Dane Arts Awards $115,051

June 08, 2016
Stephanie Miller 608-267-8823
County Executive

Sixty-seven grants supporting arts and cultural activities countywide

with public-private funds

Today, the Dane County Cultural Affairs Commission announced the award of 62 project and short order grants totaling $110,194 for community arts, cultural, and local history programs and 5 capital grants in the amount of $4,857.

In the Commission’s first Grant Cycle of 2016, 83 applications were submitted requesting a total of $321,100. County funds were combined with additional funds from the Endres Manufacturing Company Foundation, the Evjue Foundation, Inc., charitable arm of The Capital Times, the W. Jerome Frautschi Foundation, and the Pleasant T. Rowland Foundation. Grant recipients are listed below this announcement.

“Thank you to all of the wonderful organizations who applied for grants,” said Dane County Executive Joe Parisi. “Dane County is fortunate to have a thriving arts culture and such talented artists.”

This year, Dane Arts will award almost $220,000 in public-private funds to nonprofit organizations, schools, individuals, and municipalities for arts, cultural, and local history projects and programs offered countywide. The next project grant deadline is 4:30P.M., Monday, August 1, 2016.

Arts In Education

American Players Theatre Award: $3150

Drawing from over 35 Dane County schools, APT will perform student matinees of the highest quality for over 3,000 elementary, middle and high school students in the fall of 2016. Many of these students will be from rural and underserved areas; many will be seeing classical theater live for the first time.

Children’s Theater of Madison Award: $1500

The Young Playwrights program is an in-school residency program designed to give voice to teenagers through the medium of playwriting and through mentoring from teaching artists. The program culminates in a public performance of selected plays, directed and performed by experienced artists.

Madison Symphony Orchestra, Inc. Award: $2450

Up Close & Musical® is the Madison Symphony Orchestra (MSO)'s nationally-recognized education program that brings the MSO's Hunt Quartet to Kindergarten-3rd grade classrooms to present exciting and engaging lessons that get students hunting for the musical concepts of expression, melody, rhythm and form in beloved classical music repertoire.

Madison Youth Choirs Award: $1800

Madison Youth Choirs continues to helm an increasingly popular in-school choir program at Chavez, Lincoln, Nuestro Mundo and Leopold Elementary schools, and will potentially expand to an additional school in 2016. Devoting their recess time to rehearsals once a week, over 350 students will discover the thrill of singing in a choir for the first time.

Opera for the Young, Inc. Award: $2100

Funding from Dane Arts will support the countywide school tour of a new production based on L'elisir d'amore (or The Elixir of Love) by composer Gaetano Donizetti. Teaching materials will include a Tutorial CD* and Cast Recording, a Teacher's Guide about opera, and a Student Preparation Handbook* including activities for integration of the opera into academic subjects.

Dance

East Madison Community Center Award: $3636

Since 2008, EMCC has had b-boy/b-girl dance program where people gather twice a week to watch, learn, and coach others to learn difficult dance moves. There are also younger people's groups with instructors. The program is free and welcomes anyone who wants to dance.

Kanopy Dance Theatre Inc. Award: $1750

Kanopy presents Martha Graham:(R)evolution. Featuring Martha Graham's masterwork and revolutionary Heretic (1929). Martin Lofsnes, former Martha Graham Principal dancer, Artistic Director of 360Dance performs Countertime and presents a new work performed by Kanopy Dancers. Martha Graham Principal Dancer Miki Orihara and musician Senri OE perform collaboration from her Resonance. Kanopy's Artistic Directors Lisa Thurrell and Robert E Cleary present Cassandra's Cry and Fear is the Enemy.

Madison Ballet Award: $975

Madison Ballet’s “Behind the Curtains” is a full-length performance of the holiday classic, “The Nutcracker,” presented specifically for students. Combining a full-length professional ballet performance with a pre-performance Study Guide, "Behind the Curtains" provides students with a one-of-a-kind opportunity for a deeper understanding of dance and the art of ballet.

