 

and profoundly moving. 

The Legacy Project: It Happened In 

Little Rock premiered in fall 2007 

to national acclaim. ART brought 

the project to the stage with help 

from an NEA Access to Artistic 

Excellence grant of $20,000. Six of 

the nine former students attended 

the show on September 25, the day 

of the anniversary, and sang with 

the cast at the curtain call. Two more 

of the former classmates eventually 

came to the theater, and all eight 

lavished nothing but praise on the 

play. And while their endorsement 

meant much to Hupp, he was more 

concerned about how members of 

the Little Rock community would 

react to seeing history reenacted 

live.

After each performance, Just 

Communities of Central Arkansas, 

a social advocacy consortium, 

encouraged people to remain in 

the theater and discuss what they’d 

seen onstage. Audiences stayed 

for up to 90 minutes, venting, 

remembering, and reconciling. 

 “The issues of 1957 are still very 

much a part of this community,” 

Hupp said. “We knew we were 

taking a risk, but the play was so 

well received, and so thoughtfully 

responded to, it made me proud to 

be a member of this community.”

Hate mail written in the late 1950s regarding desegregation of Little Rock’s 

Central High School are projected over actresses Mary-Pat Green and Gia 

McGlone in Arkansas Repertory Theatre’s production of The Legacy Project: It 

Happened in Little Rock.

Photo by Benjamin Krain
32 National Endowment for the Arts

GRANt HiGHliGHtS

Chitresh Das 

Dance Company 

SAN FRANciScO

The American Dance Festival, 

held each summer in 

Durham, North Carolina, is 

a place where dance practitioners 

of all styles have a chance to mingle 

and meet. Occasionally, dancers hit 

it off so well, they decide to perform 

together. But one of the most 

unusual pairings ever to emerge 

from the festival may be Indian 

kathak dancer Pandit Chitresh Das 

and tap-dancer Jason Samuels 

Smith of Bring in ‘Da Noise, Bring in 

‘Da Funk fame. 

After that fateful backstage 

meeting in 2004, Das and Smith 

realized they had something 

special in common. Although Das 

was trained in an ancient Indian 

art form and Smith in a relatively 

recent American one, both dancers 

wield percussion instruments with 

their feet. Smith taps the ground 

with the steel on his toes and Das 

rings the fi ve pounds of bells 

wrapped around his ankles. Their 

collaboration resulted in a melding 

of the two art forms into an exciting 

new work. 

In November 2005, India Jazz 

Suites debuted at San Francisco’s 

Fort Mason Center. The two 

dancers performed solos, a duet, 

and took turns dancing with each 

other’s respective jazz and Indian 

musicians. Smith gave Das’s 

Indian table drummer a run for 

his money, while Das stomped to 

a stand-up bass instead of a sitar. 

The work proved so popular in 

San Francisco—the San Francisco 

Chronicle deemed it one of the city’s 

top-ten dance events of the year—

that Das and Smith made plans to 

tour. In FY 2007, the NEA awarded 

Chitresh Das Dance Company an 

Access to Artistic Excellence grant 

of $20,000 to take India Jazz Suites 

on the road. The tour stopped in 

Monterey, California; Denver, 

Colorado; Richmond, Virginia; and 

Bryn Mawr, Pennsylvania. 

The tour attracted a slightly 

diff erent demographic group in 

each city, Celine Schein, executive 

director of Chitresh Das, said. 

African Americans and South 

Asians often sat next to each other in 

the audience, learning to appreciate 

new styles of dance.

“What is really striking is that we 

have people who attend who either 

haven’t seen kathak or haven’t seen 

tap,” Schein said. “It completely 

opens people’s minds to another 

art form.”

California
 2007 Annual Report 33

GRANt HiGHliGHtS

Los Angeles Philharmonic 

Association 

lOS ANGElES

When the Los Angeles 

Philharmonic took on 

the 2007 revival of The 

Tristan Project—a multimedia concert 

staging of Wagner’s tragic opera, 

Tristan and Isolde—Artistic Director 

Esa-Pekka Salonen considered it 

among the major accomplishments 

of his 17-year tenure with the 

esteemed orchestra.

“When one decides to take on 

an iconic piece of the repertoire, 

it’s more fascinating—in my 

opinion—to put it into a new context 

and to illuminate it from various 

angles,” Salonen said in a statement 

describing The Tristan Project. To 

fi nd that “new context” for the 

opera, the LA Phil commissioned 

renowned video artist Bill Viola 

Pandit chitresh Das and 

Jason Samuels Smith 

perform India Jazz Suites. 

Photo by Marty Sohl

to interpret the ill-fated romance 

at sea. Globe-trotting director 

Peter Sellars handled the concert 

staging and tied the visual elements 

together.

The Tristan Project premiered 

in 2004 as a coproduction with 

the LA Phil and the Paris Opera. 

Salonen fi rst led the work at Walt 

Disney Concert Hall, then fl ew to 

France to conduct the piece in Paris 

fi ve months later. In FY 2007, the 

LA Phil received an NEA Access 

to Artistic Excellence grant of 

$100,000 to remount The Tristan 

Project in Los Angeles, present the 

work in New York two weeks later, 

and create a corresponding family 

concert. 

At three concerts in Los Angeles, 

Salonen paired one act of the opera 

with a complementary full-length 

work by Debussy, a composer 

who, in his early years, was much 

infl uenced by Wagner’s music 

dramas. The LA Phil also performed 

the complete opera twice at home 

and in New York’s Avery Fisher Hall. 

Every performance sold out. 

American soprano Christine 

Brewer returned to reprise her 

role as Isolde, Canadian tenor Alan 

Woodrow sung the role of Tristan, 

and Anne Sophie von Otter made a 

rare Wagnerian appearance as the 

devoted but fallible maid Brangäne. 

The Los Angeles Master Chorale 

came through splendidly, as Los 

Angeles Times music critic Mark 

Swed noted in his review: “The 

Tristan Project is, quite simply, the 

great Los Angeles artwork of our 

time.” 

the los Angeles 

Philharmonic’s 2007 revival 

of The Tristan Project with 

video art by Bill Viola. 

Photo courtesy of

Matthew Imaging
34 National Endowment for the Arts

GRANt HiGHliGHtS

Arvada Council for the 

Arts and Humanities 

ARVADA

A fictional interpretation 

of the behind-the-scenes 

making of the movie 

Gone With the Wind, the comedy 

play Moonlight and Magnolias 

was the perfect season opener 

for the Arvada Center, attracting 

approximately 8,000 theater 

patrons in its four-week run. In 

FY 2007, the Arvada Council for 

the Arts and Humanities received 

an NEA Challenge America grant 

of $10,000 to support the center’s 

production. The Chicago Sun-Times

called Moonlight and Magnolias “at 

once a hyperventilating slapstick 

comedy, an impassioned love 

song and a blazing critique of 

Hollywood.”

The Arvada Center prides itself 

in showcasing local talent in the 

Colorado area, and this production 

was no exception. The center held 

auditions for the four-person play 

followed by intense rehearsals. 

This production’s emphasis on 

local talent included not just the 

actors but the technical crew as 

well. Although the production 

of Moonlight and Magnolias was a 

challenge, the center’s technical 

crew and staff provided audiences 

with a full night of entertainment. 

The Arvada Center off ers yearround theater as well as concerts, 

dance performances, and visual 

arts exhibits. Additionally, more 

than 800 classes are off ered in a 

variety of fi elds, such as writing, 

ceramics, dance, and acting. Due to 

the diversity in programming and 

array of classes off ered, the Arvada 

Center fulfi lls a unique niche within 

the cultural community. The theater 

is the fi fth largest in Colorado and 

their programs reach communities 

statewide. The Arvada Center is 

successful because it provides 

its audience with theater that is 

inspirational yet entertaining. 

The production of Moonlight 

and Magnolias off ered a fresh 

artistic experience for the Arvada 

community, providing surprising 

insight into Hollywood life behind 

the silver screen. 

New Dance Theatre 

(Cleo Parker Robinson 

Dance) 

DENVER

Cleo Parker Robinson has 

made it her life’s work to 

continue the legacy left 

by Katherine Dunham—dancer, 

choreographer, anthropologist, 

and humanitarian. In 2007, 

Robinson was able to bring that 

work to fruition with support from 

Colorado

Erik Sandvold as David O. Selznick and Jordan leigh as Ben Hecht in the Arvada 

center’s production of Moonlight and Magnolias. 

Photo by P. Switzer
 2007 Annual Report 35

GRANt HiGHliGHtS

Robinson’s company 

taught a brief history of dance 

during their SOS (Season of 

Schools): The Healing Power of 

Dance workshops, which brought 

the joy and freedom of movement 

to children who wouldn’t otherwise 

experience it. “Everything is quite 

fragile unless we have the arts in our 

lives,” said Robinson.

In addition, the Robinson 

dance company took part in an 

international dance institute for 

children and adults, bringing 

Dunham-trained dancers to 

instruct and perform. Roughly 75 

percent of the students received 

scholarships to attend. 

Katherine Dunham’s legacy is 

one that deserves to be recognized. 

She studied dance and anthropology 

in Chicago, travelling to Haiti and 

Jamaica to study dance with an 

ethnographic approach. While in 

Haiti she studied voodoo rituals and 

later became a champion for Haitian 

causes. She and her company broke 

racial barriers when touring the 

whole country, and Dunham became 

the fi rst-ever African American to 

choreograph for the Metropolitan 

Opera. To this day, she is recognized 

for making African-American 

dance a serious art form. Robinson 

was able to learn directly from this 

master, making her company the 

perfect outlet to carry on Katherine 

Dunham’s legacy. 

an NEA Access to Artistic 

Excellence grant of $15,000 to share 

Dunham’s legacy with the Denver 

community. 

Robinson’s company, Cleo Parker 

Robinson Dance, performed three 

important works by Dunham—

Ragtime, Bellhouse Blues, and Choros—

in February 2008, then took the 

works on tour to Toronto, Canada; 

Caspar, Wyoming; and St. Louis, 

Missouri, in the fall of that year. A 

spring tour is planned for 2009.

 These three pieces, according to 

Robinson, show Dunham’s range 

as a choreographer—working with 

Broadway, African dance, modern, 

jazz, and even opera. Dunham gave 

the pieces Choros and Bellhouse Blues 

to Robinson late in her life, because, 

as Robinson likes to say, “Dance is 

a gift we give to each other.” The gift 

was shared during free in-school 

performances and workshops 

at approximately 30 Denverarea public and private schools. 

laurel Richardson in cleo Robinson 

Parker Dance’s performance of 

Katherine Dunham’s Choros. 

Photo by Michelle Knudsen
36 National Endowment for the Arts

GRANt HiGHliGHtS

Artspace

NEW HAVEN

Making connections and 

gaining visibility are two 

key factors for success 

in the visual arts. Artspace provides 

these opportunities annually 

through City-Wide Open Studios 

(CWOS), a month-long exhibition 

in Artspace’s main gallery, featuring 

one piece of artwork each by more 

than 500 artists. This non-juried 

program also fi nds vacant buildings 

for artists without their own studios 

to use. CWOS annually draws more 

than 10,000 people, providing 

artists the exposure needed to help 

propel their careers.

CWOS is just one of Artspace’s 

programs designed to help local 

visual artists develop their careers. 

Founded in 1987, Artspace uses 

its exhibition programs to provide 

artists with visibility, leadership 

training, income, and space. At 

their Center for Contemporary Art, 

New Haven’s largest independent 

visual arts venue, Artspace presents 

six cycles of exhibitions annually.

In FY 2007, Artspace received an 

NEA Access to Artistic Excellence 

grant of $15,000 for a special 

exhibition, The Lasso Project: A 

New Haven Alumni Exhibition, to 

celebrate CWOS’s tenth anniversary. 

The Lasso Project was designed to 

highlight the achievements of New 

Haven artists. Nine artists who are 

current and former residents of 

New Haven participated, including 

Johanna Bresnick, Bonnie Collura, 

Michael Donovan, Frank Gardner, 

Baptiste Ibar, Marie Lorenz, Tavares 

Strachan, Siebran Versteeg, and 

Kitty Sweet Winslow. 

Instead of having the exhibition 

in a traditional location, Artspace 

arranged for each artist to exhibit 

in vacant storefronts around New 

Haven’s Ninth Square, where the 

art could be viewed 24 hours a day. 

Artspace’s corresponding audio 

tour, featuring the artists talking 

about their work, was also accessible 

at any time, as participants used 

their cell phones to call phone 

numbers corresponding to the 

diff erent pieces of artwork. The 

exhibition ran from October 12 

through December 14, 2007, and 

was visited by more than 10,000 

people.

Artspace discovered that by 

placing art in unconventional 

locations, they drew a new audience 

to their central gallery. In fact, the 

idea of placing work in privately 

owned public spaces turned out to 

be so popular that the landlords 

of the original spaces asked to be 

included in future programming 

and other regional organizations 

invited Artspace to develop and 

present similar exhibitions.

Connecticut

Michael Donovan, Untitled, 2007, part of Artspace’s The Lasso Project.

Photo courtesy of Gregory Vershbow.
 2007 Annual Report 37

Grant Highlights

Eugene O’Neill Memorial 

Theater Center

Waterford

With more than 800 

applications for 10 spots 

to the Eugene O’Neill 

Memorial Theater Center National 

Playwrights Conference and the 

National Music Theater Conference, 

the playwrights, composers, 

librettists, and lyricists chosen 

receive the invaluable opportunity 

of cultivating new works and forging 

important connections with other 

artists. Established in 1965 and 

1978, respectively, the Playwrights 

and Music Theater Conferences are 

part of the O’Neill Center’s mission 

to discover and support new works 

and new artists. The conferences 

run concurrently and also include 

a joint speakers’ series to discuss 

ideas and issues facing theater 

artists and their supporters. In FY 

2007, the O’Neill Center received an 

NEA Access to Artistic Excellence 

grant of $40,000 to support the 

conferences.

Participating artists come from 

a broad range of experience, from 

emerging playwrights to Broadway 

veterans, and have included such 

notable playwrights as August 

Wilson, Lee Blessing, and Adam 

Rapp. For 2007, the participants, 

all of whom submitted their work 

through an open submission 

process, were playwrights Roberto 

Aguirre-Sacasa, Ifa Bayeza, Lucy 

Caldwell, Rebecca Gilman, Deborah 

Zoe Laufer, James Still, Samuel Brett 

Williams, and Karen Zacarias, and 

for the Music Theater Conference, 

David Rossmer and Dan Lipton and 

Arnold Weinstein, John Wulp, and 

Jan Warner. 

During the month-long residency 

in July, the artists lived on the 

grounds of the O’Neill Center and 

worked with a professional director 

and actors. Two staged readings 

of each play were presented over a 

one-week period and four staged 

readings of the music theater works 

were presented over a two-week 

period. Each included a rewriting 

period in between performances. 

In order to focus on the playwright’s 

words, sets were suggested using 

movable modules and actors wore 

simple costumes. 

Of the 24 plays that have been 

developed as part of the National 

Playwrights Conference in the 

past three years, 18 have gone on 

to a full production. In addition, 

works developed out of the Music 

Theater Conference include recent 

Tony Award-winners In the Heights

and Avenue Q. This success signals 

both the high artistic quality the 

conferences produce and the 

advantage of providing artists with a 

retreat to cultivate and create.

From Left: Daniel Breaker, Nic Few, 

Warner Miller, and Nicoye Banks in The 

Ballad of Emmett Till, by Ifa Bayeza, 

part of Eugene O’Neill Memorial Theater 

Center’s 2007 National Playwright’s 

Conference. 

Photo by Keith Jochim
38 National Endowment for the Arts

GRANt HiGHliGHtS

Delaware Symphony 

Association

WilMiNGtON

There are good reasons why 

the orchestra-in-residence 

at the Grand Opera House in 

Wilmington, Delaware, is called the 

Delaware Symphony. As Executive 

Director Lucinda Williams is quick 

to point out, her orchestra doesn’t 

serve just a city but an entire state. 

“Dedication to our community 

and education drive our mission,” 

Williams said. 

In FY 2007, the Delaware 

Symphony received an NEA Access 

to Artistic Excellence grant of 

$10,000 to support its In-School 

Ensembles, a program that sends 

musicians out to interact with 

elementary school students. The 

program has three components. 

When symphony musicians arrive at 

a school, they divide themselves by 

instrument sections and set off for 

classrooms, where they introduce 

students to their instruments. 

Later that day, the musicians 

reunite to present a chamber music 

performance. They often write 

original arrangements for each 

unique classroom situation. 

Williams and her staff also 

customize teachers’ guides to 

comply with state guidelines for 

music education, and they carefully 

review the feedback that comes 

in from each campus. Schools 

that host In-School Ensembles 

commit to busing their students 

to Wilmington for a symphony 

fi eld trip. At those concerts, the 

orchestra plays full-length versions 

of pieces the children heard 

snippets of in school. Williams often 

hears children holler out hellos to 

musicians that had visited their 

classrooms. “Now that’s ownership, 

right there,” she said. “That’s 

sustained learning.” 

Although only eight schools 

received visits during the 2007-

2008 school year, Williams hopes 

to expand the In-School Ensembles 

program as funding allows. There’s a 

long waiting list of schools that want 

their students to host a visit from 

the musicians. She’s also looking for 

ways to reach schools south of Dover. 

Delaware may be tiny, but it’s also 

long, and schools at the southern tip 

cannot bus their students two hours 

north. Williams is seeking a second 

stage so her musicians can perform 

for more students, and continue to 

reach out to the entire state.

Delaware

Delaware Symphony string musicians play as a quintet for students at North Star Elementary 

School in Hockessin, Delaware. 

Photo by Brittany Binler
 2007 Annual Report 39

Grant Highlights

Delaware Art 

Museum

Wilmington

Delaware Art Museum 

is proud to house the 

nation’s largest collection 

of pre-Raphaelite art. There is 

no larger collection of this type 

of art assembled outside of Great 

Britain. From spring 2005 until 

summer 2007, while the museum 

underwent a major expansion, the 

collection was out on a nine-city 

tour, including a stop at England’s 

Nottingham Castle. To give the 

pre-Raphaelites a proper welcome 

back, the museum received an NEA 

Access to Artistic Excellence grant 

of $10,000 to reinstall the collection 

in a new gallery.

The Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood 

formed in 1848, when seven young 

artists gathered in London and 

expressed their mutual distrust 

of the Royal Academy. Led by the 

painter Dante Gabriel Rossetti, the 

men pledged to take their aesthetic 

cues from the art of Middle Ages, 

that is, art before the time of 

Raphael. Their search for subjects 

sent them delving into scripture and 

Shakespeare. For inspiration, they 

rubbed shoulders with local poets 

like Alfred Tennyson, John Keats, 

and Rossetti’s sister, Christina. 

The brotherhood gradually 

dispersed, but the name stuck 

to later configurations of likeminded artists, including William 

Morris, who founded the decorative 

arts firm Morris and Company, 

considered the beginning of the 

English arts and crafts movement. 

Samuel Bancroft, a Wilmington 

textile mill owner, began collecting 

pre-Raphaelite art in 1890. In 1935, 

his family bequeathed the collection 

and a memorial fund to the museum. 

Over the years, the museum has 

continued to acquire artworks and 

materials that support the collection. 

Curator Margaretta Frederick now 

has responsibility over the 150 

paintings, drawings, photographs, 

illustrated books, and decorative 

objects that make up the Bancroft 

collection. She also oversees an 

extensive outreach program that 

acquaints Delaware residents with 

these important works of art. 

In September 2007, the city of 

Wilmington held a celebration, 

“Return of the Pre-Raphaelites,” 

including a gala and other events. 

The artworks were reinstalled in the 

museum’s new Helen Farr Sloan 

Gallery, a 3,000-square-foot space 

divided into a series of parlors 

covered in replicas of Morris and 

Company wallpaper designs.

“Our desire is to create a beautiful, 

otherworldly place,” Frederick 

said. “I wanted people to step into 

the gallery and feel like they were 

stepping into another age.” 

Dante Gabriel Rossetti’s Lady Lilith, 1866-68 (altered 1872-73), is part of the 

Delaware Art Museum’s pre-Raphaelite collection. 

Photo courtesy of Delaware Art Museum 
40 National Endowment for the Arts

Grant Highlights

Woolly Mammoth 

Theatre Company

washington

Named by the New York Times

as “Washington’s most 

daring theatre company,” 

Woolly Mammoth Theatre 

Company—established in 1980—is 

a national leader in developing and 

producing new plays. In FY 2007, 

Woolly Mammoth received an NEA 

Access to Artistic Excellence grant 

of $25,000 to produce a world 

premiere by playwright Sarah Ruhl. 

Dead Man’s Cell Phone, directed by 

Rebecca Bayla Taichman, opened to 

critical acclaim, and with recordbreaking attendance became the 

highest-grossing show in Woolly 

Mammoth’s history.

Woolly Mammoth Artistic 

Director Howard Shalwitz said, 

“Woolly Mammoth’s mission is to 

produce path-breaking new work by 

emerging American playwrights—

always a risky proposition. The NEA 

grant allowed us to launch a highly 

original new play with an absolutely 

first-class production. It enabled 

us to engage a remarkable team of 

theater artists from Washington and 

New York, which helped to account 

for the great success of the play.As 

a result, Dead Man’s Cell Phone has 

gone on to further productions in 

New York and Chicago, with several 

more currently scheduled across the 

country. So the NEA’s support on 

the front end of this project had, I 

believe, a big payoff for the field. We 

are incredibly grateful.”

Due to the play’s success, Woolly 

Mammoth was able to extend the 

production by ten performances, 

allowing more than 9,000 audience 

members to see the production 

between June 4 and July 14, 2007. 

Following six of the performances, 

Woolly Mammoth held post-show 

discussions with the cast and the 

playwright, who was in residence 

at the theater during the rehearsal 

process. In addition, Woolly 

Mammoth began their run with 

two pay-what-you-can preview 

performances, offered $10 seats to 

students and adults under the age 

of 25, and gave away free tickets as 

part of their education and outreach 

programming—all designed to make 

their productions accessible to the 

broadest audience.

In the spring of 2008, Dead 

Man’s Cell Phone received three 

Helen Hayes Awards, including 

the Charles MacArthur Award for 

Outstanding New Play or Musical—a 

prime example of the success new, 

provocative plays can have with 

the support of a theater like Woolly 

Mammoth. 

Heritage Signature 

Chorale

washington

Established in 2000, the 

Heritage Signature Chorale 

(HSC) performs a broad 

Naomi Jacobson, Polly Noonan, and Sarah Marshall in Woolly Mammoth Theatre’s production of 

Dead Man’s Cell Phone by Sarah Ruhl, directed by Rebecca Bayla Taichman. 

Photo by Stan Barouh
 2007 Annual Report 41

GRANt HiGHliGHtS

repertoire of choral music, but what 

distinguishes this organization is 

its devotion to performing AfricanAmerican music, with a special 

emphasis on the Negro spiritual. 

Made up of more than 65 amateur 

and professional singers, HSC 

performs classical music from all 

cultures and works to make their 

performances accessible to local 

youth with an interest in music.

In June 2006, HSC participated in 

America Sings!, a free performance 

at the Music Center at Strathmore 

that launched the choral component 

of the National Endowment for the 

Arts’ national initiative American 

Masterpieces: Three Centuries of 

Artistic Genius. According to HSC 

Musical Director Stanley Thurston, 

the chorale’s involvement in the 

initiative, designed to acquaint 

Americans with the best of their 

cultural and artistic legacy, inspired 

them to spotlight The Ordering of 

Moses, a rarely performed oratorio 

composed by R. Nathaniel Dett, 

through a performance and 

recording. Dett was an AfricanAmerican composer, pianist, 

and choral director born in 1882, 

who published approximately 

100 compositions of which many, 

including The Ordering of Moses, 

were inspired by African-American 

spirituals.

HSC received an NEA Access to 

Artistic Excellence grant of $10,000 

for this recording and performance. 

The performance is set to occur for 

an audience of approximately 900 

in June 2009 at the National City 

Christian Church in Washington, DC. 

Prior to June, National Public Radio 

will record HSC’s performance of The 

Ordering of Moses, along with other 

selected compositions by AfricanAmerican composers. The recording 

will be distributed by Albany Records 

in time for the performance. In 

addition, musicologist DominqueRené de Lerma will write the album’s 

program notes.

There is only one other known 

recording of The Ordering of Moses, 

and it is an incomplete live radio 

recording of the oratorio’s world 

debut. HSC hopes that their 

recording will increase Dett’s 

profi le as an important AfricanAmerican composer as well as the 

diff erent forms of presentation the 

traditional spiritual can take.

District of Columbia

the Heritage Signature chorale of Washington, Dc, is recording R. Nathaniel Dett’s composition, 

The Ordering of Moses, with the assistance of an NEA grant. 

Photo by Caesar
42 National Endowment for the Arts

GRANt HiGHliGHtS

Aequalis (The 

Core Ensemble)

lAKE WORtH

For more than 20 years 

the three-member Core 

Ensemble—cello, piano, 

and percussion—has introduced 

new American music and musical 

theater to audiences in South 

Florida, as well as throughout 

the United States and abroad, 

through a comprehensive touring 

program. In a range of rural and 

urban settings, the organization 

has used residencies to engage 

people in concerts, musical theater 

presentations, and educational 

activities around a list of topics 

tailored for each individual 

community. In FY 2007 Core 

Ensemble received an NEA 

Challenge America grant of $10,000 

to support the musical theater work, 

A Harvest of Voices. 

The project took place in rural 

Glades County, Florida, home to 

a diverse population of ranching 

families, agricultural workers, 

African Americans, and recent 

Latino immigrants. During the 

community residency, the ensemble 

worked with actor/playwright 

Akin Babatunde to create and 

present what the group described 

as an “evening-length chamber 

music theater work” based on oral 

histories and local lore collected 

from area residents. 

A Harvest of Voices featured 

arrangements of new music 

performed by the ensemble, 

Babatunde, and community 

participants. Residents also were 

Florida

Akin Babatunde and the core Ensemble 

perform a new piece written specifi cally 

for Glades county. 

Photo by Emilio Vazquez
 2007 Annual Report 43

Grant Highlights

invited to help shape the piece 

by giving feedback during open 

rehearsals. The group gave seven 

free performances at schools, 

churches, and the community 

auditorium, benefitting more than 

1,200 people, including students 

and educators in Glades County 

schools and older residents.

Following each performance, 

the ensemble invited audiences to 

participate in talk-back discussions 

moderated by community leaders. 

Core Ensemble also planned 

to record the performances on 

DVD for later distribution to local 

gathering places, including a senior 

center, the Chamber of Commerce, 

churches, and school and public 

libraries. Margot Emery, the 

managing director of the project, 

said of the residency, “Audiences 

came to understand that their own 

history and the history of their 

community are worth examining 

and celebrating.”

Cultural Council of 

Greater Jacksonville 

Jacksonville

S

ince 1997, Jacksonville, 

Florida’s Art in Public 

Places (AIPP) program has 

amassed an impressive collection 

of 23 public art works. According 

to Deputy Director Amy Crane, 

“What was exciting was that, as 

capital projects had a huge boon 

in Jacksonville, the money in the 

public art trust fund grew extremely 

quickly and allowed our public 

art program to have immediate, 

wide visibility.” Comprising 

sculptures, installations, murals, 

and photographs, the collection 

is installed in diverse locations, 

including local library branches, a 

performing arts center, and even 

the local baseball park. Many of the 

projects were made with community 

help, such as Lyrical Light, a 

4,000-pound installation of more 

than 300 individual glass horns 

created by artists Caroline Madden 

and Jonathan Christie with students 

from Jacksonville’s University 

College of Fine Arts Glass Program. 

In FY 2007, the Cultural Council 

of Greater Jacksonville received an 

NEA Access to Artistic Excellence 

grant of $20,000 to support an 

AIPP program brochure, speaker’s 

bureau, and resource kit for 

teachers. The 28-page, full-color 

brochure features images and 

descriptions of each work, along 

with artist biographies, testimonials 

from civic leaders, and a map of 

all of the sites. Also highlighted 

are artworks––installed at area 

hospitals, airports, and other 

locations––that are not part of the 

official program but are well known 

to city residents. The brochures are 

available at Jacksonville’s public 

libraries, tourist development 

council, and Chamber of 

Commerce, as well as at Florida 

welcome centers. They also are 

distributed at community events.

Comprised of AIPP committee 

members and cultural council staff, 

the speaker’s bureau encourages 

public appreciation of the collection 

through presentations to civic 

and community groups, such as 

local branches of the Chamber 

of Commerce. To engage young 

residents in the public art project, 

the cultural council developed two 

resource kits, one targeting students 

in grades K-5 and one targeted to 

students in grades 6-12. Available in 

hard copy as well as online for area 

public, private, and home school 

teachers, the kits include a virtual 

DVD tour of the art work, artist 

information, and detailed lesson 

plans with supplementary materials. 

A brochure on Jacksonville’s Art in 

Public Places program helps identify 

works and their artists and provides a 

map of all the sculpture sites. 

Photo courtesy of Cultural Council of 

Greater Jacksonville
44 National Endowment for the Arts

GRANt HiGHliGHtS

American Jewish 

Committee

AtlANtA

S

even years ago, 1,500 people 

gathered for the fi rst annual 

Atlanta Jewish Film Festival. 

Since then, numbers have grown 

steadily—the 2007 festival brought 

30 fi lms exploring Jewish culture, 

heritage, and history to more than 

9,000 people, becoming one of the 

nation’s largest Jewish fi lm festivals. 

By bringing together hard-tofi nd fi lms and captivating expert 

speakers, the festival reached a 

diverse audience—approximately 

12 percent of festival-goers were 

not Jewish, 17 percent were 

not affi liated with any Jewish 

organization, and 22 percent were 

senior citizens. Films were shown at 

local theaters both downtown and in 

Atlanta’s northern suburbs, with an 

open invitation to the entire Atlanta 

community.

In FY 2007, the American Jewish 

Committee (AJC) received an 

NEA Challenge America grant of 

$10,000 to produce the seventh 

annual festival. In the past, such 

guests as Oscar-nominated actress 

Leslie Ann Warren, stage and 

screen legend Theodore Bikel, 

and actress Jennifer Westfeldt 

participated. By using unusual 

marketing methods, like creating 

their own movie trailers and 

advertising on mainstream cinema 

Web sites, the AJC was able to reach 

a larger audience. They facilitated 

transportation services at senior 

centers to enable older audiences 

to partake, and conducted an 

educational program that reached 

out to younger audience members. 

Every year, the festival connects 

a Jewish private high school with 

an inner-city Atlanta high school 

to teach a Holocaust Education 

Program in conjunction with fi lms 

from the festival.

The 2007 fi lms included features 

such as The Rape of Eruopa, directed 

by Richard Berge, Bonni Cohen, 

and Nicole Newnham, which told 

the story of the systematic theft and 

destruction of European artwork 

by the Nazis during World War II 

and the eff ort to return the works 

to their rightful owners, narrated 

by actress Joan Allen; and shorts 

such as Draft about a pacifi st trying 

to prevent his son from enlisting in 

the Israeli army. As Kenny Blank, 

the festival’s executive director, 

stated, “The heart of our mission 

is to use the power of fi lm to build 

bridges of understanding.”

Georgia

Acclaimed israeli fi lmmaker Amos Gitai (left) and Emory University Film Studies 

chair Matthew Bernstein discussed fi lm selections during the 2007 Atlanta 

Jewish Film Festival. 

