MSAC releases Annual Report
The Fiscal Year 2013 Annual Report—released in September—highlights the activities and grantees of MSAC programs that by design, support economic development and advance the cultural vitality and quality of life in Maryland.

“Marylanders are, at heart, a creative and forward-looking people who believe all forms of art—be it music, literature, traditional arts, visual arts— enrich our lives. By supporting arts initiatives, we continue to develop and promote vibrant centers of commerce, culture and creativity throughout our State,” says Gov. Martin O’Malley in a published letter that introduces the report.

The Arts Council awarded nearly $9 million in operating grants to 258 arts organizations across the state for fiscal 2013, in addition to more than $2 million in grants to 23 County Arts Councils and Baltimore City.

Available online, the 40-page publication features photos and artwork from a broad selection of MSAC partners and grantees, including arts organizations, programs and Individual Artists Award recipients. The report also includes artist and arts organization profiles, descriptions of all MSAC programs and details of all grants distributed to each county.

Gov. O’Malley calls for arts education task force
Gov. Martin O’Malley’s P-20 (Pre-K through postgraduate) Leadership Council voted unanimously to create a statewide task force on arts education in Maryland schools, according to a September 16 announcement from the Arts Education in Maryland Schools Alliance (AEMS).

Dr. William E. (Brit) Kirwan, Chancellor of the University System of Maryland, made the initial motion to endorse, commenting on the power of the arts in his life and the importance of the arts for all students. Sculptor and AEMS Founder Mary Ann Mears and Maryland State Department of Education Deputy Superintendent Dr. Jack Smith will co-chair the P-20 Task Force on Arts Education.

The Maryland State Arts Council’s Arts-in-Education (AiE) program includes partnerships with AEMS, the Maryland Teacher/Artist Institute (MATI), and the 21st Century Learning Institute, in addition to Visiting Performer and Artists-in-Residence grant programs and the annual Poetry Out Loud competition. FY13 AiE grants of $628,166 impacted an audience of 198,604 students in 507 Maryland Schools. To continue Maryland’s standing as a national leader in education, the Governor wants to extend quality arts education experiences to all Maryland students.

P-20 Leadership Council members emphasized the critical importance of creativity and innovation in the workforce and the need for students to have a creative edge in order to be globally competitive. The task force will present a final report to the Governor and the Council in June 2014.

Literary Arts Week at Free Fall Baltimore
The Maryland State Arts Council is partnering with the Greater Baltimore Cultural Alliance, CityLit Project and the William G. Baker, Jr. Memorial Fund to present the third annual Literary Arts Week in celebration of Arts & Humanities Month this October.

During the week of October 7-13, Literary Arts Week will feature a series of 12 free, public events hosted by Baltimore’s literary arts community, including free access to Baltimore’s Poe House, “An Evening of Dead Baltimore Authors”, and the opening of the historic Mencken House for a reading by “Sage of Baltimore” impersonator John Dausch. A poetry “flash mob” will also take place in downtown Baltimore at an undisclosed time.

MCA hosts ArtsLab
Maryland Citizens for the Arts (MCA) has opened registration for ArtsLab 2013, Wednesday, October 30, 9:30am-3:00pm at Howard County Center for the Arts. 

Entitled “The Generational Shift: Creating New Approaches to Leadership, Funding, and Audience Participation in the Arts,” MCA’s second annual capacity building conference for arts professionals and artists is an opportunity to explore solutions to the current shift in generational demographics across the arts.  Participants will look at this shift through the following three lenses:

1. Approaches to organizational leadership and governance
2. Trends in philanthropy and in earned income
3. Changes in audience participation

NEA releases new survey
How do Americans participate in the arts in the course of a year? What kinds of art forms and activities do they engage with, and in what numbers? The NEA investigates these questions and more in the 2012 Survey of Public Participation in the Arts (SPPA), the nation’s largest population survey of arts participation trends. The NEA recently released an initial report of the survey's findings.
Key findings of the survey, which was conducted in partnership with the National Census Bureau, include:

• Festivals show promise as entry points to the arts. One in four younger adults (ages 18-24) attended an outdoor performing arts festival in 2012, up from 22% in 2008.

• Fiber arts was the most popular form of art-making,  with 13% of adults participating in weaving, crocheting, quilting, needlepoint, knitting, or sewing in 2012. Twelve percent of adults played a musical instrument. Nine percent reported singing, either alone or with others, and 8 percent created leatherwork, metalwork, or woodwork.

• Mobile devices appear to narrow racial/ethnic gaps in arts engagement. Whether listening to music, looking at a photo, or watching a dance or theater performance, all racial/ethnic groups show roughly the same rates of engagement via mobile devices.

A more comprehensive report with in-depth findings will be available in 2014.