Madison Contemporary Vision Dance Award: $2420

For the 2016 performance season, Madison Contemporary Vision Dance Company will be exploring the theme of "Madison Memoirs" and how just one person can positively impact our community. MCVD will be telling the stories of 6 Dane County residents through performances, workshops and classes.

UW Madison Dance Department Award: $2868

Performing Ourselves is a dance outreach project based in Madison, WI. The program employs UW undergraduate dance students to teach dance and wellness curriculum to girls in local community centers. Performing Ourselves combines dance education, dance/movement therapy principles and performance to empower underserved girls in the areas of embodiment, self-concept and resiliency.

Theater

Four Seasons Theatre Award: $1560

Four Seasons Theatre closes our 11th season with Monty Python's SPAMLOT, a production that will showcase the work of Madison area theatre professionals - singers and actors, a talented production team, and an orchestra of local musicians- in a weekend of performances in Shannon Hall at the Wisconsin Union Theater.

Music Theatre of Madison Award: $612

MTM will present the Madison premiere of William Finn's A NEW BRAIN with an ensemble of Madison based professional artists.

Oregon Straw Hat Players Award: $837.6

OSHP presents Big Fish, bringing to life Edward Bloom's incredible, larger-than-life tales and adventures that he tells his son Will, who is expecting his first child. A heartfelt and powerful musical about the struggles of a father and son to understand each other.

Verona Area Community Theater Inc. Award: $750

Verona Area Community Theater presents Mary Poppins on June 17-25, 2016 at the Verona Area Performing Arts Center at 7:30 Pm and a matinee at 2:00 on June 19. The huge cast of singers and dancers will have you singing and tapping your toes.

Music

4 Lakes Traditional Music Collective Award: $1800

Charming and locally grown, the Maple Sugar Traditional Music Festival will bring a well-known headliner artist to their 8/5-6/2016 festival stage. Nestled in the prairie at Lake Farms Park, Madison, Wisconsin, the festival will draw musicians and families to revel in the joy of traditional music through concerts, workshops, and dance.

Bach Dancing & Dynamite Society Award: $3150

Bach Dancing & Dynamite Society combines musicians from around the country, varied repertoire, and delightful surprises creating "serious fun." Scattered throughout our season, in 12 concerts and three outreach events, our "25th Silver Jubilee" will feature many audience favorites from our last 24 years—thrilling works that helped define who BDDS is.

Black Marigold Wind Quintet Award: $300

Short Order Project Grant from Dane Arts to support a commission project that serves to create new work for the contemporary wind quintet repertoire and to engage non-traditional classical audiences through an appealing theme and expansion of a concert series to include less formal performance venues.

Capitol City Band Association Award: $2400

The Capitol City Band will present two free patriotic concerts on Thursday June 30 and Saturday July 2 as a "Tribute to the Troops, then and now" as a way for the community to salute Wisconsin Veterans, all veterans, through music. The band will specifically give tribute to the Veterans of the Vietnam era (Welcome Home Vietnamese Vets). It is the 50th year of the Vietnam War. The band will play some music selections of the 1960s specifically requested by the Veterans.

City of Madison Award: $975

Tunes at Monona Terrace offers opportunities for the public to enjoy the spirit of Dane County in a world class venue at no charge. The series celebrates the heyday of dance and musical shows, drawing thousands of seniors and dance enthusiasts of all ages, some physically challenged, due to the no cost aspect and ease of accessibility.

Fresco Opera Theatre Award: $2400

Fresco takes opera from the concert stage and brings it to you, performing the classics in your neighborhood! As the garage door opens, sit back and enjoy the art so many have for hundreds of years - without leaving the comfort of your community! Garage Opera is portable, without sacrifice.