Photo by Marcy Levinson
 2007 Annual Report 45

Grant Highlights

Museum of Design Atlanta

 Atlanta

The Beltline is sometimes 

called Atlanta’s Emerald 

Necklace. Comprising 22 

miles of abandoned rail line, the 

Beltline is being converted into 

a trolley line and linear park that 

connects Atlanta’s neighborhoods. 

Who better to design the trolley 

stops and park areas around Greater 

Atlanta than the youth who reside 

there?

The Beltline Project by the 

Museum of Design Atlanta 

(MODA) brings together designers, 

educators, and students to discuss 

community planning and urban 

design. Modeled after the A City 

of Neighborhoods program by 

Cooper-Hewitt, the Smithsonian’s 

National Design Museum, the 

Beltline Project is an ongoing 

educational program that allows 

communicated their ideas to their 

“commissioners”—the Atlanta 

neighborhood associations. 

Through this hands-on method, 

the students explored what it is 

like to be a real city designer, and 

gained knowledge about the areas 

where they live. The final workshop 

was recognized by the Architecture 

+ Design Education Network.

MODA also created an exhibit 

titled Reconstructing Atlanta 

featuring the designs that the 

students created. Said Randy 

Taylor, MODA’s curator of 

education, “The students’ designs 

were catalysts for the entire 

community’s involvement in the 

Beltline.” Students donned the 

mantle of the expert to create 

something very real and involved 

their parents, schools, and 

neighbors in a community-wide 

project that will impact the whole 

area for years to come.

Students role-play as contractors presenting their proposals to clients as part of the Beltline Project 

by the Museum of Design Atlanta. 

Photo by Patricia Kendall

students to become actively involved 

in design issues that directly affect 

their neighborhoods. MODA 

received an NEA Access to Artistic 

Excellence grant of $20,000 to help 

support the Beltline Project.

The students were chosen from 

Atlanta’s school system, including 

Georgia Tech Summer Camp for hgh 

schoolers, Booker T. Washington 

High School, and Grady High 

School. They learned what the 

Beltline design encompasses, 

took tours of the neighborhoods 

where the Beltline will be, and 

reviewed the historical context 

of the communities with Brandie 

Morrison from the Historical 

Planning Commission. The 

students then worked side by 

side with professional architects, 

landscapers, and city planners 

to imagine and construct models 

for proposed trolley stops. In the 

final phase of the project, students 
46 National Endowment for the Arts

GRANt HiGHliGHtS

Kauahea 

WAilUKU

Hula ceremonies are 

all about traditions. 

They were practiced to 

communicate before the Hawaiian 

language was written down. They 

are held to celebrate birth, death, 

graduation, initiation—every aspect 

of life that must be commemorated. 

Every subtle move has a specifi c 

meaning, and, in order to perform 

a dance or ceremony properly, 

you must understand the intricate 

history of the ritual. 

In hula there are many things 

that are included in the ceremony. 

Leis, probably the best known, are 

neckpieces made from beautiful 

fl owers or bird feathers. Kapa is 

the skirt or loincloth piece, which 

is made from organic fi bers soaked 

and beaten until soft and embossed 

with designs. Hau is the cordage, 

which holds these things together, 

and Puniu is the knee drum, 

traditionally made from coconut 

shells and sharkskin. In the city of 

Wailuku, an eff ort was made to keep 

this vital Hawaiian tradition alive 

by teaching its art to a new 

generation. 

In FY 2007, Kauahea produced 

the fi rst ever Na Mea No `eau, a mini 

“Hula university,” according to 

Moani Whittle-Wagner, education 

director. With help from an 

NEA Challenge America grant of 

$10,000, they were able to reach out 

to a group of interested individuals 

who wanted to apprentice with the 

masters of the art form. Students 

attended fall and spring four-day 

intensive workshops, with six 

months worth of “homework” 

in between, studying the various 

traditional arts. 

Traditional kumu hula

(knowledgeable teachers) and 

practitioners of these arts spend 

their entire lives devoted to a craft. 

The students soaked in as much 

about their chosen craft in the 

time they had, with the intention 

of coming back to it, and using 

the techniques in traditional hula 

ceremonies. Said Whittle-Wagner, 

“What others call an art to us is 

a way of living.” She and others 

strive to keep alive traditional 

practices and preserve the ancient 

culture. 

Maui Community 

Arts & Cultural Center

KAHUlUi

Maui Arts and Cultural 

Center (MACC) is the 

only public performance 

venue on the island of Maui. The 

MACC’s commitment to bringing 

Hawaii

Na Mea No `eau students learn how to work with 

natural dyes to create costumes for hula performances. 

Photo courtesy of Kauahea
 2007 Annual Report 47

Grant Highlights

international artists to the island 

provides more than 40,000 people 

with a chance to explore the arts 

outside of traditional Hawaiian 

forms. Over the years, MACC has 

been responsible for hosting artists 

such as Sweet Honey in the Rock, 

Brazilian dancers Grupo Corpo, the 

Shanghai Quartet, and Senegalese 

hip-hop artist Daara J. 

In 2007, MACC received an 

NEA Access to Artistic Excellence 

grant of $40,000 to support 

MACC Presents... This program 

features nine distinct series, 

including Global Rhythms featuring 

international music; Local Voices 

with music, comedy, and spoken 

word from around the islands; 

and a local theater series. In total, 

MACC presents about 59 shows 

during its September to May 

season.

MACC tours productions in rural 

parts of the islands as well as at its 

own venue, giving them art “on 

their terms,” as MACC President 

Karen Fischer said. When MACC 

schedules a performance in a 

community, there are countless 

variables to be considered. There 

are no other theaters in Maui 

County, so most performances 

happen in school cafeterias, gyms, 

or even library lawns. Those in the 

community will sometimes organize 

potluck dinners and fundraisers 

before and after the shows, which 

engages more people. Said Fischer, 

“When you live on an island in the 

middle of the Pacific, you sort of 

forget there’s a whole world out 

there.” 

The people know when an artist 

is in town—whether by seeing 

them on the street or in the local 

diner. The artist and community 

develop close interaction during 

the visits. A visiting dancer from 

Donald Byrd ’s company once said 

that this program was the first time 

that he actually understood why 

arts organizations do outreach 

work. 

Hawaiian singer Amy Hanaiali’i Gilliom (center, in lei) sings as a Baldwin High School student 

performs a hula in a performance supported by the Maui Community Arts & Cultural Center. 

Photo by Art Vento
48 National Endowment for the Arts

GRANt HiGHliGHtS

Boise Art Museum 

BOiSE

“

A very moving dynamic 

work that makes the 

viewer ‘think’ in ways that 

most works do not,” was just one of 

the positive responses from viewers 

who saw an exhibition of new work 

by internationally recognized artist 

Kendall Buster at the Boise Art 

Museum. The museum received an 

NEA Access to Artistic Excellence 

grant of $10,000 in FY 2007 to 

support Buster’s eight-month 

exhibit, New Growth.

Buster created a site-specifi c 

installation in the museum’s 

sculpture court with its 20-foot 

ceilings and large windows to let in 

natural lighting. She refers to her 

work as “biological architecture”—

using organic and geometric shapes 

and “skins” made of fi berglass and 

nylon—which refl ect her love for 

microbiology and the environment. 

The sculptures, made out of welded 

steel armatures and covered in 

white mesh, were arranged in 

sections and suspended from 

the ceiling in interlocking forms 

to play off of each other and the 

architecture of the sculpture court.

The exhibition familiarized 

Idaho audiences with a new kind of 

art and encouraged a high level of 

Idaho

Kendall Buster’s exhibition New Growth at the Boise Art Museum featured large 

sculptures hanging from the ceiling in the sculpture court. 

Photo by Kendall Buster

interaction. Community members 

of all ages enjoyed the exhibition—

staff watched as children lay 

on the fl oor looking up into the 

sculptures while a group of visitors 

in wheelchairs moved under and 

through the sections with bemused 

smiles on their faces.

Seeing all the smiles was 

especially rewarding for Kendall, 

who spent several weeks at the 

museum. She also held an ingallery discussion of her work for 

more than 100 people as part of 

the museum’s ART Talk program 

that enables audiences to interact 

directly with the artist. A Free 

School Tour Program was also held 
 2007 Annual Report 49

Grant Highlights

in which docents led discussions 

with more than 2,300 participants. 

To further the educational 

component, the museum created 

a full-color brochure. Kendall 

assisted in the writing, layout, and 

production of the publication. 

More than 29,000 people viewed 

Kendall’s complex, large-scale 

architectural installation. 

Opera Idaho

Boise

Opera Idaho offers 

mainstage opera 

performances annually 

for Boise region audiences. In FY 

2007, Opera Idaho received an 

NEA Challenge America grant of 

$10,000 to present Jacques Brel is 

Alive and Well and Living in Paris. The 

production, with a cast of two men 

and two women, celebrated more 

than 20 timeless songs of Brel’s in a 

cabaret-like setting. 

The production was taken on the 

road to two locations in Idaho. It 

started in Boise at the Big Easy, a 

rock-concert venue, then traveled 

to the center of Idaho at the 

Tamarack Resort in Cascade. There 

were nine performances, including 

a matinee performance that was 

free for high school students from 

nearby communities. 

Opera Idaho works to foster a 

wider acceptance, appreciation, 

and enjoyment of the arts in young 

people and adults of all social and 

economic backgrounds. Opera 

Idaho achieved this goal through 

the performances of Jacques Brel is 

Alive and Well and Living in Paris in 

nontraditional venues. Audience 

members who would otherwise 

not attend one of Opera Idaho’s 

productions were encouraged 

because of the inviting and familiar 

venues. 

Although younger audiences were 

Opera Idaho put on a performance of Jacques Brel Is Alive and Well and 

Living in Paris in 2007. 

Photo by David Ryan

enticed because of the venue and the 

experimental style of the musical 

revue, older theatergoers were 

attracted by the production’s period 

theme, focusing on the World War 

II era. 

Opera Idaho looked to local 

performers to fill some of the 

roles in Jacques Brel is Alive and 

Well and Living in Paris. Opera 

Idaho partnered with Boise 

State University, and its music 

department chair served as musical 

director of the production. 
50 National Endowment for the Arts

GRANt HiGHliGHtS

Evanston Arts Center

EVANStON

Evanston Arts Center is 

one of Illinois’s largest 

art schools, serving the 

greater Chicago North Shore area 

with hundreds of fi ne arts classes. 

The center also off ers free art 

instruction to special audiences; 

collectors’ education programs 

on contemporary art trends 

and practices; and the Evanston 

& Vicinity Biennial, a juried 

exhibition of contemporary regional 

art. Located on a well-traveled 

thoroughfare adjacent to a public 

beach and the Evanston Lighthouse 

national monument, the center is 

ideally situated to present Sculpture 

on the Grounds, its annual public 

art installation series. Since 1991 

the center has commissioned a 

nationally celebrated artist—often 

a Midwesterner—to create sitespecifi c installations on its front 

lawn. Participating artists have 

included Dennis Kowalski, Micki 

LeMieux, and Herb Parker.

In FY 2007, Evanston Arts Center 

received an NEA Access to Artistic 

Excellence grant of $10,000 to 

support the installation of Bird’s 

Nest, an art and sound installation 

by composer and visual artist Shawn 

Decker, an Evanston resident, and 

Finnish artist Jan-Erik Anderson. 

Bird’s Nest is the seventh sculpture in 

an ongoing collaboration between 

Decker and Anderson that examines 

the architecture of nests built by 

diff erent bird species. Constructed 

of high-grade wood beams and 

piano wires, the completed 

sculpture was approximately 25 feet 

tall and 20 feet in diameter at its 

widest section.

From within Bird’s Nest, visitors 

were able to hear the piano wires, 

which when struck by small, low 

voltage electric motors, generated 

non-repeating sounds derived 

from nature, particularly local 

birdsongs. The sculpture was 

installed in June 2007, remaining 

on view through May 2008. It’s 

estimated that 10,000 people 

viewed the installation. Evanston 

Arts Center Executive Director 

Alan Leder commented, “The 

Bird’s Nest project promoted 

intercultural awareness by 

exposing Illinois residents to a 

form of sculpture developed in 

Northern Europe, a region whose 

contemporary art is not widely 

Illinois

Evanston Arts center’s installation Bird’s Nest was a hit with visiting students. 

Photo by Alan Leder
 2007 Annual Report 51

GRANt HiGHliGHtS

experienced in the United States.”

As a companion to the outdoor 

piece, in October 2007 Decker 

curated a fi ve-week group 

exhibition of sound works in the 

center’s four galleries, which 

featured fi ve local artists. In 

addition, approximately 600 

children and 150 adults attended 

lectures, demonstrations, 

symposiums, and workshops 

related to Bird’s Nest. 

Joffrey Ballet

cHicAGO

Founded in New York in 

1956 by Robert Joff rey and 

Gerald Arpino, the Joff rey 

Ballet began as a touring company 

of six dancers. The company has 

since garnered an international 

reputation, pioneering the use in 

ballet of modern dance techniques 

and commissioning early works by 

noted American choreographers 

such as Alvin Ailey, Mark Morris, 

and Twyla Tharp. The Joff rey Ballet 

is also a leader in reconstructing 

“lost” works from the early 

20th century, including Vaslav 

Nijinsky’s then-controversial 

Le Sacre Du Printemps (1913) and 

George Balanchine’s post-Ballets 

Russe Cotillon (1932). The Joff rey 

currently boasts a repertoire 

of more than 250 ballets by 90 

choreographers. Over the past 50 

years, the company has documented 

this considerable history in an 

archive that now comprises 2,500 

videos of performances, rehearsals, 

workshops, and the choreographic 

process for works by Robert Joff rey, 

George Balanchine, and Agnes 

DeMille, among others.

In FY 2007, the Joff rey Ballet 

received a Save America’s Treasures 

grant of $75,000 to support the 

conservation of 750 of the most 

signifi cant and most endangered 

videos in its archive. While many 

of these videos are endangered 

because of deteriorating recording 

materials, other items are currently 

inaccessible as they were recorded 

using technology that is now 

obsolete. 

Artistic Director Ashley C. 

Wheater said, “With our 2007 Save 

America’s Treasures grant, we are 

able to restore the Joff rey’s video 

archive and preserve a valuable 

piece of America’s 20th-century 

dance history that would otherwise 

be lost.” 

Having such an extensive video 

archive is particularly important 

to the fi eld of dance as, prior to 

the advent of video recording, the 

form’s history was preserved only 

through the memories of dancers, 

choreographers, and production 

artists. Administered by the 

company’s stage management 

department, the project will 

encompass cataloging the entire 

video archive, identifying the 

most at-risk videos, and restoring 

selected videos, including 

producing a preservation master 

copy in a highly stable format. 

Reference copies also will be 

produced in DVD format for use 

by members of the company, 

researchers, and the public. 

Robert Joffrey (left) choreographing 

his signature piece Remembrances, 

the video of which is being preserved 

with the support of a Save America’s 

treasures grant. 

Photo by Herbert Migdoll
52 National Endowment for the Arts

GRANt HiGHliGHtS

Fischoff National Chamber 

Music Association 

NOtRE DAME

J

ust miles from the University 

of Notre Dame in Indiana are 

some of the poorest schools of 

the South Bend School District. At 

least 40 percent of students at these 

schools qualify as “low income.” 

These schools have little money 

for extracurricular programs like 

band, orchestra, and art classes, 

and some of the students have never 

seen a real musical instrument. The 

Fischoff National Chamber Music 

Association set out to change that.

Since 1996, Fischoff has 

integrated an educational outreach 

element into its yearly programming. 

They stage “arts interventions” 

for the schools by giving them the 

chance to incorporate music into 

the school curriculum. To make the 

biggest impact, Fischoff designed 

an early readers program, S.A.M. 

(Stories and Music) I Am. They work 

with teachers to choose a book fi tting 

students’ interests, then compose 

and play music for in-school book 

readings. 

This year’s S.A.M. I Am book 

was Elena’s Serenade, written by 

Campbell Geeslin and illustrated by 

Ana Juan. Elena is a little girl from 

Mexico who dreams of becoming 

a glassblower, and Pam O’Rourke, 

Fischoff education director, thought 

a brass ensemble would be perfect 

to add sound eff ects. With the help 

of an NEA Challenge America grant 

of $10,000, Fischoff was able to 

bring the CINCO Brass Quintet to 

the children. Said O’Rourke, “You 

can’t corral nine-year-olds to go 

anywhere, so we brought the music 

to them.” 

CINCO’s members created 

skits to present Elena’s Serenade

in the schools, crafting pretend 

glassblowing tools with bubbles 

and straws, creating silly noises and 

voices for each of the characters. 

The children loved it, especially 

those from the area’s growing 

Hispanic population, who identifi ed 

with the English and Spanish used 

in the book. “By the end of the day, 

the children would have the story 

memorized,” said O’Rourke.

The artists might have had as 

much fun as the children. They 

had the freedom to create their 

Indiana

ciNcO Brass Quintet’s Jared Bulmer 

shows the tuba to students at St. Vincent’s 

Elementary in Elkhart, indiana, as part 

of the Fischoff National chamber Music 

Association’s educational outreach program. 

Photo courtesy of Fischoff National Chamber 

Music Association
 2007 Annual Report 53

GRANt HiGHliGHtS

own program for the kids, and 

according to O’Rourke, dressing up 

and putting on a show was almost 

as rewarding as seeing the students’ 

eyes light up with their fi rst live 

music experience.

Latvian Song and

Dance Festival 

iNDiANAPOliS

I

f there is one thing most 

Latvians love to do, it is sing. 

Many love to dance, too. At 

the 12th U.S. Latvian Song and 

Dance Festival, about 8,000 

people of Latvian descent trekked 

to Indianapolis from all over 

the country to sing, dance, and 

celebrate the rich cultural heritage 

of this Baltic country. In FY 2007, 

the NEA supported the Latvian Song 

and Dance Festival with an NEA 

Access to Artistic Excellence grant 

of $10,000. 

Since the 1800s, the festivals 

were held in Latvia intermittently 

to bring together the song and 

dance that is woven into their folk 

heritage. According to Ron Miller, 

chairman of the Indianapolis 

festival, Latvia has more traditional 

folk songs than any other culture in 

the world. The celebrations served 

as a chance to preserve traditions in 

dance, song, and crafts.

Latvian song and dance involves 

huge groups of people. As Miller 

explained, the festivals are similar 

to a Greek, Irish, or Italian cultural 

festival, but on a much larger 

scale. The city is chosen through 

a bidding process, somewhat like 

the Olympics. Restaurants hang 

fl ags outside and play Latvian music 

inside to welcome the infl ux of 

visitors to their city. Said Miller, 

“When you walk downtown during 

the festival, instead of English, 

you hear Latvian spoken all over 

the streets.” While there are only 

approximately a thousand Latvians 

residing in Indianapolis itself, 

people travelled from Los Angeles, 

New York, Washington, DC, Canada, 

and Australia to perform and join in 

the festivities.

During the Soviet occupation after 

World War II, many Latvians fl ed 

to the United States. During that 

period, it was especially important to 

Latvians to celebrate and maintain 

the culture, keeping alive the hope 

that Latvia might one day become a 

free country again. Today Latvia is 

an independent country, standing 

as a member of NATO and the 

European Union. It is still important 

to Latvians in America to preserve 

their culture to both remember and 

celebrate their past. 

ligo, a dance ensemble from Riga, latvia, performs at the 2007 latvian Song and Dance Festival. 

Photo by Gunvids Jansons
54 National Endowment for the Arts

GRANt HiGHliGHtS

Red Cedar Chamber Music

MARiON

“

Chamber music 

should be just like 

this—intimate, bonding 

and conversational,” said the The 

American Record Guide describing 

Red Cedar Chamber Music (RCCM), 

a roving concert series in rural 

Iowa. Home-cooked meals often 

precede RCCM’s performances 

in community centers, libraries, 

churches, schools, and old opera 

houses. In FY 2007, the NEA 

awarded RCCM an NEA Access to 

Artistic Excellence grant of $7,500 

to support Reaching Out: Rural 

Outreach Concerts, a program that 

presented eight concerts in tiny 

Iowa towns. 

RCCM’s core performers, 

fl utist Jan Boland and guitarist 

John Dowdall, founded the 

series in 1997. In addition to the 

rural outreach concerts, the duo 

organizes a summer festival at 

Cornell College in Mount Vernon, 

Iowa, and concerts in Cedar Rapids 

and Iowa City. Their concerts also 

are broadcast occasionally on Iowa 

Public Radio.

During the 2007-08 season, Red 

Cedar off ered two diff erent Rural 

Outreach programs. In September, 

the ensemble—Boland, Dowland, 

plus violinist Tim Shiu, violist 

David Miller, and cellist Loretta O. 

Sullivan—traveled to a trio of towns 

in eastern Iowa: Tipton, Solon, 

and Clermont. They called the 

series “One European White Guy,” 

in homage to Gaspard Kummer, 

the obscure 19th-century German 

composer featured on the program. 

In the spring, Boland and Dowland 

headed north and east as a duo, 

playing the music of contemporary 

American composer Andrew 

Earle Simpson in Delhi, Fayette, 

Marengo, Springville, and Vinton.

No venue charged an 

admission of more than $10. Most 

performances were free. Red Cedar 

seeks out small towns not only to 

bring classical music to rural areas, 

but for the chance to play venues 

that have historically brought 

communities together. In Solon, 

a town of just 1,600 people, the 

ensemble performed at Saints Peter 

and Paul Chapel, a former Catholic 

church with strong ties to the local 

Czech community. The 700 people 

who live in Clermont are immensely 

proud of their restored opera house, 

a 1910 building that for years served 

as the local auto garage. Now the 

town welcomes back the Red Cedar 

musicians year after year. 

Iowa

the Red cedar trio perform Rural Outreach 

concerts at the Saints Peter and Paul 

chapel in the rural czech community near 

Solon, iowa. 

Photo by Leonard Strutmann
 2007 Annual Report 55

Grant Highlights

Dubuque Symphony 

Orchestra 

Dubuque

I

t has been 28 years since the 

Iowa Hawkeyes made the NCAA 

Final Four, the semifinals of the 

basketball championships known 

as March Madness. In eastern Iowa, 

however, the 2007-08 season will 

be remembered as the year the 

Dubuque Symphony scored with 

Classical Madness. 

The Dubuque Symphony 

Orchestra received an NEA Access 

to Artistic Excellence grant of 

$10,000 in FY 2007 to support The 

Final Four project, a free 50thanniversary “audience choice” 

concert inspired by the NCAA Final 

Four. At the start of the season, 

the symphony drafted a bracket 

listing 64 classical works. Instead of 

dividing the works geographically, 

as the tournament teams are, the 

Music director William Intrilagator conducts the Dubuque Symphony Orchestra’s free Classical Madness concert.

Photo by Marie Fry and Kristin Noethe

orchestra’s development director, 

noticed that an American theme 

emerged. “It was interesting how 

the pieces all tied together, but 

not intentionally,” Tucker said. 

In the overture, listeners heard 

the music used as the Lone Ranger

theme, Rhapsody in Blue could be 

called the quintessential American 

piano concerto, and the New World

symphony was partially inspired 

by Dvorák’s travels in Iowa. 

Grofé’s suite was the only pick that 

surprised Tucker. As the field was 

winnowed down, the musicians kept 

rooting for Grand Canyon to make 

the Final Four. 

On Sept. 13 and 14,2008, nearly 

1,400 residents of tri-state area 

filled the Four Flags Theater, a 

historic opera house in downtown 

Dubuque. The free tickets enticed a 

number of newcomers to come hear 

the symphony, including families 

with children.

v

musical selections were parsed 

according to genre: overture, 

concerto, symphony, and a wild card 

for suites. 

Music director William 

Intriligator threw out the Classical 

Madness jump ball, literally, in 

October 2007. At that seasonopening concert, the conductor 

jogged onstage wearing a tuxedo 

jacket and sweatpants, passed a 

basketball into the box seats, and 

urged concertgoers to get voting. 

By season’s end, local residents had 

cast 9,000 ballots. Brackets were 

available at concerts, in the Dubuque 

Telegraph Herald, and on a special 

Classical Madness Web site. 

In the end, the Final Four pieces 

were: Gioachino Rossini’s William 

Tell Overture, George Gershwin’s 

Rhapsody in Blue, Antonín Dvorák’s 

Symphony No. 9 From the New 

World, and Ferde Grofé’s Grand 

Canyon Suite. Jean Tucker, the 

v
56 National Endowment for the Arts

GRANt HiGHliGHtS

Ballet Wichita

WicHitA

Kansas’s oldest and largest 

ballet company, Ballet 

Wichita has worked for 

more than 30 years to provide 

training for dancers, both through 

classes and by hosting major dance 

companies to present master 

classes and perform for the Wichita 

community. Ballet Wichita performs 

two or three times a year, and works 

to make its performances accessible 

through family-friendly events, 

free concerts, in-school residency 

programs, and tours to areas of 

Kansas that are underserved in the 

arts.

In FY 2007, Ballet Wichita 

received an NEA Challenge 

America grant of $10,000 to bring 

the internationally touring dance 

company Momix to Wichita, the 

company’s fi rst visit to this city. 

On October 13, 2007, Momix held 

a free master class at Wichita State 

University for 36 Ballet Wichita 

members and other local dance 

students. The class focused on the 

dance company’s unique style—a 

combination of athleticism and 

acrobatics with traditional ballet, 

described by The Wichita Eagle

as creating “alternate realities of 

multi-limbed creatures, slithering 

and pulsing propulsion and bodies 

that appear to pull apart or take 

fl ight.” 

Momix’s residency also included 

in-school programs for more than 

50 third- and fi fth-graders at a 

Wichita elementary school and 

more than 250 high school students. 

At each school they provided dance 

demonstrations and taught the 

students some basic poses.

Momix concluded its residency 

with a public performance at 

Wichita’s Century II Performing 

Arts & Convention Center on 

October 13, 2008. More than 750 

people attended the performance, 

titled Best of Momix. Since a public 

school in-service day prevented 

many students from being involved 

in Momix’s residency programs, 

Ballet Wichita arranged for students 

to receive vouchers to attend the 

performance.

By bringing renowned dance 

companies such as Momix to 

Wichita, Ballet Wichita introduces 

audiences to new and inventive 

dance performances, as well as 

exceptional dance companies. Ballet 

Wichita Executive Director Barbara 

Chamberlin describes the NEA’s 

support as vital to giving Ballet 

Wichita the means to bring such 

prestigious dance companies to 

Wichita. She said, “We want people 

to grow up being interested in 

dance.” By bringing such 

exciting and innovative companies 

to town, interest in the art form 

grows. 

Kansas

Momix performs Dreamcatcher 

as part of Best of Momix, 

presented by Ballet Wichita on 

October 13, 2008. 

Photo by Don Perdue
 2007 Annual Report 57

GRANt HiGHliGHtS

University of Kansas 

Center for Research 

lAWRENcE

The Lied Center in Lawrence, 

Kansas, presents dance 

performances that off er a 

unique artistic vision and represent 

various dance cultures from 

around the world. In FY 2007, 

the University of Kansas Center 

for Research received an NEA 

Access to Artistic Excellence grant 

of $25,000 for the Lied Center to 

host residencies with the Cloud 

Gate Dance Theatre of Taiwan; 

Pilobolus Dance Theater; and a 

joint presentation by Urban Bush 

Women, based in Brooklyn, New 

York, and Compagnie JANT-BI, 

based in Senegal. 

Each residency included 

programs highlighting each 

company’s particular dance style. 

Pilobolus Dance Theater, which 

performed on March 12, 2008, 

demonstrated its dance aesthetic 

through master classes with a 

local high school dance class 

and University of Kansas dance 

students.

Cloud Gate Dance Theatre of 

Taiwan’s performance of Wild 

Cursive was inspired by Chinese 

calligraphy. In conjunction with 

Cloud Gate’s performance on 

October 16, 2007, the Lied Center 

organized calligraphy workshops 

for adults and children and worked 

with the university’s East Asian 

Study Center to arrange for a 

pre-performance speaker to give 

audience members background on 

Taiwan.

Urban Bush Women, a dance 

company made up of seven women 

who use cultural expression as 

a catalyst for social change, and 

Compagnie JANT-BI, a dance 

company made up of seven men who 

combine traditional West African 

dance with elements of classical 

ballet and Western modern dance, 

performed The Scales of Memory

together on March 26, 2008. Both 

companies visited students at a local 

juvenile detention center as part of 

their residency. The artists provided 

dance demonstrations and also 

spoke with the students, both about 

their own journeys to becoming 

artists and how important dance is 

to their lives.

With attendance at these 

performances and residency 

projects totaling more than 23,000, 

Lied Center has been successful 

at using dance to encourage more 

people to explore diff erent cultures.

the all-female dance troupe Urban 

Bush Women and the all-male troupe 

compagnie JANt-Bi collaborated for a 

dance project titled The Scales of Memory, 

which they performed at the lied center. 

Photo courtesy of the Lied Center of Kansas
58 National Endowment for the Arts

GRANt HiGHliGHtS

Sarabande Books

 lOUiSVillE

I

n 16th-century Spain, poets 

were often inspired by 

the sarabande, a rhythmic 

and seductive dance usually 

accompanied by guitar and 

castanets, referenced in the 

writings of Cervantes and Lope de 

Vega. In 21st-century America, 

Sarabande Books inspires writers to 

produce lasting works of literature 

that will tantalize readers. This 

small literary press—based in 

Louisville, Kentucky, and founded 

in 1996—has published more than 

100 collections of poetry, novels, 

anthologies, and book-length 

essays. In 2007, Sarabande received 

an NEA Access to Artistic Excellence 

grant of $20,000 to publish 

and market four new titles in its 

extensive catalog. 

Sarah Gorham, president and 

co-founder of the press, chose 

books that refl ect the breadth of 

Sarabande’s publications. The 

Memory Palace of Isabella Stewart 

Gardner, by Patricia Vigderman, is a 

unique work of creative nonfi ction 

that traces the history of Boston’s 

art museum through the eyes of its 

founder. “The book is a meditation 

on Gardner’s eccentric museum 

that mixes biography, memoir, 

philosophy, and even a little bit of 

the detective story,” Gorham said.

The other books are three 

very diff erent volumes of poetry. 

Tarumba, translated by Philip 

Levine, brings back into print an 

English edition of verse by the 

late Mexican poet Jamie Sabines. 

Sarabande also published the latest 

volume of poetry by established 

American formalist Mark Jarman. 

In this collection, Epistles, Jarman 

reimagines letters of Saint Paul as 

prose poems, removing the doctrine 

and dogma but preserving the 

apostle’s exhortations regarding 

community, love, and eternity. 

The sophomore collection of Cate 

Marvin, titled Fragment of the Head of 

a Queen, rounded out the trio. 

As publicity is crucial for a small 

press like Sarabande, Gorham 

channeled a portion of the NEA 

grant toward promoting the books 

and three living authors. Many 

museums have begun selling 

Memory Palace in their gift shops, 

while religious bookstores are 

carrying Epistles. Both are new 

markets for Sarabande. Tarumba

and Fragment of the Head of a Queen

both received positive reviews in 

newspapers and literary journals. 

Kentucky Shakespeare 

Festival 

lOUiSVillE

I

n Louisville, Kentucky, May 

weekends are ideal for sipping 

mint juleps at Churchhill 

Downs. June weekends, by turn, are 

perfect for picnics and Shakespeare 

in the Park. Since 1960, the 

Kentucky Shakespeare Festival has 

been off ering free performances 

at the amphitheater in Louisville’s 

Central Park, an urban oasis 

designed by Frederick Law Olmsted 

in 1904. 

Kentucky Shakespeare holds 

Kentucky

With NEA support, 

Sarabande Books 

produced books by 

Patricia Vigderman, 

Mark Jarman, Jamie 

Sabines, and cate 

Marvin in 2007. 

