Community/Artist Partnership Project

We are not currently accepting applications for the C/APP program.  The previous round of applications closed on November 13, 2009.  Please stay tuned for the next round.

The staff liaison to C/APP is Carlton Turner.  If you have any questions about C/APP or need assistance with your application, please write to carlton@alternateroots.org.

C/APP was initiated in 1984 by Alternate ROOTS. Since its inception, the project has supported over 40 projects in eight states, convened a national gathering of community cultural workers, and initiated a training program for the advanced study of community arts practice. Projects selected for funding focus on social issues in a variety of community settings.

The Alternate ROOTS Resources for Social Change Program directly supports the C/APP by hosting Learning Exchanges that share ideas, methods, and techniques for creating social change through the arts. The core methods used to share information are learning exchanges that engage emerging, as well as established art partners in sharing best practices toward partnerships that incorporate the five key principles for creating sustained projects with deep impact.

Those principles include:

• shared power
• partnership
• transformation
• dialogue
• aesthetics

RSC offers WORKSHOPS and TRAININGS:

• for initiating and building community artists partnerships through which to discover, pool and share vision and resources;
  
• for planning collaborative projects that turn community goals into long-term community solutions;
• for using the arts as tools or search engines in community work
  

The arts help give life to communities. The Arts give spirit and support to community efforts. The Arts move people to action as well as to enjoyment.

WHO WORKS WITH US?

• ARTISTS: performers, visual artists, writers, musicians and others
• CULTURAL WORKERS
• ART and ACADEMIC EDUCATORS
• ARTS ORGANIZATIONS / INSTITUTIONS
• COMMUNITY-BASED ORGANIZATIONS, which may include service providers, youth programs, libraries, community organizing groups, crisis centers, churches, leadership development programs, preservation and historical groups, community development organizations.

Resources for Social Change workshops
feature:

• LEADERS experienced with the arts as tools for social change
• STORIES of positive transformation using the arts to address difficult issues
• CONTACT  with individuals capable of leading community in creating their own unique arts experience

The end goal of working with RSC, Alternate ROOTS Resources for Social Change, is THE CREATION OF A RIPPLING AFFECT IN THE COMMUNITY, THAT EXTENDS PAST A RSC TRAINING.

Excerpts from a special issue of HIGH PERFORMANCE Magazine on the partnering of Artists and Communities:

"I like to think of the partnering process as a dance, a series of movements through which partners learn of each other... They circle each other, watch each other’s movement and play off of each others responses."

- Nayo Watkins

"I am more confident than ever that, as complicated as the questions seem to get, finally the negotiations are simply between the partners, whether between collaborators at the beginning of a project or between artists and audience at the other end. The point of the negotiations is to discover whether we may be of a like mind, whether we can identify and assert our mutual interdependence and whether we can begin creating together."

- Bob Leonard

LET'S START A CONVERSATION!

Resources for Social Change
Facilitator/Mentor

The Community/Artists Partnership Program (C/APP) supports and promotes community-based projects between artist-activists and their community partner(s) by providing resources of information, funds and training. Initiated in 1993, C/APP was one of the first programs in the United States to promote equitable partnerships in arts-based community work. Through the C/APP program, annual C/APP grants are awarded that support and promote community-based residencies by providing resources of information, funds, and training to foster and support collaborations between artists and community-based organizations. C/APP Projects are supported by a Project Mentor to help anchor the project. This Mentor is someone who brings experience working in and with communities, and can bring a wealth of knowledge to the C/APP Project. The Facilitator/Mentor list is intended as a suggested place to begin identifying potential Mentors for your C/APP project. However, you may have someone with your respective community that you know can bring guidance and direction to your project.

The list of facilitators/mentors is available for download below.