Friends of Allen Centennial Gardens, Inc. Award: $1080

Madison’s new concert series, SUMMER SUNDAYS IN THE GARDEN, will offer jazz and classical chamber music every other Sunday afternoon beginning with the summer solstice and concluding with the autumnal equinox, June through September. Free and open to the public, the series will take place in the inspiring natural surrounds of the English Garden at Allen Centennial Gardens, and will feature the area’s best local musicians.

Greater Madison Jazz Consortium Award: $2400

Strollin’ is a mini-festival that presents 8-9 hours of stylistically-diverse jazz performances at indoor and outdoor venues in “walkable” local commercial districts, with no cover charges, enabling music fans to stroll from venue to venue to sample the music. This project presents Strollin' events in Verona, Middleton, and Downtown Madison.

Jazz at Five Inc. Award: $2040

Jazz at Five outdoor concert series begins the second Wednesday of August. Join us at the top of State Street and enjoy FREE jazz performances each week from award winning national and regional acts, as well as the best local jazz musicians Madison has to offer. Come experience the sounds of summer in Madison!

Madison Blues Society Award: $1938

The Madison Blues Society will hold its 14th Annual Blues Picnic on Saturday, June 18, 2015 from noon to 9pm in Warner Park, a free event featuring six bands, including the "Blues Kids," in celebration of an art both universal in appeal and uniquely American in origin. Dancing will be encouraged.

Madison Choral Project Award: $1200

The Madison Choral Project, a fully professional choir, will welcome a diverse audience to a winter concert series celebrating multiple faith traditions through carefully curated selections of choral music, spoken readings, and audience-participation singing.

Madison Early Music Festival Award: $2700

The Madison Early Music Festival welcomes The Newberry Consort for "The Loves of Queen Elizabeth," a multidisciplinary arts event that brings together the 1912 silent film starring Sarah Bernhardt with an Elizabethan soundtrack performed live by a 5-piece violin ensemble and soprano Ellen Hargis. In addition to performing, members of The Newberry Consort will teach techniques and small ensemble classes throughout the week.

Madison Music Collective Award: $1575

The Madison Music Collective (MMC) will be presenting five “Jazz With Class” presentations at the 2016 Isthmus Jazz Festival and two “Jazz On A Sunday” concerts this fall. We will also co-sponsor four “InDIGenous Concert Series” performances with the Greater Madison Jazz Consortium (GMJC).

Madison Opera, Inc. Award: $3675

Individuals and families come from all over Dane County and beyond to attend Opera in the Park. With its free admission and comfortable, convenient, and beautiful outdoor setting, Opera in the Park has demographics similar to the demographics of Dane County as a whole.

Make Music Madison Award: $3104

Make Music Madison is a free, citywide, outdoor celebration of community through music, held annually on the summer solstice, June 21.

Marquette Neighborhood Association Award: $652

The Cottonwood Stage Expansion for the Marquette Waterfront Festival- June 11th and 12th 2016. The Cottonwood Stage has been a wonderful addition to the Marquette Waterfront Festival and was established two years ago to meet a growing demand for a more intimate, mellow setting within the context of the wildly successful Waterfront Festival. The Cottonwood has been the scene to many great Folk, Bluegrass, Singer/ Songwriter performances and has doubled audience size each year. By creating a second day we are opening up opportunities for performers like Jon Dee Graham from Austin to try some acoustic material on the folk stage then join his band on the main stage later in the day. The expanded Cottonwood is allowing more local performers like Ana Vogelzang and Josh Harty to perform. The funds requested will mainly be used for Artist fees. While the expanded seating and sound costs will be absorbed by the festivals general revenue. We will establish seating for 200 and have snacks and beverages available at this stage for the first time so the audience won't be moving back and forth between stages. Noted folk musician Bobby Batyko is booking this stage this year. Bobby is a major organizer of the noted Sugar Maple Festival and is putting together a stellar and varied lineup. This stage will be promoted more intensely this year through WORT and Wisconsin Public Radio.