Images courtesy of 

Sarabande Books 
 2007 Annual Report 59

GRANt HiGHliGHtS

the record for the longest history 

of free outdoor Shakespeare 

performances in the county—47 

years. But the company is never 

content with simply achieving a 

milestone. Curt Tofteland, artistic 

director of the festival, innovates 

whenever funding allows. In 2007, 

the festival received an NEA Access 

to Artistic Excellence grant of 

$10,000 to provide shadow-signed 

performances of Shakespeare’s 

Measure for Measure and The Taming 

of the Shrew. 

In a shadow-signed performance, 

skilled sign language interpreters 

are onstage, in costume, following 

the major characters—as if their 

shadow—performing along with 

them in American Sign Language. 

The interpreters, skilled in acting 

as well as interpreting, are blocked 

into the scenes and under the lights 

to allow the audience to see the 

signing. The resulting Kentucky 

Shakespeare productions not 

only entertained the state’s deaf 

community, they provided hearing 

audiences with a fresh perspective 

on these classic comedies. More 

than 1,400 people attended the four 

shadow-signed performances in 

2007.

Tofteland has directed more 

than 50 Shakespearean plays over 

the course of his career. Adding 

shadow-signing to a play he’s 

already staged provided “a chance to 

reenter a text,” he said. The festival 

employed two or three interpreters 

for each show, so each signer served 

as a second voice for more than 

one character. As a director, he had 

to block two versions—one with 

shadow-signers, one without—and 

as a result, he ended up with two 

diff erent plays. “We’ve had people 

come to see a show twice to see the 

diff erence,” Tofteland said. 

If he believes anything about 

Shakespeare, it’s that anyone 

can appreciate his plays. And 

by providing the Louisville deaf 

community a new way of seeing the 

works, Kentucky Shakespeare is 

cultivating a new audience for the 

Bard. 

chuck Daube, center, signs for Duke Vincentio (James thorp) and his deputy Angelo (Jonathan Reis) in Kentucky 

Shakespeare Festival’s 2007 production of Measure for Measure. 

Photo by Holly Johnson
60 National Endowment for the Arts

GRANt HiGHliGHtS

Swine Palace Productions

BAtON ROUGE

When Thai researcher 

Krisana Kraisintu 

began working on new 

medicine to fi ght HIV/AIDS in the 

1990s, she didn’t expect that a play 

would be written about her—she 

was too busy just struggling with 

politicians and pharmaceutical 

companies. But her success in 

Thailand in developing a new, 

cheap antiretroviral drug for 

those suff ering from AIDS led to 

playwright Ping Chong working 

with biochemist Vince LiCata on 

a play about Kraisintu called 

Cocktail. 

The play was produced by Swine 

Palace Productions, a professional 

theater company in Baton Rouge, 

with support from an NEA Access 

to Artistic Excellence grant of 

$15,000. In addition to co-writing 

the play, Chong also directed the 

performance, which ran from 

April 18 through May 6, 2007, at 

the Reilly Theatre on the Louisiana 

State University (LSU) campus. The 

18 performances were attended by 

approximately 3,000 people, and a 

sold-out student matinee included 

four schools from the greater Baton 

Rouge area. 

LiCata, an LSU associate 

professor of biological sciences 

in addition to being a playwright, 

approached Chong about doing a 

science play; one of the ideas he 

pitched was a play about Kraisintu, 

to which Chong immediately 

agreed. “This is an inspiring story 

about how a single individual can 

make a diff erence in the world,” 

Chong told Baton Rouge newspaper 

The Advocate. The title of the play 

comes from the slang for the pill 

regimen that most HIV/AIDS 

patients take, which Kraisintu spent 

16-hour days developing because 

the price of American drugs were 

too high for most Thai people to pay. 

During the production of the 

play, Kraisintu was featured in the 

LSU Chancellor’s Distinguished 

Lecture Series and presented a talk 

to a standing-room-only crowd at 

the Reilly Theatre, and participated 

in post-performance talks with 

audiences of the play. 

Louisiana

Mia Katigbak (right) and Mark Jaynes in Swine Palace’s production of 

Cocktail by Ping chong and Vince licata. 

Photo by Wes Kroninger
 2007 Annual Report 61

Grant Highlights

Louisiana Folk Roots

Lafayette

Renowned Cajun fiddler 

Dewey Balfa topped the list 

of NEA National Heritage 

Fellowships in 1982. His influence 

on the musical culture of Louisiana 

is immense, so holding an annual 

event in his name to celebrate the 

state’s Cajun and Creole traditions 

seems the perfect way to honor 

Balfa’s lifelong commitment to the 

music central to his cultural heritage 

and identity.

The Dewey Balfa Cajun and 

Creole Heritage Week is presented 

annually by Louisiana Folk Roots, 

a Lafayette-based organization 

dedicated to the preservation of 

the state’s folk culture. The 2007 

event was supported by an NEA 

Access to Artistic Excellence grant 

of $25,000.

The Heritage Week was created 

by Christine Balfa Powell, founder 

of Louisiana Folk Roots and 

daughter of Dewey Balfa, to share 

her father’s passion for the Cajun 

and Creole cultures. The week-long 

event includes intensive classes, 

workshops, presentations by master 

artists, band labs, and jam sessions 

attended by more than 100 fulltime participants from 23 states and 

six foreign countries. In addition, 

more than 2,000 people from local 

communities attended nightly 

performances in the dance tent. 

The event included not just music 

but storytelling, foods, and crafts, 

providing a complete immersion in 

this important aspect of America’s 

living cultural heritage.

Among the musical instructors 

were Dirk Powell, widely regarded 

as one of the finest traditional 

Cajun-style musicians; Creole 

accordionist, fiddler, and 

bandleader Jeffery Broussard; and 

legendary Cajun musicians and 

songwriters Hadley Castille and 

NEA National Heritage Fellow D.L. 

Menard. Performers at the hugely 

popular nightly dances included 

Steve Riley (who played in Balfa’s 

band in the 1980s) and the Mamou 

Playboys, Nathan and the Zydeco 

Cha Chas, and the Pine Leaf Boys. 

Steve Riley and the Mamou 

Playboys gets the audience 

dancing at a 2007 Dewey 

Balfa Cajun and Creole 

Heritage Week concert. 

Photos by David Simpson
62 National Endowment for the Arts

Grant Highlights

Figures of Speech Theatre 

Freeport

Each year, Figures of Speech 

Theatre (FST) tours Maine 

schools, bringing their 

award-winning live theater and 

innovative teaching programs to 

students in grades K-8. Founded 

in 1982, FST’s performances 

emphasize myth and transformation 

through actors, puppets, masks, 

and movement. The company has 

performed internationally but 

in recent years they have focused 

on in-school arts enrichment 

programs in Maine. 

In FY 2007, Figures of Speech 

Theatre received an NEA Learning 

in the Arts grant of $18,000 for 

their in-school performance and 

residency program, which helps 

schools to meet the state learning 

standards. Between October 2007 

and May 2008, FST visited 15 Maine 

elementary and middle schools, 

providing performances in five of 

the schools, teaching programs in 

five schools, and the full program 

in five other schools, based on the 

schools’ scheduling and resources. 

FST’s school performances 

range from the myth of Cupid and 

Psyche to Far East! Tales from China 

and Japan. The in-school teaching 

programs are based around Chinese 

shadow puppetry, with activities 

tailored for the grade level. At 

each school, FST worked with four 

classrooms for five hours each. 

The older students wrote their own 

stories to perform using pre-made 

puppets, while younger students 

made their own puppets and 

performed a story provided. 

Teachers also benefit from the 

in-school residency as they see 

how puppets can be incorporated 

into their teaching and the positive 

effects it has on the students’ abilities 

to work in groups and problem solve; 

they even become less self-conscious 

through the act of using a puppet to 

act out their ideas.

Figures of Speech feels it is 

important for students to gain the 

full experience of both seeing a 

professional FST production and 

participating in their teaching 

programs. Since many schools 

cannot afford the time and 

expense of a full production, FST 

is developing a new smaller-scale 

performance piece featuring a 

collection of Indonesian shadow 

puppets. FST hopes it will 

encourage more schools to bring 

them in for the full package, 

allowing more students to 

experience live theater, create their 

own works, and perform for their 

peers.

Opera House Arts

Stonington

A relatively new organization, 

Opera House Arts of 

Stonington, Maine, was 

incorporated in 1999 and strives 

to commission new work that 

supports local artists. Produced 

in collaboration with Island 

Freeport High School student Kate Breau working the puppet character Danaë in 

Figures of Speech Theatre’s production of Perseus. 

Photo by Tim Greenway
 2007 Annual Report 63

GRANt HiGHliGHtS

Heritage Trust, Quarryography, an 

improvisational dance presentation, 

was inspired by Maine’s historic 

Settlement Granite Quarry preserve 

and developed by Maine artists 

Alison Chase and Mia Kanazawa, 

who created the puppets for the 

presentation. The production also 

featured original steel pan music by 

Maine resident Nigel Chase and his 

band Rock ’n Steel. 

Quarryography ran for four 

performances between August 10-

12, 2007, and attracted an audience 

of more than 1,700 from the local 

community and New England 

region, as well as summer tourists.

Quarryography highlights the 

quarry’s unique cultural history 

Maine

Professional dancers (from left, Emily Kent, Jessica Bendig, and Breanna Gribble) swing joyously from local 

excavator operator Rick Weed’s bucket in Quarryography.

Photo by Carolyn Caldwell, courtesy of Opera House Arts

by creating activity in a space that 

for a number of years was the 

industrial center of the area, but is 

currently not in use. The production 

highlights the need to care for such 

abandoned spaces.

Chase and Kanazawa worked on 

the piece over a two-year period 

and led a series of workshops on 

improvisational dance in order 

to increase community interest 

in the project, resulting in a 

dance ensemble that included 53 

professional and pre-professional 

dancers and members of the 

community of all ages. 

The project also involved 

one community member in an 

unconventional way, as a local 

excavator operator used his giant 

excavator to bring to life a central 

character of the story, a 25-foot 

tall puppet designed to look like 

he’s made out of rusted cable. 

Professional dancers also hung 

from specially designed rigging on 

the excavator’s shovel.

Alison Chase said, “The 

community element is the heart of 

Quarryography. The volunteers who 

made up the Rock ’n Steel Band and 

the community component of the 

dance company, and the volunteers 

who maintained the space and 

helped manage the crowd of 

spectators—their energy fi lled this 

magnifi cent, wide open space and 

helped the story sing.”
64 National Endowment for the Arts

GRANt HiGHliGHtS

Prince Theatre Foundation

cHEStERtOWN

S

ince its incorporation in 

2002, Chestertown’s historic 

Prince Theatre has become 

a dynamic arts hub for rural Kent 

County. With an annual summer 

children’s theater camp, a monthly 

open stage night for local musicians, 

and productions ranging from 

Tony Award-winning plays to newly 

commissioned material, Prince 

Theatre is working to present 

innovative works of theater and 

musical theater and broaden its 

outreach in the community.

In 2006, Prince Theatre 

commissioned and co-produced 

a piece by jazz musician and Kent 

County native Marlon Saunders. 

Workin’ on a Building: Compositions 

of Black Life on Maryland’s 

Eastern Shore is a multimedia jazz 

presentation that chronicles eight 

generations of Saunders’s ancestors 

in Kent County. The production 

features photos of the family lining 

the walls of the entrance to the 

theater, a short documentary on 

the history of the Walker family, 

and the central jazz performance 

piece by Saunders and his band 

Mood Control. 

After the production’s February 

2006 premiere, Prince Theatre 

worked on an arts education 

component to the production. In FY 

2007, the theater received an NEA 

Challenge America grant of $10,000 

for two performances designed 

to reach the area’s public school 

students. 

On April 25 and 26, 2007, 

Prince Theatre held free matinee 

performances and provided free 

transportation for students from 

Kent County High School and two 

local middle schools. Prior to the 

performances, students received 

a study guide providing historical 

context for the piece, and each 

performance featured a talk-back 

with Marlon Saunders and the 

other eight musicians. By bringing 

the students to a performance that 

highlights the achievements of 

local African Americans, Prince 

Theatre saw an opportunity to use 

art to open up a dialogue among 

the students about race relations 

in the community. More than 400 

students saw Workin’ on a Building.

Prince Theatre Executive Director 

John Schratwieser describes the 

student matinees as an important 

fi rst step in partnering with Kent 

County’s public schools to create 

arts education programming. Since 

the performances, Prince Theatre 

has established in-school drama 

classes for middle school students, 

who otherwise have very limited 

arts education.

American Visionary 

Art Museum

BAltiMORE

The American Visionary Art 

Museum (AVAM) isn’t your 

typical gallery. Designated 

by Congress as America’s national 

museum, repository, and education 

center for the best in original, selftaught artistry—often known as 

“outsider art”—AVAM celebrates 

works created by those without 

formal art training or schooling 

Maryland

Marlon Saunders (fourth from 

right) and his band Mood control 

after a performance of Workin’ on 

a Building: Compositions of Black 

Life on Maryland’s Eastern Shore 

at the Prince theatre. 

Photo by Leslie Raimond
 2007 Annual Report 65

Grant Highlights

a joint lecture series that featured 

experts in medical science, physics, 

metaphysics, religion, art, and 

visionary experience. AVAM 

received an NEA Access to Artistic 

Excellence grant of $30,000 in 

support of Body and Soul, the series 

of five lectures held between April 

21-June 18, 2008.

The series used both artistic 

and scientific viewpoints to 

look for evidence of spirit. 

Speakers included artists from 

AVAM’s exhibition, such as 

Andrew Newberg of the Center 

for Spirituality and the Mind at 

the University of Pennsylvania, 

who contributed a series of brain 

scans of people at the height of 

meditation, and Julia Butterfly Hill, 

who donated her drawings and 

writings from the 738 days she spent 

living in a California Redwood tree.

Many of the city’s medical 

students were drawn to the series 

and speakers such as Patch Adams, 

whose work focuses on healthcare 

based on compassion and 

friendship, and Georgia Dunston 

of the Howard University School 

of Medicine, who spoke with Liz 

Lerman, choreographer of Ferocious 

Beauty: Genome, about the scientific 

results of positive thinking.

In a city largely devoted to 

innovation and medical research, 

Body and Soul attracted a diverse 

audience of 1,200, including medical 

professionals and artists brought 

together to explore the idea of faith.

Transfiguration by Alex Grey, part of American 

Visionary Art Museum’s All Faiths Beautiful: 

From Atheism to Zoroastrianism, Respecting 

Diversity of Belief exhibition. 

Photo courtesy of American Visionary Art Museum

Artist Alex Grey in discussion with American 

Visionary Art Museum Director Rebecca 

Hoffberger.

Photo courtesy of American Visionary Art Museum

in a particular artistic tradition. 

Instead, these artists are driven to 

the creative act from a unique and 

innate vision. Opened in 1995, 

AVAM has more than 60,000 

visitors annually.

Each year, AVAM presents a 

curated exhibition devoted to a 

theme. From October 6, 2007, 

through August 31, 2008, AVAM 

held All Faiths Beautiful: From 

Atheism to Zoroastrianism, Respecting 

Diversity of Belief, an exhibition 

exploring religious and spiritual 

belief and disbelief. This coincided 

with a traveling exhibition, Body 

Worlds: The Anatomical Exhibition of 

Real Human Bodies at the Maryland 

Science Center, AVAM’s neighbor. 

The two organizations developed 
66 National Endowment for the Arts

GRANt HiGHliGHtS

Jacob’s Pillow 

Dance Festival

BEcKEt

A national historic 

landmark, Jacob’s 

Pillow Dance Festival 

supports the creation of new 

work, introduces world artists to 

U.S. audiences, and develops an 

audience for dance, particularly 

younger audiences. Jacob’s Pillow 

also hosts a professional dance 

school, creative development 

residencies, and arts administration 

and technical theater internships. 

Its 163-acre facility located in 

rural Massachusetts comprises a 

variety of spaces, including three 

theaters, galleries, dance studios, 

and lodging and dining facilities. 

Founded in 1933 by legendary 

dancer, choreographer, and teacher 

Ted Shawn, Jacob’s Pillow has been 

instrumental in launching the 

careers of dance legends Martha 

Graham, Alvin Ailey, and Mark 

Morris, among others.

Jacob’s Pillow received an NEA 

Access to Artistic Excellence grant 

of $70,000 to present its 75thanniversary festival, a ten-week 

celebration featuring 44 dance 

companies from ten diff erent 

countries spanning four continents. 

Describing the 2007 festival, the 

Hartford Courant raved, “Being at 

Jacob’s Pillow is as close to dance 

heaven as one can get.” Featuring 

more than 500 individual artists, 

the program boasted four U.S. 

company debuts, ten world 

premieres, and 12 American 

premieres. 

NEA helped to support 

performances and week-long 

residencies by Denmark’s Royal 

Danish Ballet, London’s Henri 

Oguike Dance Company, the 

Nederlands Dans Theater II, 

Australia’s Chunky Move, and 

New York’s Big Dance Theater. 

Works varied from traditional 

ballet from the Royal Danish 

Ballet to Chunky Move’s multimedia 

work that combined video, text, 

and modern dance. 

The 2007 festival also included 

creative development residencies 

by the Wally Cardona Quartet 

and by Coleman Lemieux & 

Compagnie, which used Jacob’s 

Pillow’s extensive archives to 

research a piece by Shawn that was 

then restaged using the children of 

company members. Jacob’s Pillow 

worked with the resident companies 

to present approximately 200 free 

events, including master classes, 

open rehearsals, panel discussions, 

interviews, pre- and postperformance talks, and an outdoor 

performance series. To attract new 

and younger audiences, the festival 

included fi ve youth matinees. 

Ultimately, more than 86,000 

individuals benefi ted from festival 

performances and activities. 

Massachusetts

Nederlands Dans theater ii 

performing at the 2007 Jacob’s 

Pillow Dance Festival.

Photo by Maxwell Citizen Kepler
 2007 Annual Report 67

Grant Highlights

Northeast Document 

Conservation Center

Andover

I

n the early 1970s New 

England’s historical societies, 

college and university libraries, 

public libraries, and town and 

state archives all suffered from the 

same problem—the documents and 

artifacts in their collections were in 

growing need of conservation. In 

1973, in answer to this problem, the 

six state libraries in New England 

created a shared conservation 

facility, the Northeast Document 

Conservation Center (NEDCC). 

Since then, NEDCC has grown 

into one of the largest nonprofit, 

regional conservation centers in the 

United States. 

With its reputation as one of the 

premier centers for handling difficult 

conservation challenges, NEDCC 

shares its conservation knowledge 

though a competitive internship 

program. In addition to assisting 

in specific conservation projects, 

the interns also work with NEDCC’s 

field office, conducting surveys and 

providing outreach on preservation 

and conservation issues.

In FY 2007, the NEDCC received 

an NEA Access to Artistic Excellence 

grant of $25,000 to support an 

internship for a paper conservator. 

Between July 2007-July 2008, 

Jessica Henze, a graduate of the 

bookbinding program at Boston’s 

North Bennet Street School, 

trained at NEDCC, learning how 

to determine the appropriate 

treatment for a range of materials, 

including architectural drawings, 

early manuscript documents, 

scrapbooks, and archival materials. 

For three weeks, NEDCC interns 

have the freedom to explore their 

individual interests, allowing 

them to travel and conduct their 

own research, or take a specialized 

workshop. Henze visited 

conservation labs in Venice and 

also attended a week-long workshop 

at Centro del Bel Libro in Ascona, 

Switzerland, where she learned to 

construct a medieval wooden 

board binding. 

During her time at the NEDCC, 

Henze conserved two scrapbooks 

documenting the construction 

of the Brooklyn Bridge, artifacts 

recovered from the Titanic, and a 

sketchbook of Robert S. Peabody 

from 1867. At the conclusion of 

her internship, Henze accepted 

a full-time position in the book 

conservation lab at NEDCC, just 

one of the options open to graduates 

of NEDCC’s internship program. 

Other graduates have gone on to 

work in museums and libraries, 

or have started a private practice, 

confident in their skills and 

their ability to tackle a variety of 

conservation challenges due to their 

experience at NEDCC.

Jessica Henze participates in the Northeast Document Conservation Center’s 

paper conservation internship program. 

Photo by Julie Martin
68 National Endowment for the Arts

GRANt HiGHliGHtS

Kalamazoo Symphony 

Orchestra 

KAlAMAzOO

When the Kalamazoo 

Symphony Orchestra 

wanted to fi nd out 

how best to serve their nearby 

communities, symphony 

staff went to the schools 

and communities of 

southwestern Michigan 

and asked residents 

what they wanted 

from the closest 

professional 

orchestra. Their 

goal was to become 

artistic collaborators 

rather than cultural 

emissaries. The result 

was the 2007 Rural 

Community Tour, 

fi ve mini-residencies 

that allowed students 

in fi ve communities to 

perform with the Kalamazoo 

Symphony. The project received 

a FY 2007 NEA Challenge America 

grant of $10,000. Jane Rooks Ross, 

the orchestra’s director of education 

and community partnerships, 

deemed it an immediate success. 

Four school districts and one 

arts council signed on to host 

the orchestra, and a good deal of 

planning went into each residency. 

“It wasn’t cookie cutter at every 

place,” Ross said. The symphony 

prepared a list of pieces and worked 

with the communities to customize 

the concert. In several towns, high 

school choirs sang “America the 

Beautiful.” Where schools had 

talented fl ute players, students 

were invited onstage to sound off 

the piccolos in John Phillip Sousa’s 

“Stars and Stripes Forever.”

“The opportunity for young 

people to perform with a 

professional orchestra was truly 

thrilling,” Ross said. “It gave a 

connection for the community; we 

were making music together.”

Assistant conductor Barry Ross 

visited each campus in advance 

to rehearse with the students and 

made a special point of praising 

their teachers during the concerts. 

In a few towns, the orchestra 

also off ered instrument petting 

zoos so young children had a 

chance to make noise on multiple 

instruments. 

No matter the setting, the 

symphony bolstered local arts 

education programs. Michigan has 

been hit harder than most states 

with arts funding cuts, so NEA 

support was especially crucial for 

the Kalamazoo Symphony. The 

Challenge America grant also led 

to an additional award: the 2008 

Arts Presenters/MetLife Award 

for Arts Access in Underserved 

Communities. “Raising funds in 

Michigan is challenging,” Ross said. 

“Receiving an NEA grant was like 

receiving a national endorsement. 

That’s extremely valuable, and really 

validated what we are doing.”

Michigan

A young resident of Vicksburg, 

Michigan, tries out the cello at a 

Kalamazoo Symphony Orchestra 

instrument petting zoo.

Photo courtesy the Kalamazoo Symphony 

Orchestra
GRANt HiGHliGHtS

Grand Rapids Ballet 

Company 

GRAND RAPiDS

There is only one professional 

ballet company in Michigan, 

and it is not based in the 

state’s largest city or the capital. 

Instead, it is the Grand Rapids Ballet 

Company, giving approximately 70 

performances throughout the state 

each year. In 2007, the NEA awarded 

Grand Rapids Ballet Company a 

Challenge America grant of $10,000 

to present the company premiere of 

Don Quixote. The company cannot 

say for certain, but their March 2008 

staging of this classic ballet—fi rst 

performed at Moscow’s Bolshoi 

Theatre in 1869—may have been a 

Michigan fi rst. 

Grand Rapids Ballet was founded 

in 1971, and under the leadership 

of Artistic Director Gordon Peirce 

Schmidt the company has become 

a source of state pride. Nationally 

renowned dance troupes appear 

at the Detroit Opera House, but 

his company remains a perennial 

favorite, Schmidt said. Although the 

company celebrated the opening of 

Peter Martin Wege Theatre, a small 

performance space at the Ellsworth 

Street campus, full-scale ballets like 

Don Quixote are mounted downtown 

at the DeVos Performance Hall.

To promote this special mainstage 

performance, Associate Artistic 

Director Laura Schwenk-Berman 

relied on educational outreach and 

community support. “We like to get 

creative with our marketing because 

we have to,” she said. “We have no 

money in our marketing budget.” 

In addition to off ering “Escape 

to the Ballet” assemblies for 

students, several company dancers 

went out to schools and read a 

translation of Don Quixote adapted 

for children. Area Barnes & Noble 

stores and Schuler Books & Music, 

a local chain, promoted Spanish 

literature. The Grand Rapids Press

even sponsored a Cervantes essay 

contest. By the time the dancers 

were onstage, word of Don Quixote

had spread from Grand Rapids to 

Lake Michigan’s shores. 

Schmidt slightly varied Marius 

Petipa’s classic choreography to suit 

a vaudeville aesthetic. He always 

thought the score—by Ludwig 

Minkus—was big and bawdy, and so 

he staged Don Quixote as commedia 

del arte, playing up the humor as the 

knight pursued his Dulcinea. The 

performance was a poignant one for 

principal dancers Akop and Gaiane 

Akopian, who retired from the 

company at season’s end. 

Kevin carpenter wanders through 

the mist as the title character in 

Grand Rapids Ballet company’s 

2008 production of Don Quixote. 

Photo by Rob Schumaker, Terzes 

Photography
70 National Endowment for the Arts

GRANt HiGHliGHtS

Minnesota Center 

for Book Arts

MiNNEAPOliS

A central hub of literary 

activity can be found 

just south of downtown 

Minneapolis, where one location 

houses the Loft Literary Center 

and Milkweed Editions, along 

with the nation’s largest and most 

comprehensive center of its kind, 

the Minnesota Center for Book Arts 

(MCBA). Since 1983, MCBA has 

supported all forms of book arts, 

from papermaking, letterpress 

printing, and bookbinding to 

experimental art-making and 

self-publishing techniques. MCBA 

provides studio space for rent and 

supports artists through exhibition 

opportunities, an artist cooperative, 

and artist-in-residence and 

fellowship programs. MCBA also 

off ers in-school residencies and 

a variety of book arts workshops 

for families, adults, youth, and 

children, annually serving more 

than 65,000 people. 

In addition to their workshops, 

MCBA provides an intensive art 

and mentorship program for 

teens called the By Design Teen 

Artist program, which in FY 2007 

received an NEA Learning in the 

Arts grant of $25,000. Designed 

for artists ages 15-18, By Design 

begins with a ten-week introduction 

to book arts, including workshops 

on topics such as papermaking, 

marbling, printmaking, silk 

screen-printing, and zines. 

Participation is competitive and 

based on the students’ interest in 

book arts, artistic talent, ability to 

fulfi ll commitments, and a written 

recommendation. Working closely 

with visiting artists, students create 

two collaborative/print projects and 

one individual fi nal project, shown 

in an exhibition at the session’s 

end. After participating in this 

introductory course, students are 

members of the By Design Co-op 

and have access to MCBA studios, 

equipment, and materials.

Students also have the option of 

applying for the advanced artistto-artist mentoring program. Each 

participant submits a proposal 

exploring a specifi c area of book 

arts and is paired with an artist 

mentor, who provides guidance in 

the technical and/or conceptual 

components of their proposal. 

Students plan, curate, and install 

an exhibition of their work and 

prepare an artist statement and 

a presentation for the opening 

reception.

Each year approximately 35 

students participate in the By Design 

Co-Op, and MCBA works to ensure 

that the program includes students 

from varied economic and cultural 

Minnesota

Samantha Esguerra with her papel picado book, La Llorona, created as 

part of the Minnesota center for Book Arts’ By Design teen Artist program.

Photo by Wendy Fernstrum
 2007 Annual Report 71

Grant Highlights

backgrounds, who would otherwise 

not receive such an intensive arts 

education experience. 

Minnesota Public Radio

St. Paul

Minnesota Public Radio, 

known as American 

Public Media (APM), is 

doing its part to provide the nation 

and the world with the best classical 

music programming, reaching 

more than 3.1 million listeners 

nationally each week. In FY 2007, 

Minnesota Public Radio received an 

NEA Arts on Radio and Television 

grant of $200,000 to support 

the production, acquisition, and 

national broadcast of their classical 

music programming in 2007-2008.

In early 2007, APM took over 

production and distribution of one 

of public radio’s longest-running 

daily programs, Performance Today, 

and SymphonyCast, its companion 

weekly concert broadcast. APM 

seized the opportunity to revitalize 

classical music media, enhancing 

these programs through expanded 

Web sites, podcasts, a blog by 

Performance Today host Fred Child, 

and through its many relationships 

with chamber musicians and solo 

performers. 

In addition to their other regular 

classical music programming—

including Saint Paul Sunday, which 

brings classical artists directly into 

the studio for a performance and 

discussion, and Pipedreams, devoted 

to the pipe organ—APM also 

produces classical music specials. 

On September 8, 2007, APM 

broadcast Last Night at the Proms

on 24 stations. Hosted by Brian 

Newhouse, host of Symphony Cast, 

this live national special came 

to the U.S. from the famous 

BBC Proms in London’s Royal 

Albert Hall. 

APM also supports regional 

broadcasts, including the 2008 

concerts by the Los Angeles 

Chamber Orchestra and the 

Los Angeles Philharmonic. Cohosted by Newhouse, these local 

broadcasts are later nationally 

played as part of SymphonyCast and 

Performance Today. This not only 

provides a larger national audience 

for these ensembles, but it also 

supports regional classical music 

broadcasters by pairing their hosts 

with APM’s national hosts.

With the majority of funders 

wanting to support classical music 

in their own communities, the 

NEA’s support of APM is vital. Gayle 

M. Ober, director of classical music 

programming for APM, says, “As 

we continue to communicate why 

funding for public radio programs 

that bring national attention to 

classical music is important, 

ongoing and generous support from 

the NEA is what makes it possible 

for us to do our work today.”

Mark O’Connor (left) and members of the 

Appalachian Waltz Trio (Andra Voldins, 

viola, Mike Block, cello) in the Maud 

Moon Weyerhauser Music Studio for a 

Performance Today segment. 

Photo courtesy of American Public Media
72 National Endowment for the Arts

GRANt HiGHliGHtS

Walter Anderson 

Museum of Art

OcEAN SPRiNGS

The 2003 Smithsonian 

Centennial exhibition on 

visual artist Walter Inglis 

Anderson was such a success that 

the Walter Anderson Museum of 

Art decided that the exhibition 

needed to be seen by more people. 

To make it suitable for travel to 

small and midsized museums, 

however, it would need to be 

revamped. This involved carefully 

selecting the fi nest examples of 

his work from the Smithsonian 

exhibit to include in the new touring 

exhibition, Everything I See is New 

and Strange. The 70 pieces included 

watercolors, oil paintings on canvas 

and board, wooden sculptures, 

furniture, ceramics, and linoleum 

block prints. The Walter Anderson 

Museum of Art received an NEA 

American Masterpieces: Visual 

Arts Touring grant of $110,000 

to make the touring exhibition 

possible. 

The fi rst venue for the traveling 

exhibition was the Berman Museum 

of Art located on the Ursinus 

College campus in Pennsylvania. 

The Philadelphia Inquirer described 

the exhibition as “One of the most 

surprising solo exhibits of the 

year in its breadth and depth....

Surprising at fi rst glance, this fi ne 

show becomes an adventure that 

ultimately reveals a powerfully 

gifted contemporary.” Patrons loved 

viewing the array of featured pieces, 

from 1920 up until Anderson’s 

death in 1965, and it is estimated 

that 15,000 visitors saw the show. 

The Walter Anderson Museum 

provided lecture and docent 

training to Berman staff for the 

show, as well as providing marketing 

and educational materials. 

Anderson’s work is described as 

the junction between folk art and 

European fi ne art tradition because 

it does not simply fi t into one 

particular movement or tradition. 

Most of Anderson’s life was spent 

on the Mississippi Gulf Coast. 

Although Anderson is frequently 

recognized by art historians, 

museum curators, and collectors, 

his work is relatively unknown by 

the general public. The exhibition 

introduced his work to new 

audiences and gained him a more 

national presence. 

The Walter Anderson Museum of 

Art has confi rmed other locations 

for the exhibition, including the 

Peninsula Fine Arts Center in 

Newport News, Virginia, and the 

Masur Museum of Art in Monroe, 

Louisiana. Additional venues will be 

added in the future.

Mississippi

Walter Anderson’s Sissy at 

Table, 1930, a portrait of his 

wife, was part of the Walter 

Anderson Museum of Art’s 

exhibition Everything I See is 

New and Strange. 

Photo courtesy of Walter 

Anderson Museum of Art
 2007 Annual Report 73

Grant Highlights

Mississippi State 

University (Riley Center 

for Education and 

Performing Arts)

Meridian

The Riley Center for 

Education and Performing 

Arts at Mississippi State 

University has a long history. From 

1890 to 1927, the Meridian’s Grand 

Opera House operated in what 

would become the Riley Center, 

bringing vaudeville acts, silent 

films, traveling minstrel shows, 

and popular operas. In 2000, the 

Riley Foundation converted the 

building into a conference center 

with a theater, utilizing the 19thcentury architecture and design. In 

2007, the Riley Center was selected 

as a Kennedy Center Partner in 

Education, a testament to their work 

in making arts and education a part 

of their programming.

In 2007, the Riley Center received 

an NEA Challenge America grant 

of $10,000 to support their concert 

series. They were able to bring 

Time for Three, an eclectic trio of 

classically trained string musicians 

who transcend musical genres, 

and Hot Club of San Francisco, a 

jazz group playing in the tradition 

of Django Reinhardt. The groups 

were chosen partially because of 

their eagerness to do educational 

performances and workshops.

Time for Three went to Kate 

Griffin Junior High, an inner-city 

school with a growing violence 

problem. The musicians in the group 

are young, passionate musicians 

who met at the Curtis Institute 

in Philadelphia. They use their 

instruments as “instruments of 

change.” By wearing tennis shoes, 

running shorts, and t-shirts when 

they play, they don’t look or act like 

traditional classical musicians.

Hot Club follows in the footsteps 

of the jazz manouche, or gypsy 

jazz, movement in France and 

the U.S. They conducted a master 

class for guitar students on the 

MSU Meridian Campus. They 

demonstrated their talents at 

performances in the Riley Center, 

playing jazz hits and their “silent 

surrealism,” where they created a 

salon atmosphere, accompanying 

French Surrealist films with their 

fresh and fascinating music. Both 

acts found appreciative audiences 

both for their performances and 

outreach workshops. 

The Hot Club of San Francisco held a master class for guitar students at the Mississippi State University 

Meridian campus as part of the university’s concert series.

Photo courtesy of Mississippi State University Riley Center
74 National Endowment for the Arts

Grant Highlights

Opera Theatre 

of Saint Louis

St. Louis

As one of only two opera 

companies in Missouri, 

Opera Theatre of 

Saint Louis (OTSL) takes its 

responsibility of bringing opera to 

the people very seriously. Founded 

in 1976 by Richard Gaddes (one of 

the recipients of the inaugural NEA 

Opera Honors awards), the opera 

company has produced 18 world 

premieres, having commissioned 

all but one. The company’s 

performances often include meetand-greets with the performers 

after shows and open dress 

rehearsals for students and seniors. 

It hosts an outreach program for 

students reaching at least 13,000 a 

year; their adult program connects 

with more than 9,000 annually. 

In 2007, OTSL received an NEA 

Access to Artistic Excellence grant 

of $60,000 to bring Sir William 

Walton’s seldom-performed Troilus 

and Cressida to the stage. They chose 

to scale down Walton’s original 

production to make it possible to 

perform in midsized and smaller 

opera houses. This tale of the Trojan 

War was first performed in 1954 and 

is based on the Chaucer tale rather 

than Shakespeare’s well-known play, 

making it even more unfamiliar to 

most audiences. Roger Honeywell 

and Ellie Dehn made their OTSL 

debuts in the title roles of Troilus, a 

prince of Troy, and his love Cressida, 

the daughter of the high priest 

Calkas, who are separated due to the 

circumstances of their warring states. 

Directed by Stephen Lawless, the 

opera was supported by a 32-person 

chorus and members of the St. Louis 

Symphony Orchestra, conducted by 

Antony Walker.

Said Charles McKay, general 

director of OTSL,“The future vitality 

of the art form is dependent on 

the renewal of the repertory.” For 

this reason, he is committed to 

producing not only classic pieces 

like Madame Butterfly and Romeo 

and Juliet but newer works such as 

David Carlson’s Anna Karenina and 

John Adams’s Nixon in China.

 OTSL is committed to 

performing all operas in English, 

even the classics. Addressing 

the concerns of traditionalists, 

Maggie Stearns, director of 

communications, said, “Composers 

like Verdi and Wagner expected

their operas to be performed in the 

language of the audience.” 

Ellie Dehn as Cressida in William Walton’s Troilus and Cressida at Opera Theatre of 

Saint Louis. 

Photo by Ken Howard
 2007 Annual Report 75

GRANt HiGHliGHtS

Wylliams/Henry 

Danse Theatre 

KANSAS citY

Brought back to life on the 

35th anniversary of the 

ballet’s world premiere, 

the Wylliams/Henry Danse 

Theatre’s (WHDT) performance 

of José Limón’s Orfeo is a dramatic 

yet concise retelling of the tragic 

Orpheus myth from Greek 

mythology set to Beethoven’s 

passionate music. 

Orfeo is the story of a poetmusician and his bride Eurydice. 

On their wedding day, Eurydice 

dies tragically and is sent to the 

underworld. Overcome with sorrow, 

Orpheus attempts to rescue her, 

allowed to enter the underworld 

because of his virtuous music. 

Hades allows him to return with 

Eurydice to the land of the living 

on the condition that he does not 

turn back to look at her. Orpheus, 

for reasons untold, cannot resist 

and turns to steal a glance. When 

he does, she is sent back to the 

underworld, separating them until 

his eventual death. 

With funding from an NEA Access 

to Artistic Excellence grant of 

$10,000, WHDT was able to restage 

the show with the help of Anne 

Vachon, Limón Institute’s director, 

and Jonathan Ridel, the original 

Orfeo in Limón’s production. The 

pair travelled to Kansas City to 

not only assist in choreographing, 

but to bring back the original 

context of the piece. For example, 

it is not widely known that Limón 

originally choreographed this piece 

as a tribute to his late wife, which 

provided an interesting new context 

with which to view and understand 

the piece. 

Ridel cast young dancers from 

the company in the lead roles 

because he wanted to show the 

vitality of this tragic love story. 

“The younger dancers brought a 

freshness to the dance that extended 

beyond the steps and allowed their 

personalities to come out,” said 

Mary Pat Henry, artistic director for 

Wylliams/Henry.

During their two-week tenure, 

Ridel and Vachon were able to 

convey what a heart-wrenching 

saga Orfeo is meant to be. They gave 

WHDT dancers and audiences a 

chance to work with artists who were 

intimately involved with the work. 

Because of NEA funding, Henry 

said, Wylliams/Henry was able to 

bring this classic of modern dance 

to local audiences.

Missouri Drew Shuler as Orfeo 

and carol Monnerat as 

Eurydice perform the 

lead roles in Wylliams/

Henry Danse theatre’s 

2007 production of 

José limón’s Orfeo. 

Photo by Mike Manley
Montana State University 

(Montana Shakespeare in 

the Parks) 

Bozeman

For Montana Shakespeare 

in the Parks (MSIP), no city 

is too small to take part in 

its annual summer tour. Even the 

community of Birney, Montana, 

with a population of 17, each year 

arranges for an MSIP performance 

at the mountain summit of Poker 

Jim Butte, where more than 150 

people travel across dirt roads for 

the performance. Apart from their 

summer tour, MSIP also brings 

Shakespeare performances and 

workshops to more than 45,000 

students through their Shakespeare 

in the Schools program, and 

they recently launched Montana 

SHAKES, designed for elementary 

school students.

In FY 2007, Montana Shakespeare 

in the Parks, based at Montana 

State University, received an NEA 

Access to Artistic Excellence grant 

of $25,000 for their 2007 summer 

tour of William Shakespeare’s Merry 

Wives of Windsor and George Bernard 

Shaw’s Heartbreak House. Over a tenweek period, Montana Shakespeare 

toured throughout Montana, 

northern Wyoming, eastern Idaho, 

and North Dakota, performing 69 

times in 52 communities for more 

than 25,000 people. Tickets to 

performances are free and, except 

when weather interferes, are held 

outside, in large part because 

it allows more people to see a 

performance.

Joel Jahnke, MSIP artistic 

director, calls the tour both “the 

most difficult tour in America and 

the most richly rewarding” because 

of the appreciation shown by the 

communities. And hosting an MSIP 

production takes a community effort, 

from raising the sponsorship fee 

(based on the community’s size) to 

finding beds for the actors in towns 

too small to have their own hotels. 

Jahnke calls the NEA’s support for 

MSIP critical, for it not only provides 

the seal of approval necessary for 

them to seek out additional funding, 

but it also keeps the fees low enough 

for small communities to participate. 

For many communities it is the 

residents’ one opportunity a year to 

see a full Shakespeare production 

and they seize it–– as is seen in 

Heron, Montana, where on August 

18, 2007, Heron’s community 

quintupled as 650 people from 

the area congregated at the Heron 

Baseball Field not to see a ball 

game, but to experience the genius of 

Shakespeare.

Helena Presents (Myrna 

Loy Center for the Media 

and Performing Arts)

Helena

Arts coverage may be 

declining across the nation, 

but Helena’s Independent 

Record sees its highest readership 

Mistress Quickly (Abbey Siegworth) reminds Sir John Falstaff (Michael Kane) 

of happier times in this scene from Montana Shakespeare in the Parks’s 

2007 production of The Merry Wives of Windsor.

Photo by Winslow Studio and Gallery

76 National Endowment for the Arts

Grant Highlights
on Fridays, when it includes the 

local arts insert. Helena’s 

enthusiasm for the 

arts is fed by Helena 

Presents/Myrna Loy 

Center for the Media 

and Performing Arts, a 

multidisciplinary arts 

education organization 

presenting a diverse range 

of the arts, from media arts to 

performing, literary, and 

visual arts. 

In FY 2007, Helena Presents 

received an NEA Access to Artistic 

Excellence grant of $25,000 for 

a series of commissioning and 

residency projects. Four artists 

presented performances and 

residencies, including Ronald K. 

Brown/Evidence, which presented 

One Shot on November 5, 2007, 

as part of its recordbreaking tour 

about the work of noted AfricanAmerican photojournalist Charles 

“Teenie” Harris. Brown also 

developed residency materials 

for the freshman class at Helena’s 

Carroll College, including materials 

on Harris’s life and work and an 

essay from the choreographer. In 

addition, the Myrna Loy Center staff 

developed a classroom introduction 

to contemporary dance and to the 

work of Ronald K. Brown.

Along with presenting exciting 

contemporary artists, the Myrna 

Loy also helps to create new work, 

and in 2007-2008 it commissioned 

four projects. Among those projects 

was one by two native Helena 

artists, composer Greg Bolin and 

author Maile Meloy, who were 

commissioned to write an opera 

based on a short story by Meloy. 

Tome premiered October 14, 2007, 

and included a reading of new works 

by Meloy. 

Lastly, the Myrna Loy also 

supported the creation and touring 

of new work through the Northwest 

New Works Program. In January 

2007, Pacifi c Northwest-based 

contemporary dance company 

Scott/Powell Performance spent 

a week in Helena, working with 

elementary school classrooms, 

Carroll College dance classes, and 

with the local dance studios. They 

closed out their residency with a 

performance of Geography, a new 

work co-commissioned by the 

Myrna Loy Center.

It may have a rural location, 

but there’s a reason Helena likes 

to call itself “the best little arts 

town in America,” for through the 

Myrna Loy, Helena has become 

a focal point for the creation and 

performance of contemporary 

new work.

Montana

the Scott/Powell Performance dance 

company performs Geography, a new 

work co-commissioned by the Myrna 

loy center. 

Photo by Peter Mumford

 2007 Annual Report 77

GRANt HiGHliGHtS
78 National Endowment for the Arts

GRANt HiGHliGHtS

Native American Public 

Telecommunications

liNcOlN

Traditional languages 

and modern technology. 

Native American Public 

Telecommunications (NAPT) 

has found a way to bring the two 

together by creating radio shows 

produced by and for Native 

Americans that preserve the stories 

and languages that have been passed 

down for generations. 

In 2007, NAPT received an 

NEA Access to Artistic Excellence 

grant of $10,000 to support the 

Native Radio Theater project. The 

organization hosts audio theater 

training workshops to teach Native 

Americans how to use recording 

studio equipment to create and 

produce radio shows. They also help 

produce six original radio plays, 

written, recorded, and aired for the 

fi rst time by their distributors. 

With the voices of Native Americans 

from all over Nebraska, favorite 

characters like Super Indian, a comic 

book character with a sidekick dog, 

Diogi, came to life on the radio. 

Stories like “Why the Opossum’s 

Tail is Bare” and “The Peach Seed,” 

traditionally passed down orally 

by storytellers, were recorded by 

children and elders of various tribes. 

The radio programs have high ratings 

on Indian reservations, where many 

hours are spent behind the wheel 

commuting for school, work, and to 

visit friends and family. “Opossum” 

and “Peach Seed” are tailored more to 

a young audience, but “Super Indian” 

contains family-friendly humor with 

plenty of inside jokes for adults to 

enjoy.

 Native Americans are a 

storytelling people, and the 

ability to capture those stories 

and preserve them digitally is 

revolutionary. According to Shirley 

Sneve, NAPT’s executive director, 

“The Cherokee, like a lot of tribes, 

are very concerned with language 

revitalization. To be able to include 

the Cherokee language in programs 

is important.” 

By using the native language in 

radio programs, the NAPT helps to 

make them a part of history. They 

ensure that thousands of people 

are able to hear the broadcasts via 

public radio distributor Native Voice 

One, which helps broadcast to the 

more than 33 Native-American 

radio stations, and NAPT’s Internet 

radio station AIROS. Sneve hopes 

to develop podcasts and cell phoneready broadcasts in the coming 

years, eager to adapt their native 

language to advancing technology. 

Nebraska

Playwright Rhiana Yazzie (Navajo), actress 

thirza Defoe (Anishnabe), and Native 

Radio theater coordinator John Gregg 

(Hopi/inupiat) record the Navajo story “the 

Peach Seed” for broadcast as part of the 

Native Radio theater project.

Photo courtesy of Native American Public 

Telecommunications
 2007 Annual Report 79

Grant Highlights

Opera Omaha

Omaha

The Schoolhouse Blizzard 

swept over the Great Plains 

on a balmy day in January 

1888. The storm came in quickly; 

children and teachers attempted 

to seek shelter. Within hours the 

temperature dropped from above 

freezing to 20 degrees below zero, 

causing 500 ill-prepared travelers 

to lose their lives to hypothermia. 

Through research and interviews 

with survivors, Ted Kooser, former 

Poet Laureate of the United States, 

compiled a set of poems entitled The 

Blizzard Voices, his interpretation of 

the blizzard. 

Opera Omaha was able to bring 

Kooser’s poems to the stage 

alongside Pulitzer Prize-winning 

composer Paul Moravec’s music 

with the help of an NEA Access 

to Artistic Excellence grant 

of $20,000. The production 

premiered September 12 and 13, 

2008, in Omaha and across the river 

in Council Bluffs, Iowa, to crowds of 

more than 2,500. 

The production was not fully 

staged; instead, an onstage 

orchestra accompanied six voices 

and a choir. The vocalists were 

dressed simply in period clothing 

and hairstyles, with no set, only the 

haunting minimalist illustrations of 

artist Watie White projected behind 

them. The bare bones aspect of the 

production compelled audience 

members to listen to the words. 

Moravec’s music even bowed to 

the poetry of Kooser’s libretto, 

allowing it to speak the tales of 

the storm without interruption. 

In an effort to involve the greater 

Omaha community in the premiere, 

the company helped to coordinate 

many outreach efforts. Area public 

libraries and the Assistance League 

of Omaha held a clothing drive 

for the charity Operation School 

Bell. At the request of Kooser and 

in conjunction with PoetryMenu.

com, Opera Omaha held a poetry 

contest where winners from four age 

groups had their pieces set to music 

with the help of a local recording 

company. The company worked with 

Omaha Children’s Museum to curate 

a historical and scientific miniexhibit to accompany this and future 

productions. The exhibit gave a brief 

look at blizzards and other natural 

disasters, and will travel with the 

production in future performances. 

The world premiere 

production of Ted Kooser 

and Paul Moravec’s 

The Blizzard Voices 

at Opera Omaha. 

Photo by Jim Scholz
80 National Endowment for the Arts

GRANt HiGHliGHtS

Western Folklife Center 

ElKO

The Western Folklife Center 

(WFC) is devoted to 

increasing the awareness 

of and broadening the interest in 

the traditional arts of the American 

West. As part of its mission, 

the Western Folklife Center 

implemented a research project, 

Beyond Borderlands: MexicanAmerican Ranch Traditions in 

the American West, to explore the 

cultural threads between Mexico 

and the U.S. WFC received an NEA 

Access to Artistic Excellence grant 

of $35,000 in FY 2007 to support 

the project. 

Beyond Borderlands consisted 

of research, educational, and 

presentation phases, focusing 

on family-based Mexican ranch 

culture, including band music, 

stories, and narrative songs called 

corridos. During one of the phases, 

WFC staff traveled throughout 

Nevada, Oregon, Washington, 

and Idaho, studying the arts of 

ranching life to better understand 

the traditions and art forms. Their 

fi ndings helped to create materials 

for the center like video and radio 

productions, which were then 

stored in the center’s archives. 

The corridos played an essential 

role in Beyond Borderlands. 

Contests occurred to fi nd skilled 

artists within the communities 

who are keeping these important 

traditions alive. The fi rst Gran 

Concurso de Corridos (corridos 

competition) occurred at the 

Hispanic Cultural Center of Idaho. 

Prizes were awarded by a panel 

of local corrido musicians and 

specialists in Mexican art. 

In another phase, the center 

collaborated with local educators 

to produce two four-day corrido 

composition workshops targeted 

at high school students. The 

students learned about the history 

of corridos, reoccurring themes, 

and the structure of the songs. The 

topics students chose for their own 

songs ranged from family issues to 

immigration. 

WFC also produced several 

media programs throughout the 

project. One program featuring 

the corridos was aired on National 

Public Radio as well as on three 

Western Folklife Center podcasts. 

The center is hoping to extend 

this into an ongoing project 

by using the material collected 

throughout Beyond Borderlines. 

The materials also are being shared 

with folklorists and many others to 

facilitate new relationships and to 

continue to promote the region’s 

cultural heritage. 

Nevada

Musicians and singers came from around the West to compete at the Western 

Folklife center’s Gran Concurso de Corridos. 

Photo by Rori Holdford/Western Folklife Center
GRANt HiGHliGHtS

Clark County

lAS VEGAS

The downtown Las Vegas 

amphitheater was fi lled 

to capacity at the Jazz in 

the Park series presented by the 

Clark County Parks and Recreation 

(CCPR) department. One of the 

reasons for the large crowds at 

the series was the appearance 

of Grammy Award-winning jazz 

vocalist Dee Dee Bridgewater. The 

nationally acclaimed jazz performer 

drew a crowd of more than 3,000 

people. CCPR received an NEA 

Challenge America grant of $10,000 

in FY 2007 for the jazz series.

Bridgewater captured the hearts 

and attention of people worldwide 

with her performance in the musical 

The Wiz, forwhich she won a Tony 

Award for Best Featured Actress 

in a Musical. Also the winner of 

two Grammy Awards, Bridgewater 

was accompanied by local jazz 

musicians, the Las Vegas Jazz 

Society. 

In addition to Bridgewater, other 

nationally recognized jazz artists 

also performed. Famed jazz fusion 

group Spyro Gyra kicked off the 

series, and New Orleans’s own Dirty 

Dozen Brass Band and Chicago’s 

Nick Colionne completed the list of 

major performers who participated 

in the series.

Although traditionally the series 

is only four evenings long, due to 

its rising success, the Clark County 

Parks and Recreation devoted a 

fi fth evening to this year’s series. 

All fi ve evenings were completely 

free of charge for the community. 

The audiences were full of people 

of diff erent ages and economic 

and ethnic backgrounds. People 

brought picnics, socialized, relaxed, 

and enjoyed their evening, full of 

jazz, in the outdoor Clark County 

Amphitheater. 

With positive feedback from 

audience members year after year, 

Jazz in the Park continues to grow. 

The additional evening of jazz was 

a hit as many audience members 

asked to repeat the series again 

next year, adding an additional 

date. CCPR looks forward to 

continuing to achieve jazz 

excellence and crowd 

capacity generated by

this year’s series.

Guitarist Nick colionne 

performing at the Jazz in 

the Park concert in June 

2008. 

Photo courtesy of Clark County 

Parks and Recreation 
82 National Endowment for the Arts

GRANt HiGHliGHtS

Dartmouth College 

(Hopkins Center for 

the Arts)

HANOVER

I

n central New Hampshire, the 

phrase “At the Hop” is every 

bit as relevant today as it was 

when Danny and the Juniors were 

urging teens to go dance in 1957. But 

in New Hampshire parlance, “the 

Hop” refers to the Hopkins Center 

for the Arts, Dartmouth College’s 

performing arts venue. Since 1962, 

the theater has been presenting 

groundbreaking artists and 

commissioning new works from 

iconic performers. In FY 2007, the 

NEA awarded Dartmouth an NEA 

Access to Artistic Excellence grant 

of $45,000 to continue its proud 

presenting tradition at the Hop. 

The year got off to an avant-garde 

start in January, when the Bang on a 

Can All-Stars, the New York-based 

new music collective, delivered 

music by Evan Ziporyn and David 

Lang. Orpheus Chamber Orchestra, 

the conductor-less ensemble, 

off ered works by Benjamin Britten, 

Felix Mendelssohn, and Wolfgang 

Mozart the following month. Then 

in April, the college presciently 

booked Young @ Heart, the chorus 

of senior citizen rockers. It was one 

of the choir’s fi rst performances 

outside its homebase in western 

Massachusetts. A year later, the 

eponymous documentary fi lm about 

Young @ Heart would become an art 

house hit. Jeff rey James, executive 

director of the Hop, said the vibrant 

chorus quickly won over skeptical 

students. “Young @ Heart really was 

a discovery; such a breath of fresh 

air,” James said.

Two additional performers 

supported by the grant came to 

Dartmouth as part of a multiyear 

series. Noh theater director Takeshi 

Kawamura presented a series of 

one-act plays, and playwright Anne 

Galjour completed stage one of her 

three-year residency researching 

class divides in New England. 

As an arts center in a rural 

region, the Hop bears a special 

responsibility when it comes to 

engaging the community. All of the 

NEA-funded performers engaged in 

some form of outreach, from school 

assemblies to master classes. Merce 

Cunningham Dance Company was 

in New Hampshire for a week before 

premiering Xover (pronounced 

New Hampshire

A Dartmouth college student 

gets down with members of 

Young @ Heart, one of several 

ensembles that performed at the 

Hopkins center for the 

Arts thanks to an NEA grant. 

Photo by Kawakahi Amina

“crossover”) at the Hop. Xover

proved to be a milestone: it was the 

last work any choreographer created 

with sets by the late artist Robert 

Rauschenberg. 

Currier Museum of Art 

MANcHEStER

The are many places in New 

Hampshire to buy pewter—

several small towns still 

boast working pewter factories—but 

there’s only one place in the 
 2007 Annual Report 83

Grant Highlights

state to see 200-year-old pewter 

tankards by Frederick Bassett, 

porringers by Thomas Boardman, 

and communion chalices by Roswell 

Gleason. That place is the Currier 

Museum of Art in Manchester. 

The decorative arts collection 

has been central to the Currier 

since 1932, when the museum, 

then just 13 years old, acquired the 

Dewitt Clinton Howe collection 

of early American art. Ever since, 

curators have been slowly building 

up the museum’s collection of 

furniture, glassware, paperweights, 

and of course, pewter dining 

accoutrements. By 2005, only 

a fraction of the collection was 

on exhibit. The following year, 

the Currier began a 21-month 

expansion that would eventually 

add 33,000 square feet of gallery, 

museum.” Renovations reclaimed 

this formerly unused, long, narrow 

space. Now the walls are lined with 

a new 26-feet-long, 9-feet-high 

display case that shows off the 

museum’s glass and paperweight 

collections. Some 200 items, 

including glass by Sandwich and 

Tiffany, are now on view after 

spending two decades in storage. 

Upstairs in the American Gallery, 

older decorative items have been 

integrated into the museum’s art 

collection. For example, silverware 

crafted by Paul Revere is displayed 

on antique New England furniture.

Visitors touring the renovated 

galleries have responded with 

positive feedback, Spahr said. Since 

the Currier’s grand reopening in 

March 2008, more than 60,000 

people have visited the museum. 

classroom, event, and office space at 

the museum. 

While contractors knocked down 

walls, chief curator Andrew Spahr 

and his staff applied for grants to 

redesign the exhibit spaces. The 

Currier received an NEA Access to 

Artistic Excellence grant of $15,000 

to reinstall the decorative arts 

collection in two new galleries: 

one for glass and paperweights 

near the museum entrance and 

one integrated space for early 

American art. 

“The NEA money allowed us 

to completely redo and rethink 

those galleries,” Spahr said. “That 

included everything from paint 

color to interpretive materials to 

display cases.”

Spahr called the new Decorative 

Arts Gallery “the focal point of the 

Museum guests view Tiffany glass 

at the Currier Museum of Art’s new 

Decorative Arts Gallery. 

Photo courtesy Currier Museum of Art.
84 National Endowment for the Arts

Grant Highlights

Morris Museum

Morristown

Few photos are more iconic 

than Steve McCurry’s Afghan 

Girl. Shot when McCurry 

covered the Soviet invasion of 

Afghanistan, the image of a girl with 

haunting green eyes peering out 

from beneath a russet headscarf was 

featured on the cover of National 

Geographic in June 1985, and years 

later, featured in its “100 Best 

Pictures” issue. His work—which 

has been featured in just about 

every major magazine in the world—

captures the indomitable spirit of 

the people he met travelling over six 

continents.

In 2007, the Morris Museum in 

Morristown, New Jersey, received 

an NEA Challenge America grant 

of $10,000 to present Pilgrimage: 

Photographs by Steve McCurry, an 

exhibition featuring Afghan Girl and 

49 other stunning large-format 

color photographs shot over the past 

three decades.

McCurry is considered one 

of the foremost documentary 

photographers in the world. His 

first national attention came in 

the early 1980s when he crossed 

the Pakistani-Afghan border and 

became one of the first to document 

the conflict in the region. McCurry’s 

coverage won the Robert Capa 

Gold Medal for Best Photographic 

Reporting from Abroad, an award 

dedicated to photographers 

exhibiting exceptional coverage 

and enterprise. He has several 

photography books to his name, 

including 1985’s The Imperial Way

(with text by Paul Theroux) and 

2007’s In the Shadow of Mountains, 

a collection of portraits and 

landscapes he has taken in his 

travels. More than 34,700 people 

viewed the exhibition, which was 

presented in the museum’s main 

gallery from September 2007 

through January 2008.

The exhibition was presented 

in partnership with Fairleigh 

Dickinson University, involving 

the publication Coming of Age 

in a Globalized World: The Next 

Generation, written by J. Michael 

Adams, president of Fairleigh 

Dickinson University, and 

Angelo Carfagna, the university’s 

director of communications. The 

book, which features several of 

McCurry’s photos, explores the 

current climate of global education 

and explores current issues 

and conflicts in global politics. 

Pilgrimage incorporated quotes 

from the book alongside McCurry’s 

Steve McCurry’s Kabul, Afghanistan, 1992, was part of the Morris Museum’s 

exhibition Pilgrimage: Photographs by Steve McCurry. 

Photo courtesy of Morris Museum, © Steve McCurry
 2007 Annual Report 85

GRANt HiGHliGHtS

images to complementary eff ect. 

The museum also organized a 

concurrent exhibit of photographic 

works by area high school students 

called Through Our Eyes, and created 

a special curriculum for younger 

students.

International 

Sculpture Center 

(Sculpture Magazine)

HAMiltON

Emerging artists across the 

nation had a chance to 

garner recognition thanks 

to the International Sculpture 

Center’s magazine, Sculpture. The 

International Sculpture Center—a 

New Jersey-based network for 

three-dimensional artists working 

around the world—distributes 

approximately 18,000 copies 

annually, dispersed to more than 70 

countries. The center received an 

NEA Access to Artistic Excellence 

grant of $25,000 in FY 2007 to 

support production of Sculpture

magazine for 2007. 

In 2007, the 80-page, full-color 

magazine documented the work 

of more than 30 sculpture artists 

who do not normally receive such 

recognition, including articles 

about the artists, photographs 

of their work, and interviews. In 

addition, the magazine contains 

reviews of exhibitions and technical 

discussions of new materials and 

techniques in the sculpture world. 

“We are looking to cover a broader 

range of art, and younger artists 

who aren’t the fl avor of the week in 

Chelsea,” said Glenn Harper, editor 

of Sculpture. “We have a mandate to 

not just cover New York.”

Harper also pointed out how 

vital the NEA is to the magazine. 

“The NEA has been important for 

nonprofi t magazines, not only for 

the funding, but to be a stamp of 

approval for the start-ups,” he said. 

Features in 2007 included 

interviews with Ursula von 

Rydingsvard, Bill Woodrow, Ledelle 

Moe, Anish Kapoor, Momoyo 

Torimitsu, Giordano Pozzi, and 

Frank Stella; and articles on 

the legacy of Julio González, the 

Hakone Open-Air Museum in 

Japan, the Vancouver Sculpture 

Biennale, Karlis Rekevics’s 

contemporary large-scale 

sculptures, and the controversy 

surrounding Richard Serra’s public 

art sculpture Tilted Arc.

The international distribution 

of Sculpture allows for artists to 

be seen around the world. The 

magazine is also available online 

where it received more than 

90,000 hits daily, increasing the 

profi le of these emerging artists. 

Altogether, the magazine and Web 

site help forward the center’s goal 

of creating an understanding of the 

arts and bringing artists together 

to encourage the exchange of ideas 

and information. 

New Jersey

the July/August 2007 

issue of Sculpture, with 

Karlis Rekevics’s Triangle 

Installation on the cover, 

as photographed by 

Jeremiah Jones. 

Image courtesy of Sculpture 

magazine
86 National Endowment for the Arts

GRANt HiGHliGHtS

Reggie Wilson/Fist and Heel 

Performance Group performing 

The Tale: Npinpee Nckutchie

and the Tail of the Golden 

Dek at Globas DanceFest in 

New Mexico. 

Photo by Antoine Tempé 

New Art New Mexico

EDGEWOOD

Albuquerqueans took a 

journey through Africa 

without even leaving 

the state thanks to New Art New 

Mexico and partner VSA Arts 

of New Mexico. In a twist from 

the previous eight years, New 

Mexico’s international festival 

of contemporary dance, Global 

DanceFest (GDF), was centered on 

the African tradition. By partnering 

with VSA Arts of New Mexico, the 

festival was able to reach a more 

diverse audience, including a large 

disabled population.