Middleton Community Orchestra Award: $2625

To celebrate the Middleton Community Orchestra's seventh season, the orchestra will present two concerts in collaboration with young, guest artists from Dane County including guest conductor Kyle Knox, pianist Thomas Kasdorf and voice students at the UW School of Music.

North/Eastside Senior Coalition Award: $704

Enjoy free, live music for the whole family at the 22nd Annual Summer Concert Series at the Warner Park Shelter, 2930 N. Sherman Avenue on Monday evenings June 13th, 20th & 27th and July 11th, 18th & 25th from 6-7:30 pm (Rain date is August 1st). Bring a lawn chair or blanket to sit on. Each week a local band plays jazz, country, swing, big band, R&B, rock, bluegrass or Mexican music in this relaxed, intimate setting. More information at www.nescoinc.org.

Robert Queen Award: $3640

The Central Park Sessions is a free concert series happening throughout the middle and latter part of the summer on Thursday evenings and gives families to come together at a beautiful setting to enjoy music and dance and have dinner and socialize. The concerts are unique and present music from different regions of the US and the world.

Token Creek Festival, Inc. Award: $2600

The 2016 Token Creek Chamber Music Festival continues to explore the intimacy between the natural world and art. Programming this year celebrates the reconstruction of the beautiful meandering stream on the farm property we call home. A forum offers a restoration ecology update, and our concert programs are anchored by works of the ultimate musical naturalist, Franz Schubert.

Urban Community Arts Network, Ltd. Award: $2360

Urban Community Arts Network, Ltd. is hosting For the Love of Hip-Hop, a free, outdoor summer concert series featuring all local artists. The aim of this series is to create performance opportunities for Dane County Hip-Hop artists and to expose the community to the vibrant Hip-Hop culture in Dane County.

Village of Waunakee Award: $439

A series of summer outdoor concerts are planned for The Village of Waunakee. The concerts will take place on Tuesday evenings for seven consecutive weeks spanning between June and July, 2016. Bands will change weekly and represent different genres of music each week.

Willy Street Chamber Players Award: $1600

The Willy Street Chamber Players are the new faces of chamber music in Madison. In residency at Immanuel Lutheran Church in the Williamson/Marquette neighborhood, the group features musicians who live on the East Side of Madison and perform with the cities major arts organizations.

Wil-Mar Neighborhood Center Award: $3500

La Fete De Marquette is a free and inclusive event. We expect and welcome people of all backgrounds and socioeconomic statuses, including community youth and households that would normally not have a chance to participate in free activities and see world-renowned performers from multiple genres.

Wisconsin Chamber Orchestra Award: $2625

Concerts on the Square have been a fixture of Madison's cultural landscape for 32 years. One of the this season's highlights is the July 27th concert featuring Chitravina N. Ravikiran, who is critically acclaimed across the world and been hailed as the, "Mozart of Indian Music," by the Wisconsin State Journal.

Wisconsin Union Theater Award: $3000

The Madison World Music Festival (September 16-17, 2016) will proudly celebrate musical traditions from around the world during two days of free public activities include headlining acts by international artists from around the globe and educational programs such as workshops and in-school performances.

Wisconsin Youth Symphony Orchestra Award: $2983

The Evelyn Steenbock Fall Concerts are the first performances of the WYSO season, showcasing the talents of our diverse young musicians. The Steenbock Concert Series is dedicated to private and school music teachers, who will again be honored in 2016 for their dedication to music education, and their impact on all WYSO students.

Multidisciplinary

African Association of Madison, Inc. Award: $2000

Under the theme "African Fabrics and Textiles" the African Association of Madison will produce AFRICA FEST 2016 at Central Park on Saturday, August 13, 2016. AFRICA FEST will showcase African textiles and culture through displays, songs, crafts, stories, foods, history, and heritage to help build bridges of diversity in Dane County.

Arohana School of Music Award: $1300

Multi-culturally diverse festival of artistic and cultural significance that will showcase Classical music and dance of India, and western solo/ensembles performing arranged pieces.