Journeys AFRICA begins a series 

of annual festivals that will focus 

New Mexico

on specifi c parts of the world. In 

FY 2007, New Art New Mexico 

received an NEA Access to Artistic 

Excellence grant of $10,000 to help 

produce this fi rst year of the new 

series. The festival brought artists 

from a number of African countries, 

including Zimbabwe, Tunisia, and 

the Republic of Benin, in a month 

of dance, fi lm, and visual arts 

presentations.

Week one featured New Yorkbased Ronald K. Brown/Evidence, 

opening the festival in a mix of 

Caribbean, South American, 

African, and jazz dance styles. 

Brown also held a discussion about 

migration, acculturation, and 

legacy. Audiences viewed God’s 

Gonna Trouble the Water, a fi lm about 

the Gullah peoples living on the 

coast of South Carolina and Georgia, 

and U Carmen, a performance by 

Dimpho Di Kopane, a South African 

opera theater company. The second 

week brought Brooklyn’s Reggie 

Wilson/Fist and Heel Performance 

Group, which blended ritual 

African dance with contemporary 

movement to tell the story of the 

African diaspora. Wilson and 

Antoine Tempé, a photographer 

whose work was on exhibit all week, 

discussed why the African continent 
 2007 Annual Report 87

GRANt HiGHliGHtS

Artists featured in May included 

pianist Myra Melford, one of the 

foremost women in jazz today, 

together with bassist Mark Dresser, 

who played with avant-garde 

composer and saxophonist Anthony 

Braxton for nine years. Also playing 

was the Roscoe Mitchell Quartet.

Mitchell, founding member of 

the infl uential Association for the 

Advancement of Creative Musicians 

Albert Ayler, Pharoah Sanders, and 

Don Cherry. But in 1965 he made 

his name by joining John Coltrane’s 

last band. Accra Trane Station 

features two Ghanaian musicians, 

Nii Noi Nortey and Nii Otoo Annan, 

along with ethnomusicologist 

Steven Feld. Together they play 

Coltrane’s music on African 

instruments, giving an eclectic take 

on his classic music. 

lawrence clark (saxophone) and 

Josh Evans (trumpet) of the Rashied 

Ali Quintet perform at the 2007 

creative Soundspace Festival in 

Albuquerque, New Mexico. 

Photo by Jim Gale

has such a profound impact on 

their work.

Weeks three and four saw Andréya 

Ouamba and the Compangie 1er 

Temps of the Republic of Congo 

and Nora Chipaumire of Zimbabwe. 

Hafi z Dhaou and Aïcha M’Barek of 

Tunisia performed in their second 

year at the festival, as well as Julie 

Dossavi, a French and African 

citizen from the Republic of Benin, 

in her fi rst ever visit to the United 

States. Dossavi uses infl uences from 

both Benin and France to combine 

the worlds of haute couture and 

ethnic dance. 

Outpost Productions

AlBUQUERQUE

J

ust a few blocks south of 

Route 66 in Albuquerque sits 

Outpost Productions’s 

 Space, an intimate venue that 

serves up 100 of the most diverse 

and dynamic acts in jazz and 

world music annually. Since 1988, 

Outpost has played host to 1,200 

performances, growing from an 

organization with a small budget 

to one of the city’s recognized 

“Outstanding Arts Organizations.” 

In 2007, Outpost held its third 

annual Creative Soundspace Festival 

with support from an NEA Access to 

Artistic Excellence grant of $10,000. 

The 2007 festival was the fi rst year 

that programming was expanded 

to two weekends—one session in 

the spring, and another in the fall. 

The performances were held in 

the Space, with audiences totaling 

approximately 2,000 people.

and of the free jazz group, the Art 

Ensemble of Chicago, is known for 

his adventurous saxophone playing. 

UNM students attended workshops 

and demonstrations by all artists at 

the festival. 

In October, the second part of 

the festival featured the Rashied Ali 

Quintet and the Accra Trane Station. 

Ali played with some of the biggest 

names in the 1960s avant-garde jazz 

movement, including Archie Shepp, 

By partnering with local and 

regional organizations like the 

University of New Mexico and Taos 

and Santa Fe Jazz Festivals, Outpost 

is quickly becoming known as a 

supporter of avant-jazz, roots, and 

experimental music. 
88 National Endowment for the Arts

GRANt HiGHliGHtS

Just Buffalo 

Literary Center

BUFFAlO

One of the ten largest literary 

organizations in the nation, 

Just Buff alo Literary Center 

is the heart of literary activity in 

Western New York. Since 1975, Just 

Buff alo has provided a broad range 

of programming, including writing 

workshops, poetry readings, literary 

discussions, performances, and 

community events and festivals, and 

has participated in the NEA’s Big 

Read initiative. In 2005, Just Buff alo 

collaborated with CEPA Gallery for 

a new in-school program, Picturing 

Poetry, a cross-discipline program 

that teaches students how to express 

a theme through both photography 

and writing.

In FY 2007, Just Buff alo received 

an NEA Learning in the Arts grant of 

$20,000 to expand Picturing Poetry 

to reach more students. In 2007-

2008 two schools participated— 

Frederick Law Olmsted School and 

Highgate Heights School—reaching 

approximately 1,000 students 

in grades four through eight, 

who each received between nine 

and 15 sessions of instruction in 

photography and poetry. 

Each grade worked from a 

basic theme when creating their 

art, such as “energy.” Teaching 

artists in photography and creative 

writing provided basic instruction 

in their art forms and how to 

explore a theme through these 

disciplines. The two art forms were 

then combined as students used 

disposable cameras to take photos 

representative of their theme and 

then wrote a complementary poem 

about their photo. 

The high quality of student 

art, both visual and literary, 

that resulted from this program 

cemented the value of collaboration 

among complementary art 

forms. But Picturing Poetry’s 

collaborations grew beyond 

the two arts organizations to 

encompass the teachers and 

the school administrators, who 

became partners in choosing 

themes and helping to plan 

the program. When the school 

takes a program so seriously, it 

transfers to the students, who took 

immense pride in their artwork, 

which was showcased for both 

their peers and their parents 

through school exhibitions of the 

students’ photographs and poems, 

a reading of the students’ poetry, 

and an exhibition at CEPA Gallery 

of selected student works, titled 

Writing with Light. 

Pierpont Morgan Library

NEW YORK

The Pierpont Morgan Library 

in New York City owns 

impressive collections 

of illuminated manuscripts; 

master drawings; rare books; fi ne 

bindings; and literary, historical, 

and music manuscripts. One of the 

prize possessions is a collection 

of illustrated letters written 

from Vincent van Gogh to Émile 

New York

Monica Bonner from Highgate Heights and family at the Writing 

with Light opening at cEPA Gallery. 

Photo by Lauren Tent
 2007 Annual Report 89

Bernard between 1888 and 1889. 

The Morgan used this collection 

as the centerpiece of an exhibition 

exploring the relationship between 

these two artists and what van 

Gogh’s letters reveal about his life 

and creative process.

In FY 2007, the Morgan received 

an NEA Access to Artistic Excellence 

grant of $45,000 for the exhibition 

Painted with Words: Vincent van 

Gogh’s Letters to Émile Bernard, which 

ran September 28, 2007 through 

January 6, 2008. In addition to the 

19 letters between van Gogh and 

Bernard, the exhibit included an 

additional letter by van Gogh to the 

artist Paul Gauguin, which features 

a sketch for van Gogh’s renowned 

Bedroom at Arles. Six of the letters to 

Bernard also include sketches for 

his works. Twenty-two paintings, 

watercolors, and drawings by van 

Gogh and Bernard were exhibited 

with the letters, including those 

discussed and sketched by van Gogh 

in his letters. 

Accompanying the exhibition 

were a variety of public and 

education programs, including 

a symposium on the importance 

of correspondence in van Gogh’s 

relationship with Bernard and 

Bernard’s role in establishing 

van Gogh’s reputation as a 

groundbreaking artist. As part of 

the Write A Picture, Draw a Poem 

program, students from six New 

York public schools visited the van 

Gogh exhibition with a trained 

educator, then worked in small 

teams to write a description of 

selected works and used them as a 

basis to draw pictures of their own. 

Vincent van Gogh’s letter to Émile Bernard, Arles, March 1888 (Letter 2, folio 

1), part of the Painted with Words exhibition by the Pierpont Morgan Library 

Photo by Joseph Zehavi; Thaw Collection, The Pierpont Morgan Library, New York, gift 

in honor of Charles E. Pierce, Jr. 

In addition, the exhibition included 

a brochure with English translations 

of the letters and two interactive 

listening stations with theatrical 

readings in English of excerpts from 

select van Gogh letters. 

In total, 50,000 people viewed 

this exhibition, drawn by the unique 

opportunity to gain personal insight 

into the life of one of the world’s 

great artists through his words and 

his art.
90 National Endowment for the Arts

GRANt HiGHliGHtS

Hendersonville Symphony 

Orchestra

HENDERSONVillE

Choral extravaganzas are 

a big deal for small town 

orchestras. North Carolina’s 

Hendersonville Symphony 

Orchestra (HSO) only stages a 

combined instrumental and choral 

performance every two or three 

years. So in 2007, when the 37-yearold ensemble received its fi rst-ever 

NEA grant, a $10,000 Challenge 

America award to present Brahms’s 

German Requiem, it was a big deal. 

This massive work for full orchestra, 

two choirs, and two soloists has 

been critically acclaimed since 

its premiere in 1869. In writing 

this formidable piece, Brahms 

fulfi lled a charge given by his late 

friend Frederick Schumann, who 

wrote that Brahms should, “direct 

his magic wand where the massed 

forces of chorus and orchestra may 

lend him their powers.” 

Assembling these “massed 

forces” in Hendersonville took a 

major community eff ort, according 

to Thomas Joiner, conductor 

and music director. It was also 

expensive. “We have to scrimp 

pennies,” Joiner said. “A grant like 

this certainly paved the way for us 

to think about projects like this in 

the future.” 

The requiem concert, 

appropriately, was not 

without sturm und 

drang. The HSO lacks 

a permanent home, 

and had long planned 

to present the German 

Requiem at First 

Baptist Church. But the 

church was undergoing 

major renovations, and 

the project was running 

behind schedule. A month 

before the concert, Joiner 

still didn’t know if the pews 

would be back in the sanctuary. 

They were, but then, at the last 

minute, the soprano scheduled 

to solo became ill. Joiner put in 

a call to Tamara Matthews, one 

of his colleagues at the Furman 

University music department. 

Matthews, an accomplished singer 

who has performed and recorded 

around the world, agreed to step 

in. She sang opposite Joshua 

Copeland, an up-and-coming 

baritone who graduated from 

Furman and garnered accolades 

and engagements since singing 

with the HSO, including a recital 

at New York’s Weill Hall. Two local 

vocal ensembles—Cantabile and the 

North Carolina

tamara Matthews was the solo 

soprano in the Hendersonville 

Symphony Orchestra’s production of 

Brahms’s German Requiem. 

Photo by Devon Cass

Carolina Concert Choir—combined 

to form the chorus.

“The stars really aligned,” 

Joiner said. “It was a beautiful 

performance. There were a good 

number of people who were hearing 

Brahms’s Requiem for the fi rst time, 

and everyone just felt exhilarated by 

the end.” 
 2007 Annual Report 91

Grant Highlights

North Carolina 

Pottery Center

Seagrove

From the day she walked 

into the North Carolina 

Pottery Center back in 2004, 

Executive Director Denny Hubbard 

Mecham had been hoping to fill the 

center’s gallery with highly crafted 

Native-American pottery. In 2008, 

she finally got her chance, thanks to 

an NEA Challenge America grant of 

$10,000. Contemporary Pottery from 

North Carolina’s American Indian 

Communities, an exhibit featuring 

the work of potters from four 

Carolina tribes, ran at the center in 

Seagrove, North Carolina, from May 

through August 2008.

“Many people didn’t realize that 

the native tradition is alive and well 

in the Carolinas,” Mechem said. “I 

have always been drawn to it.”

The earliest pottery shards in the 

United States were discovered off 

the Carolina coast. Archeologists 

estimate indigenous people have 

been producing pottery in the 

region since 4500 B.C. Distinct 

tribal traditions have been passed 

down through the centuries, and 

in the past decade or so, several 

tribes have renewed the tradition of 

creating artistic pottery, although 

their work is not as functional as it 

was centuries ago. On the Eastern 

Cherokee reservation in western 

North Carolina, Native Americans 

craft earthenware vessels, while 

members of South Carolina’s 

Catawba tribe usually produce pots 

with a highly burnished glaze. Both 

styles were featured in the exhibit.

The exhibit also featured the 

works of two Lumbee Indian potters 

and several members of the HaliwaSaponi tribe, including Senora 

Lynch, the youngest artist in state 

history to receive the North Carolina 

Heritage Award. 

Mechem timed the event to 

coincide with a state archeology 

conference. On opening day, the 

center was bustling with curious 

historians, pottery enthusiasts, 

and families who took advantage of 

educational activities for children. 

Seagrove is located in rural 

central North Carolina—nowhere 

near the sea—and has a population 

of just 264 people. Since its 

founding in 1992 and the opening 

of the pottery shed and exhibition 

space in 1998, the center has 

continued to function as a gathering 

place for ceramists and pottery 

enthusiasts, attracting more than 

15,000 visitors each year. 

North Carolina Pottery Center’s Native-American pottery exhibit featured hand-etched 

work by Senora Lynch, a member of the Haliwa-Saponi tribe. 

Photo courtesy of North Carolina Pottery Center
92 National Endowment for the Arts

Grant Highlights

Jamestown Fine Arts 

Association

Jamestown

The Arts Center, operated 

by the Jamestown Fine 

Arts Association, has 

been promoting the arts in North 

Dakota for more than 40 years. 

In 2007, the center established 

a project to celebrate the many 

ethnic communities that make up 

Jamestown. They hired traditional 

artists throughout North Dakota to 

work in schools to provide programs 

about the cultural heritage of the 

populations within North Dakota. 

In FY 2007, the Arts Center received 

an NEA Access to Artistic Excellence 

grant of $10,000 for the educational 

project. 

A favorite for many of the 

students, Marvin Bald Eagle 

Youngman taught more than 500 

students the traditional games and 

stories of his Chippewa culture. 

He introduced the students to the 

meaning and history of medicine 

bags. Each student made their own 

medicine bag, while Youngman 

told stories about his tribe. 

Taylor Barnes, the Arts Center’s 

director, described Youngman 

as a “wonderful man and gentle 

artist who has a vast storehouse of 

information about traditional ways 

and history.” Youngman’s geniality 

and love for his culture helped him 

connect easily with the students. 

Another popular artist was 

Margreat Sam from East India. 

Sam demonstrated dances, like 

Bharatanatyam, that told stories 

about India’s lifestyle and history. 

The most exciting aspect of Sam’s 

residency was a workshop open to 

everyone within the community. 

This event was mainly attended 

by home-schooled families who 

spent the day at the Arts Center 

learning dance steps, hearing 

stories, making traditional food, 

and painting. 

Many of the students and 

families who participated in these 

events attended the 2008 Culture 

Festival in August where all the 

artists performed. The festival 

celebrated the 125th anniversary 

of the community’s settlement, 

focusing on the traditional arts of 

the immigrants that established 

Jamestown as well as more recent 

arrivals. The festival included a 

performance by NEA National 

Heritage Fellow Mick Moloney, a 

master performer of traditional 

Irish music, as part of the NEA 

program’s 25th anniversary 

activities. 

Indian artist Margreat Sam leads students 

in a traditional dance for her residency during 

the 2008 Culture Festival in Jamestown, 

North Dakota. 

Photo courtesy of Jamestown Fine Arts Association
 2007 Annual Report 93

Fargo-Moorhead 

Opera Company

FARGO

As the only professional 

opera company within a 

200-mile radius, FargoMoorhead Opera Company (FMO) 

feels a great responsibility to 

provide its community, and those 

in surrounding communities, the 

opportunity to see a live, professional 

opera production, an experience 

not otherwise easily accessible. Area 

representatives from surrounding 

towns, such as Fergus Falls and 

Grand Forks, publicize FMO’s work 

inside their own communities to 

generate interest in opera and FMO’s 

productions.

Since being founded in 1968, 

FMO has presented two or three 

productions a year, providing 

valuable performance opportunities 

for advanced vocal music 

students, talented amateurs, and 

professional singers in the area. To 

increase students’ exposure to and 

understanding of opera, FMO sends 

opera singers, usually students 

from the local universities, into the 

local elementary, middle, and high 

schools. Middle and high school 

students also can purchase deeply 

discounted tickets to FMO’s spring 

production as part of the First Night 

at the Opera program.

In FY 2007 Fargo-Moorhead 

Opera Company received an NEA 

Challenge America grant of $10,000 

for their annual spring production. 

FMO chose to break from their 

usual style for this production—

instead of a fully staged opera, they 

chose to do a concert version of 

Giuseppe Verdi’s Rigoletto, selected 

for the opportunity it gave 

several American artists 

(both new and experienced) 

to sing and conduct this work 

for the fi rst time. To fi ll the 

more than 40-member cast, 

FMO drew from local talent 

as well as national and 

international professional 

artists. 

On April 30 and 

March 1, 2007, around 

1,000 people attended 

the FMO performances 

of Rigoletto at Festival Hall on the 

North Dakota State University 

campus in Fargo. FMO saw this as 

a great opportunity to educate the 

community about the wide range of 

operas that are not often performed 

in their region. 

North Dakota
94 National Endowment for the Arts

GRANt HiGHliGHtS

Culture Works

DAYtON

For residents of southwest 

Ohio looking for the perfect 

gift, Culture Works has 

a suggestion: buy the Arts Card. 

In FY 2007, the NEA awarded 

Cultural Works an Access to Artistic 

Excellence grant of $30,000 to 

help off set initial overhead and 

marketing costs for the cards, which 

can be redeemed at 13 Dayton area 

arts organizations. Two years into 

the project, Denise Rehg, president 

and CEO of Culture Works, has 

deemed the Arts Card a success. 

Sales are self-sustaining, and now 

she’s looking to expand.

“The card is part of a much bigger 

thrust to get arts participation up.” 

Rehg said. “It’s absolutely going 

great.” 

Culture Works began selling 

the cards during the 2006 holiday 

season. Aided by the NEA grant 

money, the alliance launched a 

marketing campaign the following 

December, and sales jumped 

56 percent. The Arts Cards are 

available in denominations of $15 

or more and must be purchased 

through Culture Works. The cultural 

organizations that have signed on to 

accept the cards, so far, range from 

Dayton’s major players—Dayton 

Ballet, Victoria Theatre Association, 

Dayton Art Institute—to smaller 

groups like Cityfolk gallery and 

Rhythm in Shoes dance company. 

The Arts Cards are becoming 

popular corporate gifts. DP&L, 

southwest’s Ohio’s electric 

company, passed out the cards 

to employees during the holiday 

season. Other companies have 

purchased the cards for clients 

and visitors from out of town. 

Culture Works is also reaching 

out to the 24,000 civilian and 

military employees who work at 

Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, 

a largely transient population. 

Future plans call for partnering with 

area universities so that parents 

can easily purchase the Student 

Arts Cards for their students, or 

professors can make the card part of 

class fees. 

Other metropolitan areas have 

experimented with similar arts 

and culture gift cards, but with less 

success. Rehg said the technology 

is now cheaper and easier to work 

with, and it’s time for more local 

arts agencies to give it a shot. 

“What’s really exciting is that it’s a 

model for other communities,” she 

said. 

Wexner Center Foundation

cOlUMBUS

Administrators at Ohio State 

University’s Wexner Center 

for the Arts got more than 

they bargained for when they invited 

Kerry James Marshall to be one of 

four artists-in-residence during 

the 2007-2008 school year. The end 

result, they knew, would be a unique 

work of visual art. What they didn’t 

expect was that the residency would 

evolve into a partnership between 

Marshall, 23 Columbus-area high 

school students, and a troupe of 

Ohio

the Arts card, created by culture Works to be used at arts 

organizations in the Dayton, Ohio, area. 

Image courtesy of Culture Works
 2007 Annual Report 95

GRANt HiGHliGHtS

Japanese Bunraku puppets. 

As it turns out, Marshall, an artist 

dedicated to exploring AfricanAmerican issues, had been looking 

for a chance to collaborate with 

teenagers. He was also hoping to 

learn Bunraku, the art of Japanese 

puppetry. The residency, supported 

by an NEA Access to Artistic 

Excellence grant of $35,000, gave 

him a chance to do both. 

More than 90 teenagers 

auditioned to be a puppeteer in 

Every Beat of My Heart, a play based 

on Marshall’s comic strip, Rythm 

Mastr, about superheroes in the 

African-American community. 

The Wexner Center staff split the 

February 2 – April 13.

“Many of these kids had never 

taken drama classes,” Shelly Casto, 

education director from the Wexner 

Center, said about the students 

participating in the play. “Working 

with Marshall showed them that 

working really hard and going for it 

could pay off .” 

The NEA grant also helped bring 

three other artistic collaborators 

to campus: fi lmmaker Jennifer 

Reeves, SITI Company theater 

ensemble, and guitarist Bill Frisell 

and his trio. All three spent time 

at the university while preparing 

to premiere new works in 

collaboration with students. 

students into nine teams that 

competed for a chance to man 

the puppets. The top three teams 

worked the puppets in the play and 

received a stipend for their eff orts. 

Marshall’s handmade puppets, 

inspired by a trip to Japan, were 

styled in the manner of traditional 

African sculptures. For four nights 

in February 2008, the puppets 

came to life in a play written by 

Marshall about an aging African 

art collector, the Rythm Mastr, and 

the city schoolchildren that bring 

his sculptures to life. An exhibition 

of the puppets, along with some 

of Marshall’s original Rythm Mastr

comic strips, was shown from 

teenage participants handle artist Kerry James Marshall’s handmade puppets in a performance of his play, Every Beat 

of My Heart, at the Wexner center for the Arts in columbus, Ohio. 

Photo by Chet Hey
96 National Endowment for the Arts

GRANt HiGHliGHtS

Lyric Theatre of Oklahoma

OKlAHOMA citY

Founded in 1963, the Lyric 

Theatre of Oklahoma is 

the state’s only year-round 

professional musical theater 

company. In 2007, the theater 

company produced the eight-time 

Tony Award-nominated musical 

Once on This Island, based on the 

novel My Love, My Love by Rosa Guy. 

Utilizing Caribbean storytelling and 

incorporating the use of beautiful 

puppets, the musical off ered an 

exotic experience for Oklahoma City 

audiences. The lighting, costumes, 

scenery, and props turned the Lyric 

Theatre into a Caribbean island 

in the French Antilles. The Lyric 

Theatre received an NEA Access to 

Artistic Excellence grant of $20,000 

in FY 2007 to make this production 

possible. 

Broadway veterans fi lled the 

primary character roles, and 

several local musicians from the 

Oklahoma City Philharmonic 

Orchestra performed the original 

Broadway score. Marcia Milgrom 

Dodge choreographed and directed 

the show, with musical direction 

from David Andrews Rogers. 

The staff noted an increase in 

audience diversity from previous 

performances, perhaps drawn 

by the unusual presentation. An 

estimated 8,000 Oklahomans 

were served by the production of 

Once on This Island.

The theater also off ered 

aff ordable ticket prices for 

the musical. The quality of the 

production earned praise for the 

cast, set design, and costumes. The 

local newspaper, The Oklahoman, 

stated, “In the American musical 

theater, some numbers are known 

as charm songs because of their 

poignant or wistful nature. Perhaps 

only once in a generation does a 

show come along in which nearly 

every number merits such a 

description. Once on This Island is 

one such musical.” 

In addition to off ering 

aff ordable ticket prices, Lyric 

Oklahoma
 2007 Annual Report 97

GRANt HiGHliGHtS

Theatre also had a week of featured 

workshops with cast members. 

More than 50 children ages 

eight to 18 from Thelma Gaylord 

Academy participated in the 

series of workshops. Some of the 

classes taught included Audition 

Techniques, Vocal Coaching, 

Character Development and Career 

Advice, and Dance Fusion – Hip 

Hop, African, Ballet, and Jazz. 

Tulsa Ballet Theatre 

tUlSA

Tulsa Ballet Theatre’s 

mission of preserving 

the traditions of classical 

and contemporary ballet was fully 

achieved with the production of In 

Black, a program involving three 

pieces covering a broad range of 

dance styles. Luciano Cannito’s Viva 

Verdi takes a satirical look at Italian 

culture; Nacho Duato’s Remansos, 

using the music of Spanish 

composer Enrique Granados, 

makes dynamic use of space and 

forms; andHans van Manen’s Black 

Cake showcases the dancers’ acting 

ability. Tulsa Ballet received an 

NEA Access to Artistic Excellence 

grant of $10,000 to support this 

production. 

Regarded as one of the top 

regional companies in North 

America, Tulsa Ballet presented two 

Oklahoma premieres and one world 

premiere as part of In Black. The 

ballet attracted a broader audience 

than it usually receives due to the 

variety of pieces being presented. 

Twenty-nine dancers from 

Tulsa Ballet were involved in the 

production, eager to work with the 

guest choreographers and stagers 

(Tony Fabre for Remansos and Mea 

Venema for Black Cake). 

This presentation helped expand 

the ballet’s existing repertory, 

providing a higher degree of variety 

and opportunity for the dancers. 

Black Cake was Tulsa Ballet’s fi rst 

Hans van Manen work, and the 

dancers were eager to work with 

Venema on this little-known 

piece, performing it for van 

Manen himself the week prior 

to production. 

The audience feedback for the 

four performances of In Black was 

lyric theatre of Oklahoma’s production of 

the musical Once on This Island. 

Photo by Mutz Photography

enthusiastic, as was feedback from 

the press. Arts reviewer James D. 

Watts Jr. commented on the ballet 

in Tulsa World, “Any good ballet 

company can make what it does 

appear eff ortless. A great ballet 

company makes what it does look 

not only eff ortless but unplanned, 

that the dance is being created 

step by step by step in front of 

the audience. That’s the impact 

Viva Verdi has.” 

More than 800 complementary 

tickets were distributed to 40 social 

services agencies for a performance 

of In Black to make the dance piece 

more accessible to many community 

members who might otherwise be 

unable to attend the performance. 

In addition, Tulsa Ballet traveled 

to Seoul, Korea, to perform Black 

Cake as part of the International 

Dance Expo. 

tulsa Ballet dancers Karina 

Gonzalez and Alfonso Martin in 

Hans van Manen’s Black Cake.

Photo by Christopher Jean-Richard 
98 National Endowment for the Arts

GRANt HiGHliGHtS

Caldera

PORtlAND

Y

oung people living in 

Portland and central Oregon 

are fortunate to have the arts 

organization Caldera in their region. 

With a mission of encouraging 

artistic creativity for underserved 

youth in Oregon, Caldera off ers 

art experiences through which 

youth can gain a sense of who they 

are and who they might become. 

Low-income students begin in 

sixth grade and remain connected 

to the organization throughout 

high school, college, and into 

their careers. The students attend 

summer retreats where they 

work with professional artists in 

disciplines such as dance, music, 

theater, and creative writing. The 

artists continue working with the 

youth throughout the school year. 

Caldera received an NEA Learning 

in the Arts grant of $75,000 in FY 

2007 for the year-long project, 

Perspectives in Photography. Onehundred-and-sixty students, ages 

11 to 18, worked with professional 

artists and writers to develop their 

artistic skills. They attended lectures 

by professional photographers and 

operated professional-level digital 

cameras. At the end of their sessions, 

students exhibited the work in their 

community. 

The most signifi cant public 

exhibition during Perspectives 

in Photography was the Hello 

Neighbor Project. Caldera students 

identifi ed, interviewed, and 

photographed an array of neighbors 

in their local communities, all 

of diff erent backgrounds, ages, 

and races. Students then created 

photo-word portraits of the people 

that were printed on large vinyl 

banners and displayed around 

their communities. There were 

108 banners in total, promoting 

a dialogue among community 

members.

The project also gave the students 

a sense of accomplishment and 

belonging to their community. Nine 

communities were involved in the 

project. Caldera students, artists, and 

staff unveiled the banners and led 

community members on a walking 

tour to see each artwork. Through 

programs like Perspectives in 

Photography, Caldera helps awaken 

the students’ creativity, promote selfconfi dence, reveal possible career 

paths, and bring about long-lasting 

relationships. 

Eugene Ballet 

EUGENE

Audience members got a taste 

of the dance traditions of the 

Pacifi c Northwest coastal 

tribes thanks to the Eugene Ballet’s 

production of Children of the Raven. 

The ballet company’s performance 

presented tribal culture through 

contemporary dance, with members 

of the company wearing traditional 

clothing of the coastal tribes. Children 

of the Raven celebrates the legends 

of four Indian tribes: the Haida, 

Caldera

Oregon

Ron McDowell (left), a union iron worker in Portland, and Nathan tran, a student at 

Binnsmead Middle School in Portland, stand in front of the banners tran made after 

interviewing McDowell for caldera’s exhibition, Hello Neighbor Project. 

Photo courtesy of Caldera
 2007 Annual Report 99 Grant Highlights

Kwakiutl, Tlingkt, and Tsimshian. 

The Eugene Ballet received an 

NEA Access to Artistic Excellence 

grant of $10,000 to bring this 

production to ten different 

communities in four different 

states: Idaho, Montana, Oregon, 

and Washington. There were a 

total of 42 activities that took 

place, including performances, 

in-school presentations, master 

classes, and theater workshops. 

The performances and activities 

allowed audiences to experience 

the culture of the tribes through 

traditions such as mask-making, 

storytelling, and ritual dances. 

The Eugene Ballet performed at a 

wide range of performance venues, 

from opera houses to high school 

auditoriums to elementary school 

stages. The variety of locations made 

the performances more accessible 

for a diverse group of people, many 

who had never seen a professional 

dance company before. 

In addition to the outreach 

activities, a 120-page Teachers 

Resource Study Guide was created. 

The guide provided teachers with 

information on the geography, 

history, and culture of the tribes. 

Students not only learned about 

the tribes in the classroom but also 

had a chance to perform with the 

company in parts such as “snow 

pullers” and “bear children.” 

The ballet reached an estimated 

15,000 students and 35,000 

audience members through all the 

events. Children of the Raven provided 

the communities with high quality 

dance while introducing many of 

them to an unfamiliar culture.

Eugene Ballet’s performance 

of Toni Pimble’s Children of the 

Raven, based on the legends 

of the Pacific Northwest Coast 

Native Americans.

Photo by Cliff Coles
100 National Endowment for the Arts

GRANt HiGHliGHtS

Allentown Art Museum

AllENtOWN

I

n 2002, Allentown Art Museum 

asked its longtime patrons 

to name their favorite of the 

museum’s exhibits, discovering a 

1964 show about arms and armor 

stood out. The appeal of knights and 

armor, combined with a promised 

gift to the museum of 110 pieces of 

Renaissance and Baroque armor, 

was the genesis of Allentown 

Art Museum’s most ambitious 

exhibition in a generation: Knight 

in Shining Armor: Myth and Reality, 

1450-1650. In FY 2007, Allentown 

Art Museum received an NEA 

Access to Artistic Excellence grant 

of $15,000 to support their Knight 

in Shining Armor exhibition, which 

ran from January 27 through June 

3, 2007.

The Allentown Art Museum was 

established in 1939 and maintains a 

collection of more than 12,000 works 

of art. With more than 150 objects 

from the Baroque and Renaissance 

periods, including arms and armor 

as well as paintings, prints, and 

tapestries, the exhibition was 

arranged into four sections—Nobility 

and Authority; Religious Imagery; 

Images of War; and Myth, Story, and 

Allegory. The exhibition explained 

how during this time period, armor 

was seen more off the battlefi eld 

than on it, as wearing armor became 

a sign of social status, worn in 

Pennsylvania

Girolamo Romanino’s Portrait of a Gentleman, circa 1520, was part of Allentown 

Art Museum’s Knights in Shining Armor: Myth and Reality,1450-1650 exhibition. 

Courtesy of Allentown Art Museum, Samuel H. Kress Collection

pageants and parades, and often 

seen in portraiture. In addition, the 

exhibition reveals women’s roles 

in armor—from a painting of Joan 

of Arc in armor to the lacy handles 

on swords inspired by women to 

paintings of the Sabine women who 

stopped war by carrying their infants 

as armor onto the battlefi eld.

In order to make the exhibition 

accessible for younger children, 

Allentown Art Museum created the 

Art Ways Interactive Family Gallery, 

recreating Renaissance life with 

workshops, stables, gardens, and the 

home of a knight. In addition, the 

museum arranged a full Renaissance 

evening with music, sword-play 

demonstrations, and a talk by Daniel 

Weiss, president of Lafayette College 
 2007 Annual Report 101

Grant Highlights

and a leading authority on the art of 

medieval Europe in the age of the 

Crusades. 

More than 23,000 people 

participated in the museum’s 

education and outreach programs, 

on top of the more than 41,000 who 

toured the exhibition, proving that 

the public’s fascination with knights 

and armor hasn’t diminished. 

Taller Puertorriqueño

Philadelphia

What started in 1974 

as a communitybased graphic arts 

workshop providing cultural 

training alternatives for local youth 

has grown into a multifaceted 

organization dedicated to the 

preservation, development, and 

promotion of Puerto Rican and 

Latin American artistic and cultural 

traditions. In FY 2007, Taller 

Puertorriqueño received an NEA 

Access to Artistic Excellence grant 

of $35,000 for its 2007-2008 series 

of programs around the theme 

Connecting the Threads of Our 

Pasts and the Hopes of Our Futures. 

Three exhibitions, visited by more 

than 4,500 people, provided the 

foundation of the series, and 

through different means compared 

old traditions and ideas with 

present day practices and views. 

Santos de Puerto Rico: Tallas 

de Fé y Sentimiento (October 5, 

2007-January 12, 2008) presented 

the traditional art of santos, 

religious carvings of statues. The 

exhibition included older examples 

of santos as well as contemporary 

versions, and artisans in residence 

brought to Philadelphia by Puerto 

Rico’s Institute of Culture provided 

demonstrations of the art. 

Following this, Tony Rocco’s 

Photo Essay/Book—True Faces of 

Colombia and Other Stories (February 

8-April 16, 2008) explored how 

Rocco’s portraits of the people of 

Philadelphia and Colombia can 

clarify traditional misconceptions 

about Colombia. While in 

residence, Rocco taught a six-week 

The opening of Taller Puertorriqueño’s exhibition Puerto Rico and the U.S.: A Pervaded Consciousness, which 

featured the art of Miguel Luciano.

Photo courtesy of Taller Puertorriqueño

program for high school students on 

how to use photo-documentation as 

a storytelling tool, concluding with 

an exhibition of the students’ work.

The last exhibit, Puerto Rico and 

the U.S.: A Pervaded Consciousness

(May 9-July 26, 2008) featured 

artwork by Miguel Luciano 

that examines the relationship 

between the two cultures using 

popular, religious, and consumer 

iconography. Luciano taught writing 

workshops for approximately 600 

middle and high school students, 

asserting the importance of 

expressing oneself. The students 

wrote down their feelings in short 

sentences that were then placed 

in coin machines in public spaces, 

allowing the public to insert coins 

and receive one of the students’ 

statements.

As a part of their series, Taller 

Puertorriqueño also presented 

two community festivals, reaching 

more than 11,000 people; a series 

of book readings; and a symposium 

exploring the influences of the 

African Diaspora on Latino culture.
102 National Endowment for the Arts

Grant Highlights

New Urban Arts

Providence

Artistically inclined students 

in Providence, Rhode 

Island, have a unique 

place to spend time after school. 

Since 1997, New Urban Arts has 

been offering a drop-in studio for 

teenagers. Under the curatorial 

eyes of new Executive Director 

Jason Yoon, a record 165 students 

enrolled and were mentored by 

15 working Rhode Island artists 

during the 2007-08 school year. To 

help the studio keep pace with such 

growth, New Urban Arts received an 

NEA Learning in the Arts grant of 

$25,000 in 2007. 

More than 1,300 students have 

participated in the program over 

the past eight years, with some 150 

artists serving as mentors. (Yoon 

himself worked as a mentor as an 

undergraduate at The Rhode Island 

School of Design.) When students 

arrive at the studio each October, 

they are grouped according to 

artistic discipline. Options typically 

include drawing, photography, 

poetry, and fashion design. Yoon 

hasn’t had to turn kids down or 

screen students for their abilities—

yet—but knows demand will soon 

exceed space available in the busy 

studio. 

“Students here feel a lot of 

ownership,” Yoon said. “They 

keep coming back because of the 

relationships they form with the 

mentor artists. These are mutually 

beneficial relationships. New Urban 

Arts is fueled by both the students’ 

and the artists’ enthusiasm.” 

Artist mentor Adrienne Benz guides student 

Laura Huaranga during a New Urban Arts afterschool studio session. 

Photo by Jesse Banks III
 2007 Annual Report 103

GRANt HiGHliGHtS

Yoon took over as executive 

director in February after the studio 

bid a fond farewell to founder Tyler 

Denmead. As a student at Brown 

University back in 1997, Denmead 

and a few friends started off ering 

free art lessons in a downtown loft 

apartment. The following year, they 

relocated into a double-storefront 

space near two urban high schools, 

and New Urban Arts was born. 

In 1999, Denmead began 

recruiting artist mentors to work 

with students two afternoons 

each week throughout the school 

year. Contacts at the schools 

and local social service agencies 

recommended students, and 

funding began trickling in. Soon the 

After-School Studio was recognized 

as a community necessity rather 

than an artistic curiosity. In 2003, 

readers of the Providence Phoenix

chose New Urban Arts as Rhode 

Island’s Nonprofi t of the Year. 

Trinity Repertory Company

PROViDENcE

Thornton Wilder may have 

modeled Grover’s Corners 

on Peterborough, New 

Hampshire, but cities and towns 

throughout New England claim 

his play Our Town as their own 

story of love, death, and life in a 

close-knit community. In January 

2007, Trinity Repertory Company 

used a nontraditional staging to 

personalize this classic American 

drama for Providence, Rhode 

Island. The theater received an 

NEA Access to Artistic Excellence 

grant of $25,000 to support the 

production. 

Barbara Meek, an AfricanAmerican actress who has been with 

the theater for more than 40 years, 

played the stage manager, a role 

typically fi lled by an older white 

male. As in any other production 

of Our Town, the stage manager 

introduced the townspeople to the 

audience and narrated Wilder’s 

three-act play. Meek also supervised 

a unique two-tier stage conceived 

by director Brian McEleney. The 

traditional lower level was strewn 

with chairs and tables for the 

characters in Our Town, including 

Emily Webb, George Gibbs, and 

Constable Warren. On the second 

fl oor, designer Eugene Lee created 

a faux Green Room where the off -

stage actors relaxed in full view of 

the audience. 

The show ran for six weeks, 

reaching more than 20,000 

people—almost 12 percent of the 

Providence population—including 

the governor, the mayor, and half of 

the state’s congressional delegation. 

Eight of the 44 shows were sold-out 

student matinees. Curt Columbus, 

artistic director of Trinity Rep, 

attributed the turnout to a sense of 

community ownership. Working 

with the City of Providence and 

the Providence public schools, 

the theater sponsored an essay 

contest for middle and high school 

students. The theater also collected 

photos of Providence taken circa 

1911 for a lobby display. 

“We tried to engage the 

community as much as possible, 

and it worked,” Columbus said. 

“It was so moving to watch 

Thornton Wilder’s 1937 play turn 

into a contemporary play for this 

audience. ... I love Our Town so 

much. It is not the old chestnut that 

some people think it is. The play 

has intense contemporary impact 

if it’s done well. There is nothing 

sentimental about it.” 

Rhode Island

Susannah Flood as Emily Webb, Barbara 

Meek as Stage Manager, and Eric Murdoch 

as George Gibbs in trinity Repertory 

company’s production of Our Town by 

thornton Wilder. 

Photo by T. Charles Erickson
104 National Endowment for the Arts

GRANt HiGHliGHtS

Greenville Symphony 

Orchestra

GREENVillE

I

n February 2008, Greenville 

audiences were treated to 

a special concert by the 

Greenville Symphony Orchestra 

(GSO). The concert, entitled A 

“Knight” of Percussion, featured 

guest artist, Scottish virtuoso 

percussionist Dame Evelyn Glennie. 

The highlight of the performance 

was Kevin Puts’s Percussion 

Concerto, which Glennie performed 

on the vibraphone, fi ve-octave 

marimba, glockenspiel, twooctave crotales, and tubular bells. 

Profoundly deaf since age 12, 

Glennie is considered by many to 

be the premier solo percussionist in 

classical music. The GSO received 

an NEA Access to Artistic Excellence 

grant of $10,000 to invite 

Glennie to headline two weekend 

performances with the orchestra. 

In addition to those feature 

appearances, the GSO worked with 

the South Carolina School for Deaf 

and Blind on a series of community 

engagements featuring Glennie. 

Two concert previews were held free 

of charge, featuring lectures about 

Glennie’s works. 

The GSO held adult education 

programs in the form of salons 

taught by the orchestra’s principal 

timpanist, Sherwood Mobley, and 

South Carolina

Dame Evelyn Glennie, a 

premier solo percussionist in 

classical music, performed 

with the Greenville 

Symphony Orchestra. 

Photo by Richard Ecclestone/ 

Sabian

local professor John Beckford. 

“I became convinced in order 

for orchestras to stay relevant 

to their communities, we must, 

in part, be a resource for the 

entire community, not just our 

subscribers,” said Braxton Ballew, 

GSO education director, of the 

outreach eff orts of the project. About 

520 students experienced the magic 

of Glennie through in-school visits, 

performances, and the screening of 

Touch the Sound, the award-winning 

documentary on Glennie’s life. Out of 

those students, roughly a quarter were, 

like Glennie, hearing impaired. In 
 2007 Annual Report 105

Grant Highlights

learning about sound and vibration, 

the students were excited—they 

understood the passion behind the 

music, and the connection between 

the magnificent sensations of 

hearing and feeling.

As Ballew put it, “Just about 

everyone that comes in contact 

with Evelyn has a life-changing 

experience, and for the better.” 

Glennie’s performance and school 

visits brought new educational and 

cultural experiences to the citizens 

of Greenville, and was considered 

by many to have been one of the best 

programs of the year.

Sumter Gallery of Art

Sumter

Curators Mark Sloan and 

Brad Thomas of the Sumter 

Gallery of Art (SGA) 

travelled to Japan to find artists 

whose work brought to light the 

constant interaction between 

humans and nature, choosing works 

that not only spoke to the ephemeral 

quality of nature, but also are sitebased, temporary installations 

themselves. The reason for this visit 

was to prepare for a new traveling 

exhibition, Force of Nature.

Ten Japanese artists conducted 

six-week residencies at seven 

institutions throughout the 

Carolinas. Hosts such as the 

Halsey Institute at the College of 

Charleston, University of North 

Carolina-Charlotte, and Winthrop 

University Galleries participated 

in the first phase of the project 

by hosting and often providing 

materials for the exhibitions. 

At the College of Charleston, 

artist Yamamoto Motoi created 

a salt labyrinth in the middle of 

the student library’s rotunda. At 

the McColl Center for Visual Art 

in Charlotte, North Carolina, 

Aiko Miyanaga used caught 

butterflies and salt evaporated 

from Charleston, South Carolina, 

seawater to create her pieces. 

The culminating exhibition at 

the Sumter Gallery of Art in April 

2007 brought Motoi back from 

Japan to create another of his 

stunning, painstakingly created 

salt labyrinths. Photographs 

and selections from each of the 

exhibitions were also displayed at 

the gallery through June 2007. 

The exhibition was supported by 

an NEA Challenge America grant of 

$10,000. The gallery is often a field 

trip destination, but this exhibit 

was more unusual than most. In 

addition, during Motoi’s time in 

Sumter, the artist completed a 

two-day residence at Sumter High 

School, one of the largest schools in 

the state. The biggest success of the 

program, said Executive Director 

Karen Watson, was that “regular 

students walking by the exhibit 

were interested and got involved.” 

In total, about 1,700 high schoolers 

interacted with Motoi during his 

stay, in addition to the 2,100 

visitors to the gallery. The exhibition 

was temporary, but its effect was 

lasting. Eventually the three tons 

of salt used in Motoi’s piece were 

returned to the Atlantic Ocean by 

Watson and gallery employees, 

once again bringing the connection 

between humans, art, and nature 

full circle. 

Students from Sumter High School look on as Yamamoto Motoi painstakingly 

creates a salt labyrinth artwork. 

Photo by The Item, Sumter, South Carolina
106 National Endowment for the Arts

GRANt HiGHliGHtS

First Peoples Fund 

RAPiD citY

S

ince 1999, the Community 

Spirit Awards have honored 

36 artists from 26 diff erent 

Native-American Nations from 

Alaska to Maine. Honorees are 

Native-American artists nominated 

by their tribes for their generosity, 

humility, and ability to inspire 

and teach. Their crafts range from 

the contemporary—mixed-media 

installations and photography—to 

the traditional—canoe-making and 

storytelling. For the past eight years, 

the awards were presented to those 

who keep alive the ancient way of 

life and resurrect forgotten tribal 

ceremonies and traditions.

In FY 2007, the First Peoples 

Fund received an NEA Access 

to Artistic Excellence grant of 

$30,000 toward a publication 

commemorating the Community 

Spirit Award artists, featuring 

nine years’ worth of stories and 

anecdotes. The 72-page booklet 

will bring recognition to the diverse 

cultures within the Lakota Nation 

itself, as well as in the surrounding 

rural communities. “This gives us 

the opportunity to share the voices 

of the indigenous Americans with 

the rest of America,” said Lori 

Pourier, president of the First 

Peoples Fund. “A banker from 

a local community attended the 

ceremony last year. All he could say 

South Dakota

Julia Parker, a basketweaver and 2007 NEA National Heritage Fellow, is one of the 

recipients of the community Spirit Awards, honoring Native-American artists. 

Photo courtesy of First Peoples Fund

afterward was ‘I had no idea.’”

Included in the publication are 

biographies of the artists, samples 

of their work, and commentary 

from their nominators and others 

in their tribes. The publication will 

be distributed to local libraries and 

colleges as a learning tool, and to the 
 2007 Annual Report 107

GRANt HiGHliGHtS

artists’ tribes, where their tales will 

be preserved in print forever. Plans 

to create an interactive DVD-ROM 

are also in the works.

To honor these artists is to honor 

the communities themselves: it is 

the role of the artist in Northern 

Plains communities to serve the 

people by bringing them spirit 

and inspiration. Continuing this 

tradition is pivotal to preserving 

and sustaining the Lakota Nation’s 

unique culture. Said Pourier, “It’s 

interesting how when one member 

is honored, it inspires the spirit of 

others to serve, too.”

Four Bands 

Community Fund

EAGlE BUttE

The Lakota Nation in South 

Dakota encompasses eight 

diff erent Native-American 

reservations, of which the largest 

are the Cheyenne River, Pine Ridge, 

and Rosebud reservations, each 

about the size of Connecticut. The 

Four Bands Community Fund, 

located within the Cheyenne 

River reservation, is committed to 

promoting the preservation and 

appreciation of the Lakota Nation’s 

rich cultural and artistic heritage.

Their revered tribal history and 

holistic, harmonic approach to life 

carry through into the art of Native 

Americans. In FY 2007, the Four 

Bands Community Fund received an 

NEA Access to Artistic Excellence 

grant of $20,000 to promote the 

art forms of the Lakota peoples 

to the thousands of tourists and 

families that visit the reservations 

annually. From early June to midAugust, the Red Cloud Indian Art 

Show presents the work of artists in 

traditional media such as parfl eches

(folded containers made from dyed 

animal hides), beadwork, drummaking, quillwork (from porcupine 

needles), and the traditional star 

quilt, brought to the tribes by their 

women who were educated at Amish 

boarding schools in the late 19th 

century. 

The art show drew 7,800 people 

from all over the country. “For 

an extremely rural and isolated 

area, the show brought an amazing 

amount of tourists,” said Nicole 

Seaton, Four Bands’ program 

coordinator. In order to draw these 

massive crowds, the fund placed 

brochures in all of South Dakota’s 

highway rest stops and created huge 

banners to hang in high traffi c areas 

near the reservations. To make the 

show and information even more 

accessible, the Native Discovery 

Partnership created a Web site with 

information about the artists. 

The artists’ creativity is 

evident—they combined new art 

forms with old ideas, like painting 

on a canvas as opposed to a hide 

or using traditional techniques for 

the beading of cartoon characters. 

“When you think of Indians, you 

tend to think of something of the 

past. Our show revealed that people 

are still here, and aren’t doing the 

same art you saw 100 years ago,” 

Seaton explained. 

A visitor to the 41st annual Red cloud indian Art Show views contemporary 

Native-American art. 

Photo courtesy of Heritage Center at Red Cloud Indian School
108 National Endowment for the Arts

GRANt HiGHliGHtS

Beale Street Caravan

MEMPHiS

I

t is only right that Memphis, 

the home of the blues, is also 

home to the most widely 

distributed blues radio program in 

the world, Beale Street Caravan.

This weekly radio series is the 

only syndicated radio program that 

broadcasts live performances of 

the blues on public radio, and it is 

heard by an audience of 2.4 million 

listeners each week on more than 

300 U.S. affi liate stations and more 

than 100 affi liate stations in Europe, 

Japan, Australia, New Zealand, 

Africa, and Asia. In FY 2007, the 

show received an NEA Arts on Radio 

and Television grant of $10,000 to 

support its production and national 

broadcast.

Beale Street Caravan includes 

recordings at great blues festivals 

across the U.S., such as the 

Mississippi Valley Blues Festival in 

Davenport, Iowa; the Waterfront 

Blues Festival in Portland, 

Oregon; and the Arkansas Blues 

and Heritage Festival in Helena, 

Arkansas. Each broadcast features 

live performances and a discussion 

of the participating musicians’ 

history and contributions to the 

blues. 

Each episode also has a guest 

host, who explores in-depth a 

particular subject relating to the 

blues, which are then broadcast in 

fi ve- to eight-minute segments. 

Between May 2007 and August 

2008, actress Cybill Shepherd 

narrated a series on the history of 

women in the blues, food historian 

Jessica Harris explored food and 

the blues, scholar Dick Raichelson 

spoke on the history and music of 

Beale Street, and ethnomusicologist 

and author David Evans’s series 

focused on the unsung heroes of 

the blues. 

Beale Street Caravan highlights a 

wide range of performers, from 

Dan Penn and Spooner Oldham, 

who wrote numerous hits in the 

1970s and 1980s, to the North 

Mississippi Allstars, made up of 

younger musicians whose music 

integrates the blues with other 

genres. The program included a 

show on a pioneer of the blues, 

Little Milton Campbell, who 

passed away in 2005, by 

broadcasting his fi nal live 

recorded performance.

This variety helps Beale Street 

Caravan appeal to a broad range of 

listeners, satisfying those who have 

been life-long fans of the blues 

and cultivating those who may be 

experiencing the blues for the fi rst 

time through this radio show.

Tennessee

chris chew, bass player for the North 

Mississippi Allstars, performs at the 

San Francisco Blues Festival, one of the 

festivals at which Beale Street Caravan 

records. 

Photo courtesy of Beale Street Caravan
Grant Highlights

Nashville Symphony 

Association 

Nashville

As one of the most active 

recording orchestras in 

the country, the Nashville 

Symphony has utilized recordings as 

a means to reach broader audiences 

and fulfill its mission—to perform 

and present the highest quality 

music, with a focus on the creation, 

promotion, and preservation of 

American repertoire. 

In September 2006 the Nashville 

Symphony marked its inaugural 

season in its new home, the 

Schermerhorn Symphony Center, 

by launching American Encores, 

an initiative that integrates work by 

American composers that is largely 

neglected or rarely performed as 

part of each classical subscription 

concert. In 2007 this program 

expanded through an NEA Arts 

on Radio and Television grant 

of $10,000 to include 13 onehour radio programs featuring 

composers included in the 

American Encores program. 

The radio program, also called 

American Encores, is hosted by 

renowned conductor and Nashville 

symphony music advisor Leonard 

Slatkin with co-host and Nashville 

composer and bassist Edgar Meyer, 

and includes both performances by 

Nashville Symphony and interviews 

with composers, conductors, guest 

artists, musicologists, and audience 

members. 

The Nashville Symphony chose 

works to be a part of the American 

Encores initiative by looking 

for pieces that deserve repeated 

hearings, whether for their unique 

instrumentation, compositional 

techniques, or ability to attract a 

younger audience. For 2007-2008, 

featured pieces included Jubilee: A 

Tennessee Quilting Party for Orchestras

by Kenneth Schermerhorn, 

former Nashville Symphony music 

director and principal conductor, 

and Joan Tower’s Chamber Dance, 

as well as two co-commissions by 

the Nashville Symphony: Philip 

Glass’s The Passion of Ramakrisna 

and Michael Daugherty’s Deus ex 

Machina. Ninety-two markets 

picked up the series, reaching 

approximately 2.6 million listeners.

In addition to the broadcast of 

the one-hour shows on the radio, 

the Nashville Symphony also 

created companion podcasts for 

each episode of American Encores. 

The 15-minute segments included 

additional commentary, interviews, 

and music, and could be downloaded 

through the Nashville Symphony’s 

Web site. Because of the symphony’s 

efforts, you no longer need a ticket 

to hear a rare performance of works 

by America’s greatest contemporary 

composers.

Renowned bassist Edgar Meyer, co-host of the radio program American Encores.

Photo by Jimmy Ienner Jr.
110 National Endowment for the Arts

GRANt HiGHliGHtS

Museum of the Southwest 

MiDlAND

The city of Midland, Texas, 

is so named because it’s 

located halfway between El 

Paso and Dallas. By car, it’s about a 

six-hour drive each way. In fact, it’s 

about six hours to anywhere, says 

Tom Jones, executive director of the 

Museum of the Southwest. That’s 

why he takes his job so seriously. 

The Museum of the Southwest is 

the only museum many Midland 

residents will ever see.

The campus is shared by three 

branches of the museum: a 

planetarium, children’s museum, 

and art galleries. All activity revolves 

around the Turner Mansion, the 

1937 home of Fred Turner Jr., an oil 

prospector who struck it rich during 

the Great Depression. In 1968, 

Turner’s daughters bequeathed the 

property to the museum. 

With strong private support 

from the Turner family and other 

benefactors, the museum grew 

and fl ourished. Four wings were 

built during the 1970s and ’80s. 

By the time Jones arrived in 1996, 

the buildings were in good shape 

but many of the 12,000 artworks 

needed upkeep. Jones has rotated 

through the museum’s collection, 

undertaking conservation projects. 

In 2007, the museum received an 

NEA Access to Artistic Excellence 

grant of $10,000 to remount 

and reframe its collection of 48 

silk screen printings by NativeAmerican artist Woody Crumbo 

(1912-1989). Crumbo gave the 

works to the museum two decades 

ago, and they’d been sitting in fl at 

storage ever since. Now a major 

exhibition is planned for 2009.

The grant also funded the 

fi rst-ever cleaning for nine of the 

campus’s 14 freestanding works 

in the fi ve-acre sculpture garden. 

The museum only began installing 

sculptures in the garden 10 years 

ago, but as Jones said, “The dust 

blows in West Texas, and it will 

erode works over time.”

Conservator Csilla Felker Dennis 

spent several days cleaning the 

sculptures and coating vulnerable 

areas with wax. The garden includes 

various works, mostly by Texas 

artists, that depict life in the 

Southwest. “We’re trying to create 

an environment where people 

see the sculptures and feel 

compelled to stop by and walk 

around,” Jones said. “It’s a real 

oasis in the desert.”

Texas

conservator csilla Felker Dennis applies wax to vulnerable surfaces of Glenna 

Goodacre’s 1994 sculpture Carefree, one of 15 works in the Museum of the 

Southwest’s sculpture garden.

 Photo courtesy Museum of the Southwest
 2007 Annual Report 111

Grant Highlights

Fort Worth Opera

Fort Worth

Fort Worth Opera announced 

that it would stage Angels 

in America in 2008. The 

opera by Hungarian composer Peter 

Eötvös is based on Tony Kushner’s 

groundbreaking 1991 play about 

living with AIDS during Reaganera America. A year before the 

production opened, Darren Keith 

Woods, artistic director of the opera, 

held a city-wide brainstorming 

session. From that initial gathering 

grew More Life, a calendar of 50-

plus events organized by the opera, 

AIDS Outreach Center, Samaritan 

House, and the Tarrant County AIDS 

Interfaith Network. 

The More Life schedule included 

everything from town hall meetings 

to readings to a mini-film festival. 

And of course, there were seven 

performances of Angels in America at 

the W.E. Scott Theatre in downtown 

Fort Worth. The opera company 

received an NEA Access to Artistic 

Excellence grant of $20,000 to 

support the production. 

The scoring of the opera calls 

for fewer than 20 instruments, 

including two keyboards and an 

electric guitar. Woods said he 

was able to put together “a dream 

cast.” Dallas Morning News music 

critic Scott Cantrell agreed. “My 

hat’s off to Fort Worth Opera for 

programming a work as challenging 

sociologically and musically as 

Angels in America, and for doing it 

superbly,” Cantrell said. 

Several of the seven performances 

sold out. Woods knows some of 

these people came more for the 

message than the music, and hopes 

all audiences left intrigued. “We are 

trying to do what art purports to do,” 

Woods said. “If art doesn’t provoke 

you, and make you think about 

something again in a different way, 

then we’re not really doing our job.” 

Although Fort Worth Opera long 

has maintained a reputation as a top 

regional company—it was founded 

in 1938—under Woods’ leadership, 

the company has undertaken several 

groundbreaking productions. 

Staging the second American 

production of Angels in America 

followed in that groundbreaking 

vein.

Prior (David Adam Moore) receives a visit from an angel (Ava Pine) in Fort Worth 

Opera’s 2008 production of Angels in America. 

Photo by Ellen Appel
112 National Endowment for the Arts

GRANt HiGHliGHtS

Ballet West

SAlt lAKE citY

I

n the spring of 2006, Ballet 

West unexpectedly found itself 

without an artistic director. 

Planning the 2006-2007 season 

was tricky—the company premiere 

of new work had to be canceled—but 

interim director Pamela RobinsonHarris was determined to turn the 

transition into a golden opportunity. 

She and the company closed out 

the season by performing Carmina 

Burana for the fi rst time in more 

than ten years. Ballet West was able 

to use its NEA Access to Artistic 

Excellence grant of $20,000 to 

support the production. 

Robinson-Harris was dancing in 

the company back in 1984, when the 

choreographer John Butler came to 

Salt Lake to present his version of 

Carmina with the company. Set to 

Carl Orff ’s 1936 secular oratorio of 

the same title, Butler’s dynamic and 

muscular movement plays up the 

bawdy and bizarre lyrics. Orff took 

his texts from a collection of 13thcentury German poems and songs 

written by monks and minstrels. 

Frankfurt Opera premiered the 

music in 1937, while New York City 

Opera debuted Butler’s ballet in 

1959. In May 2007, the audience in 

Salt Lake was hooked from the fi rst 

“O Fortuna” refrain. 

“Carmina Burana has long been a 

favorite with our audience. People 

have been asking for it to come back 

for years.” Robinson-Harris said. 

“The music is just so powerful, and 

everyone that listens to it has a story 

that they see going on in their heads. 

... The people who came to hear just 

the music walked away loving the 

dance as well.”

The NEA-funded Carmina 

brought together a triumvirate of 

Salt Lake arts organizations: the 

ballet, the Utah Chamber Orchestra, 

and the Salt Lake Choral Artists. 

Guest soloists included soprano 

Genevieve Christianson, tenor 

George Dyer, and baritone David 

Power. Ballet West also created 

all new sets and costumes for the 

performance.

 “Everyone rallied,” RobinsonHarris said. “We have a beautiful 

company, and our supporters 

are very strong. Everyone pulled 

together to make things work, and 

we are thrilled to have this ballet 

back in our repertory.” 

Utah

Ballet West’s Stephanie 

Fenz danced in the 

company’s 2007 

production of Carmina 

Burana. 

Photo by Quinn Farley
 2007 Annual Report 113

Grant Highlights

Salt Lake City 

Arts Council

Salt Lake City

S

alt Lake City’s festival scene 

begins each May with the 

Living Traditions Festival. It’s 

risky, said festival director Casey 

Jarman, kicking off the first of many 

outdoor events in Utah’s capital. But 

Living Traditions, a folk festival run 

by the Salt Lake City Arts Council, 

has longevity on its side. In 2007, 

40,000 came out to the 22nd annual 

festival, held May 18-20 on the city 

hall grounds in downtown. “These 

types of festivals tend to come and 

go, and we’re pretty proud to have 

lasted so long,” Jarman said. Living 

Traditions has been perpetuated by 

its strong support infrastructure, 

commitment to authenticity, and 

the work from some 400 volunteers. 

In 2007, the arts council received 

an NEA Challenge America grant of 

$10,000 to support the festival.

Jarman and his three colleagues 

work out of the Art Barn, a 

75-year-old community art 

center that is considered an 

artistic treasure. In addition to 

running Living Traditions, the 

council awards grants, runs a 

guest writer series, and organizes 

a twilight concert series that 

attracts national independent 

artists. Living Traditions 2007 

featured two visiting guest artists: 

bluesman Alabama Slim and 

Afropop recording star Aurelio 

Martinez. The main purpose of the 

festival, however, is to give the folk 

traditions of Utah center stage. 

Local favorites the Chris Dokos 

Band kicked off the entertainment 

with celebratory Greek music. 

From there, musical offerings ran 

the global gamut, from a Swiss 

chorus to Japanese taiko drumming 

to Tongo singers. Dancers had a 

chance to perform as well, with 

troupes representing the Sudan, El 

Salvador, and Bulgaria, and other 

featured nations. 

Even the food vendors must have 

ties both locally and abroad. Each 

year, Jarman and his staff review 

dozens of menus proposed by local 

nonprofit groups. They screen 

for variety and authenticity. “We 

want to make sure that everything 

is authentic and traditional to 

the communities that are here 

in Salt Lake,” Jarman said. The 

festival also includes traditional 

arts and crafts workshops, a bocce 

ball tournament, and the Living 

Traditions Quest, a family scavenger 

hunt. 

Young dancers from the Utah-based 

Chinese Performing Art Group 

demonstrate traditional folk dances at 

the 2007 Living Traditions Festival. 

Photo courtesy of Salt Lake City Arts Council
114 National Endowment for the Arts

GRANt HiGHliGHtS

Vermont Studio Center 

JOHNSON

S

ince its establishment by 

artists in 1983, the Vermont 

Studio Center (VSC) 

has provided four- to 12-week 

independent studio residencies 

to more than 8,000 visual artists 

and writers from 92 countries. VSC 

is the largest artists’ and writers’ 

residency program in the United 

States, hosting 50 visual artists and 

writers each month on a historic 

30-building campus along the 

Gihon River in Johnson, Vermont. 