City of Madison Award: $1660

Maker Faire is the Greatest Show (and Tell) on Earth—a family-friendly festival of invention, creativity and resourcefulness, and a celebration of the Maker movement.

Design Coalition Institute Inc. Award: $3098

Disability Pride Madison Award: $2595

The Disability Pride Festival celebrates the lives and civil rights of all people with disabilities. Through art and performance, we will share the stories of our lives, breakdown and end internalized shame and stereotypes and build a stronger, more inclusive community for everyone.

Lo Marie Award: $2038.4

Pursuit is an all-new collaborative project combining original Jazz and Electronic music with Hip-Hop and Contemporary dance. The show follows a young woman on her fantastical journey to enlightenment while fighting her own inner demons along a dark and twisted path.

Madison Circus Space Award: $1434

The Madison Circus Space presents the Skeleton Circus, featuring new circus acts by local and regional performers including hoop dance, German wheel, aerial dance, juggling, and acroyoga. Audiences will have two chances to see this performance, on Friday, June 17, at 6:00 and 9:00pm. Everyone is welcome and performances are family friendly.

Madison Library Foundation Award: $3500

Madison Public Library will host the 2016 Wisconsin Book Festival by scheduling 60 free public programs presenting fiction, history, science, poetry, and spoken word, featuring local literary voices alongside nationally-recognized authors. With an anticipated audience of 12,000, the festival supports the library's mission to celebrate ideas, promote creativity, connect people, and enrich lives.

Mazomanie Charitable Alliance Award: $931

The Gandy Dancer Festival was first held in 2007 at Madison's Central Park as a one-time event to benefit the Mid-Continent Railway Museum in North Freedom. A co-sponsor that year was the Southern Wisconsin Bluegrass Music Association, which organized the musical line-up of local and regional folk, bluegrass and blues musicians as warm up for the appearance of the nationally known bluegrass band, the Alan Munde Gazette. The festival was so popular with the general public and the event organizers that it was decided to hold the festival a second time, again as a benefit for the railroad museum. But the location was moved to the newly completed Westland Promenade in Mazomanie.

The new venue allowed the festival's organizers to add other activities to the musical program that were not available at the Madison location. Community leaders were asked to join the planning committee and partnerships were created with the Mazomanie Free Public Library and the Mazomanie Historical Society to help fashion these activities with the goal of appealing to young families as a way to boost our audience appeal beyond an older generation that tends to favor Americana music. During the nine years that the festival has taken place other local and regional organizations have participated in providing exhibits and activities to enhance the festival's program. These organizations include the Madison Children’s Museum, the Cross Plains Lions Club, the Mazomanie Movement Arts Center, the S-Gauge Club of Madison, Cornerstone Carriages, Shenanigans, and the newly opened Micro-Car Museum.

The Gandy Dancer Festival is a production of the Mazomanie Charitable Alliance. It is a free, one-day event which features musical performances by local, regional and nationally known Americana artists, along with family activities, rides and exhibits.

Overture Center Foundation Award: $2450

Overture's Rising Stars is a local talent show created to highlight and celebrate the amazing talent of our community members and to build awareness of Overture Center for the Arts and its programs.

TAPIT/new works Award: $ 1380

TAPIT/new works seeks from Dane County for the outreach and performances of Ben Franklin & Baron von Steuben vs. the Paine County School Board, a new play about what happens when historical figures get involved in contemporary controversies.

Wisconsin Historical Foundation Award: $1500

Summertime Fun provides an engaging experience to the casual museum visitor through immersive environments and activities. Expanding on themes found throughout the Museum, this programming offers enrichment activities that provide a deeper understanding of Wisconsin history.

Visual Arts

Arts & Literature Laboratory, Inc. Award: $960

Arts Literature Laboratory (ALL) offers year-round exhibition opportunities for local and national artists in a unique collaborative space for visual, literary and performing artists. ALL will present its first Dane County Emerging Artists series February through April 2017, featuring three exhibitions by promising local artists.