In 2007, VSC received an NEA 

Access to Artistic Excellence grant 

of $20,000 to support full and 

partial fellowships for economically 

disadvantaged artists and writers. 

With the NEA’s help, writers 

Melissa Kwasny (Montana) and 

Aaron Belz (Missouri) and visual 

artists Alexandra Huddleston (New 

Mexico) and Stephanie Serpick 

(Illinois) benefi ted from VSC 

residencies. As Kwasny wrote in 

her thank you letter to the center, 

“The residency program . . . and full 

fellowships, especially for those of 

us who cannot aff ord to pay to go 

somewhere in order to [work on 

our art] without distractions, are 

crucial.”

Selected through a rigorous jury 

process, full fellows receive room 

and board, a private work studio, 

and a stipend. Those that receive 

partial fellowships are able to apply 

for work exchange opportunities to 

off set the costs of their residencies. 

VSC fellows also participate as 

visiting artists in the VSC/Johnson 

Elementary School Art and Culture 

program, which provides weekly 

arts education classes to nearly 300 

kindergarten through sixth-grade 

students. 

All VSC fellows are given an 

opportunity to share their work 

with the community through open 

studio tours, craft talks, slide shows, 

lectures, and readings. Participating 

visual artists with full fellowships 

are also off ered individual 

exhibitions in the center’s Red Mill 

gallery; partial fellowship recipients 

exhibited their work as part of a 

group show. While in residence, 

fellows also can meet with a roster 

of distinguished visiting artists and 

writers. In 2007, this acclaimed 

group included glass artist Hank 

Adams, painter Therese Oulton, 

and poets Toi Derricotte and 

Stanley Plumly.

Flynn Center for the 

Performing Arts 

BURliNGtON

S

ince 1984, the Flynn Center 

for the Performing Arts 

has annually presented the 

Burlington Discover Jazz Festival, 

a jam-packed ten days of jazz 

concerts, lectures, interviews, 

master classes, and workshops. The 

center received an NEA Access to 

Artistic Excellence grant of $17,500 

to support artist residencies and 

performances during the 2007 

festival, which took place June 1-10. 

The festival presented a full roster 

of nationally and internationally 

recognized jazz artists at venues 

citywide, including the historic 

Flynn Theatre, City Hall, the Church 

Street Marketplace, and even on 

Lake Champlain. Discover Jazz 

Vermont

Stephanie Serpick in her studio during 

her Vermont Studio center residency in 

June 2007. 

Photo courtesy of Vermont Studio Center
 2007 Annual Report 115

GRANt HiGHliGHtS

also provided educational and 

performance opportunities for 

local middle school, high school, 

and college jazz musicians. Festival 

organizers encouraged widespread 

community participation, 

presenting workshops targeted 

to at-risk youth and Burlington’s 

ethnic refugee population and 

making subsidized tickets available 

for low-income residents.

Highlights of the 2007 festival 

included a conversation with 

Bela Fleck and NEA Jazz Master 

Chick Corea as part of the Meet 

the Artists sessions moderated by 

noted jazz historian and critic Bob 

Blumenthal. The Mary Lou 

Williams Resurgence Project, 

presented by jazz vibraphonist and 

composer Cecelia Smith, featured 

a lecture-demonstration on the 

pioneering jazz artist, a vibes master 

class, and a residency with the 

Burlington Discover Jazz Festival 

Big Band and the Champlain 

Valley High School Chorus. Free 

concerts were held throughout the 

festival, including presentations by 

more than 35 student jazz bands. 

Nearly 38,000 people attended 

the 2007 festival, which—thanks to 

partnerships with local public and 

commercial radio stations—also 

boasted a broadcast audience of 

approximately 65,000 listeners. 

According to Arnie Malina, the 

festival’s artistic director, “The 

NEA allows our festival to achieve 

broader access and to include 

lesser known and emerging as well 

as innovative artists, which keeps 

the festival fresh and a sense of 

adventure alive. The artistic mix, 

the gatherings of people attending 

free concerts, which this grant 

also makes possible, including 

families listening to their children 

performing, expands the jazz 

audience and helps us create a 

genuine community experience.”

the Kenny Garrett Quartet, with 

special guest Pharoah Sanders (left), 

played at the Burlington Discover 

Jazz Festival in 2007. 

Photo by Dana Pleasant
116 National Endowment for the Arts

GRANt HiGHliGHtS

Jefferson Center 

Foundation 

ROANOKE

Located on the campus of 

Roanoke’s historic 86-year 

old Jeff erson High School, 

the Jeff erson Center Foundation is 

the leading visual and performing 

arts presenter for western Virginia. 

Its jampacked calendar of cultural 

and educational events has included 

performances by NEA National 

Heritage Fellow Chuck Brown, an 

Irish music festival, and a rotating 

series of gallery exhibitions. A 

core priority for the Jeff erson 

Center is partnering with cultural 

and social service organizations 

to better serve diverse segments 

of the community. In FY 2007, the 

center received an NEA Access to 

Artistic Excellence grant of $20,000 

to support The Blind Leading..., 

a multidisciplinary project in 

partnership with the Virginia 

Association of the Blind. Through 

performances, public discussions, 

workshops, and a fi lm series, the 

six-month project explored the 

connection between blindness and 

creativity.

Highlights included concerts 

by blind performers, such as NEA 

National Heritage Fellows the Blind 

Boys of Alabama and Arthel “Doc” 

Watson, and Louisiana barrelhouse 

pianist Henry Butler. Dr. David 

Hartman, a blind psychiatrist, 

facilitated pre-performance 

audience discussions with the Blind 

Boys and Butler respectively on 

the positive and negative eff ects 

of blindness on their careers. 

Hartman also hosted a screening and 

discussion of classic fi lms dealing 

with aspects of blindness, such as 

Scent of a Woman. The Blind 

Leading ... included workshop 

sessions on blindness and artistry, a 

training session on audio description 

techniques, and a panel discussion 

with all of the participants. 

Special eff orts were made 

to include visually impaired 

audience members, such as free 

transportation, audio description 

of all events, and Braille-translated 

program information. The center’s 

Artistic Director Dylan Locke 

explained that the project’s impact 

on the community “was substantial 

in that a larger audience was made 

aware of a smaller underserved part 

of their community. This awareness 

can only bring about a better, more 

Virginia

Henry Butler (left) performing as part of the Jefferson center Foundation’s project, the Blind leading... 

Photo courtesy of Jeff erson Center Foundation
 2007 Annual Report 117

Grant Highlights

conscious community. Even if it 

comes about in small doses, this will 

be the focus of Jefferson Center’s 

programming and outreach in the 

future.” 

Wolf Trap Foundation for 

the Performing Arts

Vienna

Catherine Filene Shouse, 

the indomitable founder of 

the Wolf Trap Foundation 

for the Performing Arts, mandated 

that the organization “preserve 

significant artistic traditions while 

supporting new initiatives, foster 

the careers of the next generation 

of artists, and make education 

a key component in its artistic 

offerings.” This is an apt description 

of Wolf Trap’s Discovery Series, 

which not only presents emerging 

and established chamber music 

stars on the same stage, but also 

encourages interaction between the 

public and the performers through 

a post-intermission question-andanswer session and a free postperformance dessert reception at 

which audience members can meet 

the performers face-to-face.

In FY 2007, Wolf Trap received an 

NEA Arts on Radio and Television 

grant of $10,000 to support the 

production, distribution, and 

broadcast of Center Stage from 

Wolf Trap, a series of 13 one-hour 

radio programs featuring live 

performances from the Discovery 

Series airing in 2008. The program 

presented concert recordings from 

the 2006-2007 Discovery Series 

season. Performers included world 

renowned groups such as the Paris 

Piano Trio, the Ahn Trio, and 

the Turtle Island String Quartet, 

playing a range of work by Johannes 

Brahms, Dmitri Shostakovich, and 

Benjamin Britten, among others. 

Also highlighted on Center Stage

were choral performances and 

lieder recitals, such as tenor Eric 

Culter’s appearance with pianist 

Kim Pensinger Witman. 

In addition to highlighting 

selections from the traditional 

repertoire, the program’s innovative 

Off the Beaten Track segment also 

introduced listeners to new work 

from the contemporary chamber 

music scene, such as NEA Jazz 

Master Paquito D’Rivera’s AfroMexican tinged small-group work, 

“Wapango.” The musical selections 

are punctuated by unscripted 

analysis, conversation, and 

commentary from co-hosts Rich 

Kleinfeldt—who also emcees the 

live performances at Wolf Trap—and 

Bill McGlaughlin. The lively duo 

introduce each work, offering 

little-known facts about the artists 

and the composers. The nationally 

syndicated show is carried on nearly 

250 stations nationwide adding 

an estimated 10 million listeners 

to the more than 2,000 chamber 

aficionados who attend the live 

Discovery Series performances.

Center Stage from Wolf Trap host Rich Kleinfeldt (left) talks with the Parker String Quartet during one of the shows. 

 Photo courtesy of Wolf Trap Foundation for the Performing Arts
118 National Endowment for the Arts

Grant Highlights

Confluence Project

Vancouver

“How do we live with 

nature versus living 

over it?” This is the 

question posed by Maya Lin, an 

artist and architect famous for 

designing the Vietnam Veterans 

Memorial in Washington, DC. 

Her newest conquest is a massive 

undertaking, creating seven 

works of art that use text, cultural 

histories, and the environment 

of the Columbia River Basin–– 

where native tribes united at 

the confluence of rivers––to tell 

the story of the Lewis and Clark 

expedition and its effect on the 

Native Americans they encountered 

on their journey. 

In FY 2007, the Confluence 

Project received an NEA Access to 

Artistic Excellence grant of $25,000 

to assist this colossal task. The 

project has been ongoing since late 

1999, but will not be completed 

until 2010. The Sacajawea State 

Park, in particular, was a focus for 

this grant. Lin’s pieces for this site 

are “story circles.” The artwork will 

consist of text etched into seven 

circles, some raised above and some 

lowered into the ground. The text 

comes from tribal stories, Lewis and 

Clark’s journals, Yakama elder and 

Sahaptin speaker Virginia Beavert, 

and the natural history of this site.

Jane Jacobsen, executive director 

of the Confluence Project said, “The 

name ‘confluence’ means so much 

more than rivers coming together. 

It’s the confluence of people, ideas, 

and the confluence of time.” Lin’s 

juxtaposition of text, which retells 

the stories, with the sparseness of 

her designs “causes one to reflect 

on how the past merges with the 

present and the present with the 

future. It’s about what was and 

what’s next,” explained Jacobsen.

Over the next ten years, more 

than 5 million people are expected 

to visit the Confluence artworks. 

The positive effect on tourism is 

a byproduct of this important art 

project. Said Vancouver Mayor 

Royce Pollard, “This is an icon 

we have in our community. It’s a 

statement about who we are, who 

we were, and where we’re going 

together. People will come from all 

over the world to see this.”

Artist Maya Lin works on her sculptures for the Confluence Project. 

Photo by Betsy Henning
 2007 Annual Report 119

GRANt HiGHliGHtS

Northwest Indian College

BElliNGHAM

The Northwest Indian 

College (NWIC) is the 

only accredited tribal 

college in the Pacifi c Northwest. 

Because of this, they are able to 

reach thousands of people through 

community classes, college classes, 

and interactive television classes. 

The reach of the college spreads 

throughout the Muckleshoot, 

Swinomish, Nez Perce, Tulalip, 

Colville, and Port Gamble 

S’Klallam reservations, and even 

further through distance learning 

classes. 

It is the aim of the college’s 

Coastal Salish Project to preserve 

the tradition of Coastal Salish 

basketry, an art that has been kept 

alive by the oral tradition alone for 

generations. The Salish family of 

languages did not have a written 

alphabet until the 1970s. With the 

increased modernization of the 

entire country, the Coastal Salish art 

of basketry is in present danger of 

becoming lost to history.

The NWIC received an NEA 

Access to Artistic Excellence 

grant of $25,000 to embark on a 

three-phase eff ort to preserve this 

dying art. To ensure excellence 

in the world of basket weaving 

for years to come, the Weavers 

Teaching Weavers conference 

brought together master weavers, 

who are generally elderly, with 

those advanced weavers who may 

soon take their places. After the 

conference, the baskets created 

were sold at a highly anticipated 

Native Arts Sale. 

between generations. 

In order to introduce newcomers 

to the art of weaving, 12 basketry 

classes will be made a part of the 

NWIC curriculum. Across eight 

campuses, students learn basic 

techniques on weaving, methods 

for gathering materials, modern 

substitutions and shortcuts, unique 

Washington

Master weaver trudy Marcellay (chehalis) (center) demonstrates her technique 

to Betty Phelps (Nooksack) (left) and Edie Hottowe (Makah) (right) at the Weavers 

teaching Weavers conference in Bellingham, Washington. 

Photo by David Given-Seymour

The 11th Annual Native American 

Women and Girls Conference not 

only ensured that budding basket 

weavers will maintain the traditions 

of their parents, but also promoted 

family kinship and bonding 

tribal techniques, and a history of 

the art of basketry. Creating new 

audiences and appreciators will 

signifi cantly impact the importance 

of basketry in Native-American 

cultures.
120 National Endowment for the Arts

GRANt HiGHliGHtS

Huntington Museum of Art

HUNtiNGtON

Located in rural Appalachia, 

the Huntington Museum of 

Art serves the tri-state area 

of West Virginia, eastern Kentucky, 

and southern Ohio. The region’s 

largest fi ne arts museum, the 

Huntington serves the community 

through arts, arts education, 

and nature programming. The 

museum’s extensive permanent 

collection of paintings, works on 

paper, sculpture, ethnographic 

objects, and decorative art is at the 

heart of its exhibition schedule, 

which is further enhanced by 

temporary exhibits. In FY 2007, the 

Huntington Museum of Art received 

an NEA Access to Artistic Excellence 

grant of $15,000 to support VIDEO: 

Beyond the Frame, a large-scale video 

series. 

The year-long project featured 

exhibitions of work by four master 

video artists for approximately 

ten weeks each. Lorna Simpson’s 

Easy to Remember was on view 

from February 1-April 30, Bill 

Viola’s Ascension was on view from 

May 10-July 30, Peter Sarkisian’s 

Dusted was on view from Aug 10-

Oct. 30, and the series closed with 

Mary Lucier’s Floodsongs on view 

from Nov. 10-January 30, 2008. 

The works in the exhibition were 

selected to highlight a diversity of 

styles within the medium as well as 

for the accessibility of their subject 

matter. According to the museum, 

the video exhibition was planned 

in order to “provide the audience 

with an opportunity to view an art 

form that it would otherwise have to 

travel to a large metropolitan area to 

experience.... Viewing these objects 

tests our skills of observation, 

listening, and contemplation.”

The museum also produced a 

catalogue and hosted educational 

activities around the video art 

exhibition, the fi rst exhibition 

of this art form in the museum’s 

West Virginia
 2007 Annual Report 121

Grant Highlights

history. In February 2007, noted art 

historian Michael Rush presented 

a public illustrated lecture on the 

history of video art. Rush also 

served on the jury for Exhibition 

208, the Huntington’s annual 

regional juried exhibition, which in 

2007 featured a special call to video 

artists. In November 2007, featured 

artist Mary Lucier gave a public 

lecture and also facilitated a fullweekend, intensive video workshop. 

Approximately 50,000 people 

benefited from the exhibition and 

outreach activities.

West Virginia 

Symphony Orchestra

Charleston

I

ncorporated in 1939, the 

Charleston-based West Virginia 

Symphony Orchestra (WVSO) 

serves nearly 200,000 patrons 

each year with six symphonic 

concerts, three Family Discovery 

concerts, four Pops concerts, 

opera presentations, and joint 

presentations with neighboring 

performance arts organizations 

such as the Charleston Ballet. 

WVSO also offers youth education 

programs, including youth concerts 

and musical competitions, and adult 

and community outreach activities 

such as concert previews. 

For nearly a quarter of a century, 

each fall and spring WVSO also 

has brought live performances of 

symphonic music to the state’s rural 

areas through its touring program. 

with a program of works by 

Wolfgang Mozart, Max Bruch, and 

Robert Schumann. Prior to each 

tour, the orchestra also works with 

host sites to develop materials about 

the orchestra’s history along with 

information about the featured 

composers, musical works, and 

soloists.

For the 2007-2008 season, WVSO 

also debuted a new component 

of the touring program—daytime 

concerts targeted to students in 

grades K-12. Two Young People’s 

concerts were presented in 

partnership with Nicholas County 

High School in Summersville. 

Nearly 10,000 individuals benefited 

from the orchestra’s fall and spring 

tours, including 1,200 children and 

youth and 112 performing artists. 

WVSO presented accompanying 

educational opportunities with the 

tour, including pre-performance 

public discussions with Cooper. 

The West Virginia Symphony Orchestra, 

conducted by Grant Cooper, perform on their 

tour through the rural areas of the state. 

Photo courtesy of West Virginia Symphony 

Orchestra 

Lorna Simpson’s Easy to Remember, 2001, 

one of the pieces exhibited at the Huntington 

Museum of Art’s large-scale video series, 

VIDEO: Beyond the Frame.

 Image courtesy of Lennon, Weinberg Gallery

In FY 2007, the West Virginia 

Symphony Orchestra received an 

NEA Access to Artistic Excellence 

grant of $12,500 to support the 

seasonal statewide tours at venues 

such as a church and high school 

and university auditoriums. 

WVSO Artistic Director and 

Conductor Grant Cooper called 

the program an important part 

of the orchestra’s mission. “I 

believe that everyone should have 

the opportunity to experience 

the joy of musical discovery. The 

WVSO’s biannual statewide touring 

program continues to be one of our 

most successful efforts to provide 

flexible, affordable, and accessible 

cultural programs to the widest 

possible audience.”

On September 28 and 29, 2007, 

the orchestra, with featured cellist 

Jolyon Pegis, performed a program 

of Richard Wagner, Antonín 

Dvorák, and Sergei Rachmaninov 

in Fairmont and Berkeley Springs. 

From April 17-20, 2008, the 

orchestra and featured violinist 

Amelia Chan visited Charleston, 

Summersville, Elkins, and Beckley 

v
122 National Endowment for the Arts

GRANt HiGHliGHtS

Marquette University 

(Haggerty Museum of Art)

MilWAUKEE

The Marquette University’s 

Haggerty Museum of 

Art presented the fi rst 

retrospective exhibit by Cuban 

artist Wifredo Lam (1902-82). As 

a multicultural artist infl uenced 

by his African, Asian, and Spanish 

heritage, Lam uses his artistic 

skills to bridge cultural and ethnic 

identities with a fusion of AfroCuban images and European 

modernism. This exhibition and 

associated programs drew new 

visitors to the museum from the 

Latino and African-American 

communities of Milwaukee, spiking 

general attendance by 16 percent. 

In FY 2007, Marquette University 

received an NEA Access to Artistic 

Excellence grant of $25,000 to 

support a touring exhibition of the 

work of Lam, with accompanying 

catalogue and education programs. 

The exhibition, Wifredo Lam in North 

America, examined Lam’s signifi cant 

infl uence on the development of 

modern art in the United States, 

featuring more than 60 works by 

the artist. The exhibition traveled to 

the Miami Art Museum (February 

8-May 18, 2008); Museum of 

Latin American Art, Long Beach, 

California (June 12-August 31, 

2008); and the Salvador Dali 

Museum, St. Petersburg, Florida 

(October 2-January 10, 2009).

Students who attended the 

education programs were from 

diverse backgrounds and explored 

the idea of identity within the 

context of Lam’s life and work 

as they participated in handson activities. A performance of 

classical Cuban music by Duo 

Roldan brought even more attention 

to the abundance of fi ne art that 

is distinctly Cuban. University 

of Wisconsin-Milwaukee dance 

students used one of the exhibition’s 

paintings as an inspiration for a 

performance that was a kinetic 

response to the work of Lam 

and was met with high praise 

and enthusiasm for continued 

collaboration. 

A catalogue with full-color 

plates representing every work 

in the exhibition was published 

and included scholarly essays by 

Lam expert Lowery Stokes-Sims, 

executive director of the Studio 

Museum in Harlem; Dawn Ades, 

director of the Centre for Studies 

of Surrealism and its Legacies; 

Wisconsin

Wifredo lam’s Personaje con sombrero 

(Person with a Hat), circa 1942, was part 

of the Haggerty Museum of Art’s exhibition, 

Wifredo Lam in North America. 

Image courtesy of the Haggerty Museum of Art
 2007 Annual Report 123

GRANt HiGHliGHtS

Edward Lucie Smith, author, 

journalist, and broadcaster; Valerie 

Fletcher, curator of sculpture at the 

Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture 

Garden; and memoirs from Lou 

Laurin-Lam, widow of the artist. 

Racine Symphony 

Orchestra 

RAciNE

S

ummertime Pops concerts by 

the Racine Symphony feature 

light and lively fare: Broadway 

classics like Annie Get Your Gun and 

soundtracks from fi lms such as Star 

Wars and On Golden Pond. Supper 

is served at these casual concerts, 

and the conductor engages with the 

audience between numbers, making 

them almost a dinner theater 

experience rather than a traditional 

concert. The Pops concerts are 

Racine favorites, drawing up to 700 

people per night.

The Racine Symphony Orchestra 

(RSO) hoped to extend the 

popularity of its summer season 

into its fall season. To do this, 

the RSO planned to produce a 

showstopper concert featuring 

works by the greats, plus a new piece 

by their new music director, Andrew 

Massey. “We try to pinpoint those 

who enjoy the lighter classical fare 

in the summertime,” said Executive 

Director Keith Hampton. To present 

this event, the RSO received an 

NEA Challenge America grant of 

$10,000. 

Light classics at the opening 

performance meant Benjamin 

Britten’s Suite on English Folk Tunes. 

This work in fi ve movements is 

based on traditional folk songs and 

dance tunes. Also on the program 

were Ludwig von Beethoven’s 

Overture from Coriolan, Sergei 

Prokofi ev’s Symphony No. 1 

(Symphonie Classique), and 

Johannes Brahms’s Symphony No. 1 

in C minor. 

To make the whole evening more 

accessible to Racine’s audiences, 

RSO created extensive program 

notes for each work. By giving the 

audience background information 

on the pieces, they hope to make the 

classical concert-going experience 

not only more understandable but 

enjoyable for any and all audience 

members.

the violin section of the Racine 

Symphony Orchestra during their 

2007 concert season. 

Photo by Brad Jaeck 
124 National Endowment for the Arts

GRANt HiGHliGHtS

Buffalo Bill 

Memorial Association 

cODY

Cowboys have long been a 

symbol of the American 

West, encompassing both 

the history of ranching and the 

commercial idea of the cowboy as 

depicted in movies and advertising. 

The Buff alo Bill Historical Center 

examines these two sides through 

their annual festival, Cowboy Songs 

& Range Ballads. The Historical 

Center focuses on more than just 

the cowboy culture; they advance 

knowledge of the American West 

through their Buff alo Bill Museum, 

Whitney Gallery of Western Art, 

Plains Indian Museum, Cody 

Firearms Museum, Draper Museum 

of Natural History, and McCracken 

Research Library.

In FY 2007, the Buff alo Bill 

Memorial Association received an 

NEA Access to Artistic Excellence 

grant of $20,000 to support its 25thanniversary celebration of the music, 

poetry, and history of the American 

cowboy. Cowboy Songs & Range 

Ballads: Melodies and Memories 

began on April 11-12, 2007, with 

school programs for more than 300 

elementary school students, who 

visited the Buff alo Bill Historical 

Center for hands-on activities that 

explored the culture of the cowboy, 

such as how to make cinches, play the 

fi ddle, and do trick roping. 

An opening reception and 

informal jam session kicked off the 

weekend’s activities, which included 

a one-day symposium, Melodies 

& Memories. Speakers included 

folklorist, author, and storyteller 

Jim Garry and rancher, storyteller, 

and NEA National Heritage 

Fellow Glenn Ohrlin. Garry also 

participated in the 25th-anniversary 

celebrations in a diff erent way—he 

collected oral histories from 14 

past Cowboy Songs & Range Ballads 

performers, listening to their 

stories and learning about the 

infl uence of music on their lives. 

These oral histories will be housed 

as part of a major folk life collection 

Wyoming

Otto Rosfeld at the Museum Adventures school program for cowboy Songs & Range Ballads, the 25th-anniversary celebration of 

the music, poetry, and history of the American cowboy by the Buffalo Bill Historical center. 

Photo by Sean Campbell
 2007 Annual Report 125

Grant Highlights

at the McCracken Research Library.

The weekend’s concerts 

included performances by Cowboy 

Celtic, who combine Celtic 

instrumentation and music with 

cowboy songs; Wylie & the Wild 

West, a cowboy singer, yodeler, 

rancher, and roper; and Sons 

of the San Joaquin, a family trio 

whose music is rooted in the West 

harmony tradition of the Sons of the 

Pioneers. In addition, the weekend 

included open-mic sessions, 

allowing both new and seasoned 

musicians to perform. Cowboy 

Songs & Range Ballads 25thanniversary activities continued 

through August 2007, reaching 

more than 4,000 people total. 

Goshen Community 

Theatre 

Torrington

I

n the small, rural town of 

Torrington, Wyoming, the 

annual spring musical truly is 

a community affair. From building 

the sets to sewing the costumes 

to acting in the production itself, 

the creation of a play at Goshen 

Community Theatre (GCT) requires 

the participation of community 

members of all ages and skills. Since 

2002, GCT has presented two to 

three family-oriented productions 

each season, providing Goshen 

County residents with high-quality 

live theater that would not otherwise 

be available to this rural community.

In FY 2007, GCT received an NEA 

Access to Artistic Excellence grant 

of $8,000 to support a production 

of Meredith Wilson’s Tony Awardwinning musical The Music Man. 

The play has been popular since it 

opened on Broadway in 1957, and 

in 1962 its popularity grew with 

a screen adaptation. Fifty years 

since its opening, the production’s 

popularity is still evident, as more 

than 2,500 people in Torrington 

and its surrounding community 

showed up to see GCT’s production, 

which ran for seven performances 

at Eastern Wyoming Community 

College in March 2007. 

The Music Man requires a large 

cast representing a variety of ages, 

something that could be seen as 

a challenge to a small community 

theater. But instead, Goshen saw 

the play as a perfect opportunity to 

include a large number of people. 

In order to raise interest and get the 

necessary number of actors, GCT 

held an acting workshop in advance 

of auditions. GCT’s annual summer 

children’s theater workshop 

also increased the number of 

experienced young actors available 

for a production like this. In total, 

more than 50 residents acted in the 

production, filling roles that ranged 

from children to senior citizens. 

But GCT’s productions rely on 

the community for more than 

their acting abilities. The crew 

and directing staff were all local, 

as well as the talented musicians 

who made up the live orchestra. 

Other residents constructed props, 

costumes, and sets. GCT also made 

a concerted effort to involve senior 

citizens, whether through acting, 

behind-the-scenes work, or by 

attending the productions. 

The entire cast at the end of the opening number, “Iowa Stubborn,” in Goshen 

Community Theatre’s production of The Music Man. 

Photo by Becky Cameron.
126 National Endowment for the Arts

Grant Highlights
 2007 Annual Report 127

literature fellowships

Most writers in America 

make a living by some 

other means than 

writing. Some teach, others work at 

a variety of jobs, all struggle. That is 

why the NEA Literature Fellowship 

program is so important. Many 

of these writers have received the 

award during the early stages of 

their careers, as they have labored 

to write, given the demands of 

work and family. More important 

than the financial support, many 

writers credit the receipt of the 

Literature Fellowship with giving 

them the fortitude to keep working 

at their craft. In all, 3,058 prose 

writers and poets have benefited 

from NEA Literature Fellowships 

since the program was formally 

inaugurated in 1967. Among the 

writers who have benefited from 

an NEA Literature Fellowship are 

21 U.S. Poet Laureates, 41 Pulitzer 

Prize winners, one Nobel Laureate, 

and six recipients of the National 

Medal of Arts, the highest award 

given to artists and arts patrons by 

the federal government.

Although artistic merit always has 

been at the heart of the fellowship 

awards, today it is the sole basis on 

which the grants are given. Over 

several months, a diverse panel of 

readers, composed of distinguished 

U.S. writers and one knowledgeable 

layperson, read through the blind 

submissions. All applicants must 

be U.S. citizens. Panelists do not 

know the identities of the writers, 

their publishing histories, academic 

achievements, or previous awards. 

The highest ranked applications 

are recommended to the National 

Council on the Arts and the NEA 

Chairman as meriting an individual 

writing fellowship.

The Literature Fellowships 

alternate on an annual basis 

between prose and poetry. This year 

50 poets from 30 states, out of an 

applicant pool of 1,056, received 

NEA Literature Fellowships of 

$20,000 each for a total federal 

investment of $1,000,000.

Steven Gehrke, a 2007 Literature 

Fellow, said, “Along with the time 

to work on the book, the NEA has 

helped to bring some exposure for 

my work. About a month after I 

received the grant, a reporter from 

the New York Times called and said 

he’d like to do a short article about 

the grant, and about my poetry. I’m 

extremely grateful for the money 

and the attention.”

Literature Fellowships also are 

awarded for the translation into 

English of literary works written 

in foreign languages. Unlike the 

creative writing fellowships, 

translation fellowships are awarded 

for specific projects, and the 

panelists are aware of the identity 

of each applicant. The art of 

literary translation facilitates the 

international exchange of fiction 

and poetry among cultures and has 

introduced U.S. readers to writers 

such as Federico García Lorca, 

Marcel Proust, Marina Tsvetaeva, 

and Wisława Szymborska. 

In 2007, 48 applications for 

Translation Fellowships were 

received, of which 14 translators in 

eight states and one living abroad 

were awarded grants totaling 

$200,000. Translators receive 

grants of either $10,000 or $20,000 

Literature Fellowships

NEA Literature Fellow Kevin Young at 

the 2007 National Book Festival’s Poetry 

Pavilion, sponsored by the NEA. 

Photo by Tom Roster
128 National Endowment for the Arts

literature fellowships

depending on the translation 

project. These fellowships will 

support the translation of work from 

11 different languages, including 

Icelandic, Romanian, and Italian. 

Excerpts from many of the 2007 

NEA Literature Fellows can be 

found on the NEA Web site at 

www.arts.gov/features/writers/

index.html.

Creative Writing 

Fellowships—Poetry

(all grants are $20,000)

David Barber is a staff editor at 

Atlantic Monthly. The recipient of a 

Massachusetts Artist Fellowship, 

the Terrence Des Pres Prize from 

TriQuarterly, and a PEN/New England 

Discovery Award, his poems have 

appeared in a number of journals, 

including Poetry and The New Criterion.

Tony Barnstone, author of Impure, Sad 

Jazz: Sonnets, and Naked Magic, won 

the 2006 Benjamin Saltman Award 

for his manuscript Lips Like Rubies, 

Teeth Like Whatever. He has translated 

a number of books of Chinese poetry 

into English.

Nicky Beer is the recipient of a 

Discovery/The Nation Award and a 

Discovered Voices Award from Iron 

Horse Literary Review. She received 

her MFA from the University of 

Houston and is a PhD candidate at the 

University of Missouri-Columbia.

John Bradley earned his MA from 

Colorado State University and his 

MFA from Bowling Green State 

University. He is the recipient of a 

previous NEA Fellowship in Poetry, 

an Illinois Arts Council Grant, 

and the 1989 Washington Prize 

for his book Love-In-Idleness.