Art Working Award: $300

Art Working, in partnership with the Madison Public Library, is hosting a summit specific focus of the summit will be the intersection of the Arts, Ability, Access and Enterprise. The event is specifically designed to assist diverse populations, who are interested in arts-based small business ownership. The summit will take place on May 17, 2016 at the Madison Public Library, Central Branch, and will be free and open to the public. The project is being funded in part by the Wisconsin Board for People with Developmental Disabilities. It will also provide an opportunity for existing small businesses to share knowledge, engage in marketing, and expand their customer base. The event will consist of six individual workshops and a keynote address. Presenters are being selected based on the input of stakeholders and the community.

Bayview Foundation, Inc. Award: $2625

Bayview's Place-making Mural is the first project in a series of planned initiatives to increase resident engagement, beautify the neighborhood and publicly identify Bayview as home to hundreds of Madison immigrants and refugees from twelve different countries. An estimated 100 residents of all ages and backgrounds will create the artwork.

Cambridge Arts Council Award: $1530

The Inaugural Midwest Fire Fest is a celebration of all arts, visual and culinary, that are created with fire. The performance heavy event will feature an iron pour, fired pottery and large sculpture built and fired on location and unveiled at white heat.

Gay Straight Alliance for Safe Schools Award: $2100

Captured is a series of images taken of youth inside the Dane County Juvenile Detention Center. The series hopes to expose the public to what life is like for incarcerated youth, while at the same time creating a visual narrative that documents and puts a face to what racial disparity looks like in present-day Dane County.

Madison Museum of Contemporary Art Award: $1575

Drawn from MMoCA’s permanent collection, Our Good Earth is an exhibition featuring a wide range of artworks connected by themes in which artists explore the natural world. Included works will reveal the modern and contemporary artist’s concern for the planet; compassion for flora and fauna; concerns about threats to the natural world; and topics of environmental renewal and restoration.

Street Pulse- Refuge Films Award: $2600

ARTISTS IN ABSENTIA, a documentary by the director of Dostoevsky Behind Bars, gives viewers a chance to meet the men from Oakhill Correctional Institution, a minimum-security prison in Oregon, Wisconsin, who cannot attend the exhibition of their writing, music, art and acting mounted at Madison's central library.

Wisconsin Academy of Arts Sciences and Letters Award: $1620

This project will develop an exhibition and related programming about the revival of Haudenosaunee (Iroquois) raised beadwork among the Wisconsin Oneida, who have been established on lands near Green Bay since the 1830s. Their distinctive raised beadwork technique, while typically associated with items made for tourists, is increasingly used on pieces made for personal and ceremonial use as a marker of Haudenosaunee identity. For the Wisconsin Oneida, it represents a vital link to sister Nations in New York and Ontario.

Organized in partnership with the Oneida Nation Arts Program (ONAP) and the Oneida Nation Museum (ONM), Beading Culture will focus on a key group of artists who teach and participate in beading circles. Working closely with the artists, the exhibit team will present a complex, layered story of resilience and cultural preservation. The show will include examples of early raised beadwork; pieces by Six Nations beaders who have mentored Wisconsin artists; video of beading circles; and objects that reveal technique. If fully funded, public programming will include artist demonstrations, lectures, panels, student workshops, and gallery talks.

Capitol Grants

Capitol City Band Association Award: $1482

Purchase of electronic equipment.

Madison Children’s Museum Award: $1500

Design to Move: the Community Stairwell Collaborative Art Project.

Madison Trust for Historic Preservation Award: $262

Listening devices for summer historic architecture walking tours.

Urban Community Arts Network, Ltd. Award: $713

Audio/Visual upgrades for community events.

Wisconsin Academy of Sciences, Arts & Letters Award: $900

Plexiglas topped cases, wall shelves and mannequins for current artwork on exhibit.