Andrea Hollander Budy, the author of 

three poetry collections, has received a 

previous NEA Fellowship in Poetry, the 

Nicholas Roerich Poetry Prize, a D.H. 

Lawrence Fellowship, the Runes Poetry 

Award, and two Arkansas Arts Council 

Fellowships in Poetry. She is the 

writer-in-residence at Lyon College. 

Joseph Campana’s poems have 

appeared in Beloit Poetry Journal, 

Prairie Schooner, TriQuarterly, and Hotel 

Amerika, among others. The author of 

Book of Faces, he writes a weekly blog 

for The Kenyon Review and teaches at 

Rice University. 

Susan Deer Cloud is the author 

of three books of poems and the 

editor of Confluence, a multicultural 

anthology. Her poems have appeared 

in a number of journals, including 

Rosebud and Mid-American Review. 

In 2003, she won a Prairie Schooner

Readers’ Choice Award.

Morri Creech is the author of two 

collections of poetry, Paper Cathedrals 

and Field Knowledge, winner of the 

2005 Anthony Hecht Prize. His poems 

have appeared in The New Republic, 

Poetry, The Sewanee Review, Southwest 

Review, and The New Criterion. 

Averill Curdy’s poems have appeared 

in a number of journals, including 

Poetry, The Paris Review, 32 Poems, and 

The Kenyon Review. She has received a 

Pushcart Prize and fellowships from 

the Rona Jaffe Foundation and the 

Illinois Arts Council.

Lightsey Darst holds an MFA from 

the University of Minnesota and has 

had poems published in The Antioch 

Review, The Literary Review, Gulf Coast, 

and New Letters. The recipient of two 

grants from the Minnesota State Arts 

Board, she is at work on a manuscript 

of poems called Find the Girl. 

Carol Ann Davis has been awarded 

the 2005 Dorset Prize, the W.K. Rose 

Fellowship, and a grant from the 

South Carolina Arts Commission. She 

is the editor of Crazyhorse and directs 

the Undergraduate Creative Writing 

Program at the College of Charleston. 

Michelle Detorie received her MFA 

from Texas State University and was 

the 2006-2007 writer-in-residence 

at the Katherine Anne Porter Literary 

Center. She is at work on a manuscript 

of poems, a prose-poem memoir, a 

novel for teens, and an improvised 

music and text project. 

Rebecca Dunham’s first book of 

poetry, The Miniature Room, won the 

2006 T.S. Eliot Prize. Her poems have 

appeared in AGNI, The Antioch Review, 

Gulf Coast, The Iowa Review, FIELD, 

and elsewhere. She received an MFA 

from George Mason University and a 

PhD from the University of Missouri.

Angie Estes is the author of three 

books of poems. She has received 

the FIELD Poetry Prize; the Alice Fay 

di Castagnola Prize from the Poetry 

Society of America; the Peregrine 

Smith Poetry Prize; a Pushcart Prize; 

and fellowships from the Woodrow 

Wilson Foundation, the California Arts 

Council, and the Ohio Arts Council. 

Jonathan Fink’s poems have appeared 

in Poetry, New England Review, 

TriQuarterly, Slate, The Southern 
 2007 Annual Report 129

literature fellowships

Lisa Gill is an MFA candidate at the 

University of New Mexico. She is the 

former editor of the Donkey Journal, 

and the author of two books of poetry, 

Red as a Lotus: Letters to a Dead Trappist

and Mortar & Pestle.

Saskia Hamilton authored the poetry 

collections As for Dream, Divide These, 

and Canal: New and Selected, and 

edited The Letters of Robert Lowell. She 

is an assistant professor at Barnard 

College.

Janice Harrington’s poetry has 

appeared in FIELD, the Alaska 

Quarterly Review, Beloit Poetry Journal, 

and New Letters, among others. She 

has received an Illinois Arts Council 

Literary Award and the A. Poulin, 

Jr. Poetry Prize to publish a book of 

poems in 2007.

James Hooch is the author of two 

books of poems, Miscreants and Parade 

of Hands, which won the Gerald 

Cable Book Award from Silverfish 

Review Press in 2003. His poems 

have appeared in Slate, The Kenyon 

Review, Virginia Quarterly Review, and 

elsewhere. 

William Johnson is the author of 

Out of the Ruins. He has received 

fellowships from Fishtrap, the 

Environmental Writing Institute, the 

Idaho Humanities Council, and the 

Idaho Commission on the Arts.

Lance Larsen’s poems have appeared 

in the New York Review of Books, 

The Paris Review, the Times Literary 

Supplement, The Kenyon Review, The 

New Republic, and The Pushcart Book 

of Poetry: the Best Poems of the First 30 

Years. He is a professor of English at 

Brigham Young University.

Lisa Gill 

Excerpt from Red as a Lotus: Letters to a Dead 

Trappist (La Alameda Press, 2002)

Used by permission of the author

Dedicated to Thomas Merton

XIX.

When I placed a stone on my tongue, a friend told me

not to be too hard on myself, as if the stone were in my hand

and I was using it to bash my head. But my mouth is not gored,

wind and sand have worn the stone’s edges smooth, so I did not

try to explain, and the rock in my mouth didn’t even whimper.

I have been talking for decades now, and maybe my voice

is nothing in the sea of words, just one more small abrasion

but my friends’ ears must be ringing and what have I said?

If silence is more awkward than speech, it is because finally

we feel the weight that is always on our tongues. So I am

a slow learner and need a reminder to become quiet and

even then, my thoughts run like a deep spring. If I cannot go

into the desert to become a hermit, I will take the desert

into my mouth and begin to practice with friends.

Review, and Southwest Review, among 

others. He received an MFA from 

Syracuse University and was awarded 

the 2006 Editor’s Prize for Poetry 

from The Missouri Review.

Rachel Contreni Flynn received an 

Illinois Arts Council Fellowship 

and was featured as The Spoon River 

Review’s Illinois poet, both in 2005. 

Her first book Ice, Mouth, Song won 

the 2003 Dorset Prize from Tupelo 

Press. 

Chris Forhan teaches at Auburn 

University and is the author of The 

Actual Moon, the Actual Stars and 

Forgive Us Our Happiness. He has won 

a Pushcart Prize, the Samuel French 

Morse Poetry Prize, and a Washington 

State Book Award. 

Steven Gehrke won the Philip Levine 

Prize for his second book, Pyramids 

of Malpighi, and his third book, 

Michelangelo’s Seizure, was selected for 

the National Poetry Series. He teaches 

at Seton Hall University. 
130 National Endowment for the Arts

literature fellowships

Eleanor Lerman’s first book of poems, 

Armed Love, was nominated for a 

National Book Award in 1974. She has 

since published three award-winning 

collections of poetry, including Our 

Post Soviet History Unfolds, winner of 

The Nation’s 2006 Lenore Marshall 

Poetry Prize. 

Phillis Levin is the author of three 

books of poetry, including Temples and 

Fields, winner of the Norma Farber 

First Book Award from the Poetry 

Society of America. Her other honors 

include a Fulbright Fellowship and a 

Guggenheim Fellowship.

Sabrina Orah Mark graduated from 

the University of Iowa’s Writers’ 

Workshop, and has received 

fellowships from the Fine Arts Work 

Center in Provincetown and the 

Glenn Schaeffer Foundation. Her first 

book of poems, The Babies, won the 

2004 Saturnalia Books Poetry Prize. 

Leslie Monsour is the author of Travel 

Plans, Indelibility, and The Alarming 

Beauty of the Sky. She has been a poetry 

instructor in Los Angeles area public 

schools and at the UCLA Extension 

Writer’s Program. 

Sean Nevin teaches creative writing at 

Arizona State University. He won the 

2005 Slapering Hol Press Chapbook 

Prize, an Alsop Review Poetry Prize, an 

award from the Academy of American 

Poets, and a fellowship from the 

Arizona Commission on the Arts. 

Jill Osier’s poems appear in Prairie 

Schooner, The Gettysburg Review, The 

Iowa Review, Poetry, 32 Poems, and 

Best New Poets 2006. She holds an 

MFA from the University of AlaskaFairbanks, where she was twice 

awarded the Harold McCracken 

Poetry Prize.

Alison Pelegrin, a professor at 

Southeastern Louisiana University, 

is the author of two books of poetry 

and three prize-winning chapbooks. 

She received an Individual Artist 

Fellowship from the Louisiana 

Division of the Arts. Her book Big 

Muddy River of Stars won the Akron 

Poetry Prize. 

Lynn Powell is the author of Old & 

New Testaments and Zone of Paradise. 

She has been awarded individual 

artist fellowships from the New Jersey 

State Arts Council and the Ohio Arts 

Council. In 1995, she was awarded the 

Brittingham Prize in Poetry from the 

University of Wisconsin.

Kevin Prufer is the author of Fallen 

from a Chariot and The Finger Bone. 

He is the winner of three Pushcart 

Prizes and his work appeared in 

Best American Poems in 2003. He is 

currently co-editing The New European 

Poetry. 

Karen Rigby, author of Festival 

Bone, has had poems published in 

FIELD, The New England Review, Black 

Warrior Review, and Swink. She is the 

recipient of a Vermont Studio Center 

Fellowship and a Greater Pittsburgh 

Arts Council Artist Opportunity 

Grant. 

Dana Roeser, winner of the 2005-

2006 Jenny McKean Moore Writerin-Washington Fellowship, is a 

visiting professor at Butler University. 

Her first book of poems, Beautiful 

Motion, won the Samuel French Morse 

Prize and the Great Lakes Colleges 

Association New Writers Award. 

Martha Ronk’s most recent book, 

In a landscape of having to repeat, was 

selected as the PEN USA Best Poetry 

Book of 2005, and her forthcoming 

book, Vertigo, was selected for the 

National Poetry Series. Her poems 

have recently appeared in Volt, 

Interim, Radical Society, and The 

American Poetry Review.

Catie Rosemurgy teaches creative 

writing at the College of New Jersey. 

She is the author of My Favorite 

Apocalypse, and the 2002 recipient 

of a Rona Jaffe Award for Emerging 

Female Writers. Her work appeared in 

Best American Poetry in 1997.

Dennis N. Sampson is the recipient of 

an Individual Fellowship in Creative 

Writing from the North Carolina Arts 

Council and is the author of For My 

Father Falling Asleep at Saint Mary’s 

Hospital, published in 2005. 

Jane Satterfield received the Towson 

University Prize for Literature for her 

first poetry collection, Shepherdess 

with an Automatic, and won the Elixir 

Press Poetry Award for Assignation at 

Vanishing Point, her second collection. 

She teaches at Loyola College in 

Maryland.

Jason Shinder is the author of Among 

Women, which was chosen as a New 

York Public Library Notable Book. 

He has been a resident at Yaddo 

and at the Fine Arts Work Center 

in Provincetown. He is the founder 

and director of the YMCA National 

Writer’s Voice.

Jeffrey Skinner, a former poet-inresidence at the James Merrill House, 

is the recipient of a previous NEA 

Fellowship in Poetry and fellowships 
 2007 Annual Report 131

literature fellowships

from the Kentucky Arts Council and 

the George A. and Eliza Gardner 

Howard Foundation. He is the author 

of Salt Water Amnesia.

J.D. Smith received his MA in 

Creative Writing from the University 

of Houston. He is the author of the 

poetry collections Settling for Beauty

and The Hypothetical Landscape and 

the children’s book The Best Mariachi 

in the World.

Adrienne Su has had residencies 

at the MacDowell Colony, Yaddo, 

the Fine Arts Work Center in 

Provincetown, and the Frost Place. 

Winner of a Pushcart Prize and a 

Readers’ Choice Award from Prairie 

Schooner, she is an associate professor 

of English and the poet-in-residence 

at Dickinson College. 

Mark Sullivan’s poems have appeared 

in Mid-American Review, The New 

England Review, Orion, Shenandoah, 

The Southern Review, Southwest Review, 

and elsewhere. He is the winner of 

a Walt MacDonald First Book Series 

Prize and received a Discovery/The 

Nation Award. 

Brian Turner, who received his MFA 

from the University of Oregon, is 

the author of Here, Bullet. He has 

served in the 10th Mountain Division 

of the U.S. Army and as a NATO 

peacekeeper in Bosnia. He is the 

recipient of a 2005 Beatrice Hawley 

Award from Alice James Books.

G.C. Waldrep has received honors 

from the Academy of American Poets, 

the Poetry Society of America, the 

North Carolina Arts Council, the 

Campbell Corner Foundation, and 

the Bread Loaf Writers’ Conference. 

His first book of poems, Goldbeater’s 

Skin, won the 2003 Colorado Prize for 

Poetry. 

Nicole Walker earned her PhD 

in Creative Writing from the 

University of Utah. Her poems and 

creative nonfiction have appeared 

in numerous journals, including 

Ploughshares, The Iowa Review, New 

American Writing, Fence, Crab Orchard 

Review, and Ninth Letter.

Greg W. Williamson is the author 

of The Silent Partner, winner of the 

1995 Nicholas Roerich Poetry Prize. 

In 2004, he received an award from 

the American Academy of Arts and 

Letters. He is a senior lecturer at 

Johns Hopkins University, where he 

earned his MA in Poetry.

Emily Wilson is the recipient of an 

Iowa Arts Fellowship and author of the 

poetry collection The Keep, published 

in 2001. She has served as proprietor 

of Spurwink Press and as a professor 

at the University of Iowa, where she 

earned her MFA.

Matt Yurdana’s honors include 

a Pushcart Prize, an award from 

Academy of American Poets, and the 

C. Hamilton Bailey Fellowship from 

Literary Arts in Portland. His first 

collection of poems, Public Gestures, 

was a finalist for the Oregon Book 

Award. He earned an MFA from the 

University of Montana at Missoula.

Translation Projects

Christopher Burawa $20,000

To support the translation from 

Icelandic of the selected poems of 

Johann Hjalmarsson. Hjalmarsson 

has published 18 books of poetry, 

three chapbooks, six books of 

translations, and two volumes of 

critical essays. In 2003, he received 

an Icelandic Parliament Award for his 

contributions to the field of literature.

Christopher Burawa is the 

literature director of the Arizona 

Commission on the Arts. His previous 

translations of Hjalmarsson’s poems 

have appeared in his book Of the Same 

Mind: Poems by Johann Hjalmarsson, 

and in Ars-Interpres: An International 

Journal of Poetry, Translation & Art, and

The American Poetry Review. 

Bogdana Carpenter $20,000

To support the translation from 

Polish of a selection of poems by Julia 

Hartwig. Born in Lublin, Poland, in 

1921, Hartwig is an award-winning 

poet who has published numerous 

collections. Her poetry has been 

translated into eight languages. 

Bogdana Carpenter is professor of 

Polish and Comparative Literature 

at the University of Michigan at 

Ann Arbor. She and her husband 

John have translated six volumes of 

Zbigniew Herbert’s poetry. Their 

translations have appeared in a 

number of anthologies. 

Thomas Cooper $20,000

To support the translation from 

Hungarian of The Snakes’ Shadow by 

Zsuza Rakovsky, a historical novel 

set in 17th-century Central Europe 

against the backdrop of religious wars 

between Protestants and Catholics. 

Rakovsky’s novel, published in 2002, 
132 National Endowment for the Arts

literature fellowships

was an immediate success in Hungary 

and has been translated into German 

and French. 

Thomas Cooper has translated 

the poetry and prose of many 

contemporary Hungarian authors; 

his translations of Rakovsky’s poems 

are forthcoming through the Petofi 

Literary Museum in Budapest. He is 

a post-doctoral fellow at Columbia 

University. 

Karen Emmerich $10,000

To support the translation from 

Greek of ten volumes of poetry by 

Eleni Vakalo, collected under the 

title The Other Side of Things: Poetry 

1954-1994. Born in Istanbul in 1921, 

Vakalo relocated to Athens as a child, 

where she lived until her death in 

2001. Vakalo was a prolific poet and a 

prominent art critic and theorist. 

Karen Emmerich is a graduate 

student and instructor at Columbia 

University. She is the recipient of 

a PEN Translation Fund grant and 

Mellon and Fulbright Fellowships. 

Ileana Orlich $10,000

To support the translation from 

Romanian of The Hidden Way, the 

final novel of Hortensia PapadatBengscu’s Hallipa Trilogy. PapadatBengescu was born in 1876 and was 

Romania’s most prominent female 

novelist in the early 20th century. She 

won the National Prize for Fiction in 

1946.

Ileana Orlich has translated 

the Trilogy’s first two novels, 

The Disheveled Maidens and A 

Concert of Music by Bach. She is an 

associate professor of Languages 

and Literatures at Arizona State 

University.

John Penuel $20,000

To support the translation from 

Spanish of the collected short stories 

of Peruvian author Julio Ramón 

Ribeyro. Born in Peru in 1929, 

Ribyero spent most of his adult life in 

Paris, though he continued to write 

in Spanish. In recent years, Spanish 

language publishers have reissued 

much of his work.

John Penuel has translated 

Ribeyro’s diary, a book of prose 

pieces, and his novel Chronicle of 

San Gabriel (2004). His translation 

of Ribyero’s story “The Wardrobe, 

Forefathers, and Death” appeared in 

The Antioch Review. 

Barbara Romaine $10,000

To support the translation from 

Arabic of Specters, a novel by the 

Egyptian author Radwa Ashour. In 

the semi-autobiographical Specters, 

Ashour examines the relationship 

between her homeland of Egypt, and 

her husband’s homeland of Palestine. 

She is a professor at Ain Shams 

University in Cairo.

Barbara Romaine is an Arabic 

language instructor at Swarthmore 

College. She is the translator of two 

books, and her translations have 

appeared in Translation Review and 

Al-Ahram Weekly.

Damion Searls $10,000

To support the translation from 

German of a selection of Ranier Maria 

Rilke’s poetry and prose, titled The 

Inner Sky: Poems, Notes, Dreams. The 

Inner Sky will collect works outside 

of Rilke’s finished volumes, much 

of which is currently unavailable in 

English.

Damion Searls is a preceptor for 

the Harvard University Expository 

Writing Program and a reader and 

copywriter for the New York Review 

of Books. He has translated books 

by Ingeborg Bachmann and Uwe 

Johnson, and his work has appeared 

in Two Lines: A Journal of Translation.

Cindy Schuster $10,000

To support the translation from 

Spanish of an anthology of Argentine 

writer Rodolfo Walsh’s short 

fiction. Born in 1927, Walsh is a 

canonical author in Latin America 

and is considered to be the father of 

investigative journalism in Argentina.

Cindy Schuster’s translations have 

appeared in Cubana: Contemporary 

Fiction by Cuban Women and in the 

journals Words Without Borders and The 

American Voice. She is a PhD candidate 

at the University of California, Irvine. 

Marian Schwartz $20,000

To support the translation from 

Russian of Olga Slavnikova’s novel 

2017. Slavnikova, who has been 

publishing fiction since the late 

1980s, is the recipient of numerous 

awards, including a nomination for 

the Russian Booker Prize. Her works 

have been translated into French and 

German. 

Marian Schwartz is a professional 

translator and a prior recipient of 

an NEA Fellowship in Translation. 

She is the former president of the 

American Literary Translators 

Association.

Anthony Shugarr $10,000

To support the translation from 

Italian of Sandokan by Nanni 

Balestrini. Balestrini is a poet and 

journalist who used real events as 

the basis for Sandokan, a short novel 

detailing organized crime in southern 

Italy.

Anthony Shugarr is a professional 
 2007 Annual Report 133

literature fellowships

translator. Recent translations 

include Maurizio Viroli’s books 

Niccolo’s Smile: A Biography of 

Machiavelli (2000) and Republicanism

(2001).

Roberto Tejada $10,000

To support the translation from 

Spanish of Enemy Rumor and The 

Fragments Drawn By Charm, poetry 

collections by Cuban writer José 

Lezama Lima. Born in Havana in 

1910, Lima is widely considered to be 

one of the most influential writers in 

the Latin American canon. He is best 

known in the United States for his 

novel Paradiso.

Roberto Tejada is an assistant 

professor at the University of 

California, San Diego. He has served 

as a translator for The New York Times 

Book Review, The Americas Society, 

and the Miami Art Museum, among 

others.

Elizabeth Williamson $10,000

To support the translation from 

French of three plays by Michel 

Azama. Williamson will collaborate 

with Nicholas Elliot. Azama is 

one of France’s most prominent 

contemporary playwrights. He is the 

winner of the Prix des Trois Provinces, 

the Prix Beaumarchais, and the Grand 

Prix de la ville de Bourges.

Elizabeth Williamson is a founding 

member of the Tremplin Theatre in 

Paris. Her collaborative translation 

with Nicholas Elliot of Azama’s The 

Life and Death of Paolo Pasolini was 

staged at the Act French Festival in 

New York in 2005.

Natasha Wimmer $20,000

To support the translation from 

Spanish of Chilean Roberto Bolaño’s 

novel 2666. A lifelong poet, Bolaño 

did not begin writing fiction until the 

last decade of his life. Bolaño traveled 

extensively, finally settling in Spain 

in the 1980s. In 1999 he won the 

prestigious Rómulo Gallegos Prize.

Barbara Romaine 

Excerpt from Specters by Radwa Ashour

Translated from the Arabic

Used by permission of the author

At first the meetings were silent. The ghosts would come in to her, 

and sit there diffidently mute. Words did not come to her, either. She 

would steal glances at them, and then, perplexed, go back to staring at 

her hands. She did not know whether she should greet them and make 

them welcome as guests—since they had been away—or whether she 

should leave matters up to them—since the house was theirs and they 

could conduct themselves in it however they liked, and speak if they 

wished or otherwise remain silent. As the meetings grew frequent, 

these family members became re-accustomed to the intimacy of 

conversation, and thus they made up for all the years of separation. 

Sometimes she questioned them, and sometimes she talked, but 

most of the time she listened. They had a great deal to say about the 

forced-labor trenches at Atabat Al-Jisr, about thirst, and about wages 

never redeemed for bitter toil. All this they had lived, and in the 

course of several months they told her about it. How could this be? 

She wondered, amazed, for she had lived as she best she might, she 

had married, produced children, been widowed, raised children and 

grandchildren, and had chafed against the family when they chafed at 

her. What for her had seemed a full life was, compared to a story like 

theirs, mere fragments of a life.

Natasha Wimmer, a former literary 

editor at The American Scholar, is the 

translator of more than six books. 

Her translation of Bolaño’s The Savage 

Detectives was published in 2007. 
134 National Endowment for the Arts
 2007 Annual Report 135

national council on the arts

T

he National Council on the 

Arts advises the Chairman 

of the National Endowment 

for the Arts on agency policies and 

programs. It reviews and makes 

recommendations on applications 

for grants, funding guidelines, 

leadership initiatives, and 

nominations for the National Medal 

of Arts. The Council meets three 

times a year.

Fourteen voting members of the 

Council—all private citizens—are 

appointed by the President and 

confirmed by the Senate for six-year 

terms, and are selected for their 

distinguished service or achieved 

eminence in the arts. In 1997, 

Congress enacted legislation that 

required the appointment of six 

members of Congress, three from 

the House of Representatives and 

three from the Senate, to serve in 

an ex officio, non-voting capacity for 

two-year terms. Current Council 

members can be found on the NEA 

Web site at www.arts.gov.

National Council on the Arts

National Council on the Arts member Chico Hamilton (right) talks with 2007 Poetry Out 

Loud National Champion Amanda Fernandez at the July 2007 NCA meeting. 

Photo by Kathy Plowitz-Worden

Chairman Gioia with (from left) actor/writer Stephen Lang, Operation 

Homecoming Program Director Jon Parrish Peede, and Operation 

Homecoming anthology editor Andrew Carroll at the July 2007 National 

Council on the Arts meeting, where Lang and Carroll were presented 

with Chairman’s Medals for their distinguished service with the 

Operation Homecoming initiative. 

Photo by Kathy Plowitz-Worden
136 National Endowment for the Arts

national council on the arts

The following Council members 

served in FY 2007: 

James K. Ballinger

Museum director

Phoenix, Arizona

Don V. Cogman 

Patron/trustee

Scottsdale, Arizona

Mary Costa 

Opera singer

Knoxville, Tennessee

Katharine Cramer DeWitt 

Patron/trustee

Cincinnati, Ohio

Ben Donenberg

Theater producer/director/arts educator

Los Angeles, California

Makoto Fujimura

Visual artist

New York, New York

David H. Gelernter 

Author/critic/educator

Woodbridge, Connecticut

Chico Hamilton

NEA Jazz Master/percussionist

New York, New York

Mark Hofflund

Theater administrator

Boise, Idaho

Joan Israelite

Local arts agency executive

Kansas City, Missouri

Charlotte Kessler

Patron/trustee

Columbus, Ohio

Teresa Lozano Long 

Patron/trustee

Austin, Texas

Bret Lott

Author/editor

Charleston, South Carolina

Maribeth Walton McGinley 

Art director/designer

Glendale, California

Jerry Pinkney

Artist/illustrator

Croton-on-Hudson, New York

Stephen Porter

Patron/attorney

Washington, DC

Frank Price

Film industry executive

New York, New York

Deedie Potter Rose 

Patron/trustee

Dallas, Texas

Gerard Schwarz 

Symphony orchestra conductor

Seattle, Washington

Terry Teachout

Critic/author

New York, New York

Karen Lias Wolff

Music educator

Ann Arbor, Michigan

Ex officio members

Robert Bennett

U.S. Senate

(R-Utah)

Sheldon Whitehouse

U.S. Senate

(D-Rhode Island)

Betty McCollum

U.S. House of Representatives

(D-Minnesota)

Patrick Tiberi

U.S. House of Representatives

(R-Ohio)
 2007 Annual Report 137

financial summary

Summary of Funds Available FY 2007 

Appropriated Program and State/Regional Grant Funds 100,319,305 

Appropriated Balance, Prior Year 1 4,324,132 

Nonfederal Gifts 1 4,121,308 

Interagency Transfers 1,2 2,953,989 

TOTAL PROGRAM FUNDS AVAILABLE 111,718,734 

TOTAL PROGRAM SUPPORT FUNDS AVAILABLE 1 2,185,869 

TOTAL SALARY AND EXPENSE FUNDS AVAILABLE 3,4 25,393,036 

TOTAL FUNDS AVAILABLE 139,297,639

1 Includes FY 2006 unobligated funds brought forward into FY 2007, prior year deobligations carried forward into FY 2007, and funds newly available in FY 2007, 

as applicable. 

2 Includes interagency transfers held on behalf of the President’s Committee on the Arts and the Humanities.

3 Includes appropriated funds, nonfederal gifts, and interagency transfers including FY 2006 unobligated funds brought 

forward into FY 2007, prior year deobligations brought forward into FY 2007, and funds newly available in FY 2007, as applicable.

4 Includes nonfederal gifts and interagency transfers held on behalf of the President’s Committee on the Arts and the 

Humanities, as applicable. 

Financial Summary
138 National Endowment for the Arts

financial summary

Summary of Funds Obligated for FY 2007 1 FY 2007

($ in thousands)

Access to Artistic Excellence:

Direct Endowment Grants

Project Support 2 36,693

Challenge America: Reaching Every Community 11,060

National Initiative: American Masterpieces 7,078

Total Access to Artistic Excellence 54,831

Learning in the Arts

Direct Endowment Grants

Project Support 8,352

Partnerships for the Arts 1,700

National Initiative: American Masterpieces 500

Total Learning in the Arts 10,552

Partnerships for the Arts

State Partnerships

State & Regional

Underserved 6,227

Challenge America: Reaching Every Community 6,998

National Initiative: American Masterpieces 3,941

Subtotal State Partnerships 40,328

Direct Endowment Grants 771

Total Partnerships for the Arts 41,099

Total Program Funds 106,482

Total Program Support

Total Salaries & Expenses 3 23,795

TOTAL 132,001

1

 Includes appropriated funds, appropriated funds balances brought forward into FY 2007, nonfederal gifts and interagency transfers

2

 Includes $551K for Save America’s Treasures and $3,720K for Arts on Radio and Television

3

 Includes funds from nonfederal gifts obligated on behalf of the President’s Committee on the Arts and the Humanities of which $237K was obligated in support 

of grants and cooperative agreements

 
 2007 Annual Report 139

appropriations history

Fiscal Year Total Funds

1966 ........................... $ 2,898,308

1967 ........................... $ 8,475,692

1968........................... $ 7,774,291

1969 ........................... $ 8,456,875

1970 ........................... $ 9,055,000

1971 ..........................$ 16,420,000

1972 ..........................$ 31,480,000

1973 ..........................$ 40,857,000

1974 ..........................$ 64,025,000

1975..........................$ 80,142,000

1976 ..........................$ 87,455,000

1976T*.......................$ 35,301,000

1977 ..........................$ 99,872,000

1978 ....................... $ 123,850,000

1979 ....................... $ 149,585,000

Appropriations History

Fiscal Years 1966 – 2007

Fiscal Year Total Funds

1980 ....................... $ 154,610,000

1981....................... $ 158,795,000

1982 ....................... $ 143,456,000

1983 ....................... $ 143,875,000

1984 ...................... $ 162,223,000

1985 ........................$ 163,660,000

1986 ....................... $ 158,822,240

1987........................$ 165,281,000

1988 ........................$ 167,731,000

1989 ....................... $ 169,090,000

1990........................$ 171,255,000

1991 ........................$ 174,080,737

1992........................$ 175,954,680

1993...................... $ 174,459,382

1994 ........................$ 170,228,000

Fiscal Year Total Funds

1995........................$ 162,311,000

1996 ..........................$ 99,470,000

1997 ..........................$ 99,494,000

1998..........................$ 98,000,000

1999..........................$ 97,966,000

2000..........................$ 97,627,600

2001.........................$104,769,000

2002.........................$115,220,000

2003 .........................$115,731,000

2004.........................$120,970,815

2005 .........................$121,263,000

2006 .........................$124,406,353

2007.........................$124,561,844

* In 1976, the Federal government changed the beginning of the fiscal 

year from July 1 to October 1, hence the 1976 Transition (T) Quarter.
140 National Endowment for the Arts

CREDITS

2007 Annual Report published by:

National Endowment for the Arts

Office of Communications

Victoria Hutter, Acting Director

Don Ball, Publications Manager/Editor

December 2008

Researched and written by Elizabeth Stark, Rebecca 

Ritzel, Paulette Beete, Don Ball, Alexandra Eichler, Kofi 

Martin, and Laurie Swanson.

With thanks to NEA staff for their assistance, and to 

grantees for their photographs and information. 

This annual report, as well as all grant and panel 

information for FY 2007, can be ordered free of charge 

and accessed electronically at the NEA Web site:

 www.arts.gov.

National Endowment for the Arts

1100 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW

Washington, DC 20506-0001

(202) 682-5400

2007 Annual Report designed by:

Fletcher Design, Inc./Washington, DC

Cover Photo: The horn section of the West Virginia Symphony 

Orchestra, which performed a statewide tour in 2007-08 with 

support from an NEA grant. 

Photograph courtesy of West Virginia Symphony Orchestra 

Voice/TTY: (202) 682-5496

For individuals who are deaf or hard-of-hearing.

Individuals who do not use conventional print may 

contact the Arts Endowment’s Office for AccessAbility to 

obtain this publication in an alternate format.

Telephone: (202) 682-5532

This publication was printed on recycled paper.
Walter Anderson’s watercolor painting

Walter Rowing, 1960, was part of the 

Walter Anderson Museum of Art’s exhibition 

Everything I See is New and Strange, 

supported by an NEA grant. 

Photo courtesy of Walter Anderson Museum of Art
A Great Nation Deserves Great Art.

1100 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW

Washington, DC 20506-0001

(202) 682-5400

www.arts.gov

Not for sale–Available for free at www.arts.gov