Grassroots On Hand

Grassroots On Hand is a menu of pre-designed arts programs that assist Designated County Partners (DCPs) and Provisional County Partners (PCPs) to use Grassroots Arts Program funds effectively and efficiently.

Designated County Partners in counties with a population of less than 50,000 are not required to subgrant GAP funds. However, these organizations must use 50 percent of their funds to conduct arts programs or, alternatively, grant these funds to other local organizations to conduct arts programs. Grassroots On Hand may be a good choice for DCPs that present programs or have funded all competitive subgrant applications. Hopefully, these offerings will also prove useful to any local arts council seeking new program ideas.

Grassroots on Hand programs include assistance from North Carolina Arts Council staff in planning and managing projects.

For additional information, please contact: Leigh Ann Wilder at (919) 807-6508 or leighann.wilder@ncdcr.gov.

View the programs:

Public Art & Community Design

• Grassroots Goes Green
• (Re)Making Space for the Arts

Folklife

• Discover Your County's African American Musical Heritage
• Train to Sustain
• Counting Quilts
• Traditional Arts Programs for Students (TAPS)
• Live and Learn: Apprenticeships
• Discovering Ourselves
• Cultural Connections

Touring & Presenting

• Artist Residencies

Public Art & Community Design

Grassroots Goes Green: Using Public Art to Promote Sustainability and a Sense of Place

Grassroots Goes Green provides a means for promoting community, neighborhood, or school identity and environmental sustainability through collaborative engagement in a public art or community design project of modest scale and scope. Because a community's landscape and natural environment represent its most deeply shared common bond, green and environmentally sustainable public art projects are the focus of this program. Such projects may involve a prominent landscape design component or may include the use of recycled materials or local natural materials.

Description: The program consists of three components:

• An educational presentation and community discussion about public art
• A three-session artist "mini-residency" with the community, a neighborhood, or school, and
• A resulting permanent or temporary work of art or community-informed design

N.C. Arts Council staff will visit your community, neighborhood, or school to lead an informative discussion about different approaches to public art and green art. The constituent organization will then select a North Carolina artist from a roster of pre-screened and experienced artists. The artist will visit the community or neighborhood three times. Through public meetings, interviews, and/or hands-on workshops, he or she will work with interested community members to identify valued elements of community cultural and environmental identity; to discuss use patterns of potential public sites; and, with the assistance of Arts Council staff, to draft a timeline and implementation plan for the artwork. Drawing from these visioning sessions, the artist—either alone or with assistance from others in the community—will create a public work of art relevant to the community's landscape and sense of place.

(Please see our Public Art page and our Creating Place and School/Public Art Residency Collaboration Grants for more resources and information about the nature of public art and community design.)

Requirements: The organizing group must identify a responsible Project Manager to oversee all aspects of the Grassroots Goes Green program within their community.

Program Cost: $8,500
This covers the cost of the artist honorarium and travel, workshop fees and supplies, artwork design, materials, fabrication and installation, and other associated costs.

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(Re)Making Space for the Arts: Arts Facility Feasibility Study and Design Assistance

An abbreviated version of our Creating Place: Facility Design Level I grant, this program is designed for organizations considering an arts facility renovation project. The project must involve either the adaptive reuse of an existing structure or renovations to an existing arts facility. New building projects are ineligible.

The N. C. Arts Council recognizes that community needs as well as arts facility needs are unique to each project, and we emphasize community involvement and a thoroughly collaborative approach to design decisions. Prior to engaging the services of an architect, an organization must conduct the necessary research and development groundwork to determine specific community attributes and desires as well as environmental, architectural, and financial challenges and requirements.

Description: This program supports the hire of experienced, community-minded architectural and design consultants recommended by N.C. Arts Council staff to determine the feasibility of an arts facility adaptive reuse or renovation project. Green and environmentally sustainable projects are highly encouraged.
Consultants, in collaboration with grantee organizations, will:

• Conduct an intensive, two-day onsite workshop to foster community dialogue, determine community needs and goals, and identify potential design options and resources
• Evaluate project needs and challenges
• Estimate costs and set realistic goals and timelines
• Identify opportunities for green modifications or construction
• Produce an illustrated written visioning report documenting the workshop, their own findings, and community conclusions
• Present the final report to the grantee organization and the local community

This final visioning report may serve as evidence of your organization's eligibility and competitiveness for a N.C. Arts Council's Facility Design Level II grant, as well as providing "readiness" documentation for corporate or foundation grants and individual donors.

Requirements: The organizing group must identify a Project Manager and community building committee to oversee all aspects of the Facility Design Assistance Program within their community.

Cost: $7,000
This covers the cost of consultant fees, travel, and other associated costs.

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Folklife

Discover your County's African American Musical Heritage

In collaboration with the North Carolina Folklife Institute, the N.C. Arts Council is implementing the first phase of the African American Heritage Music Project. This initiative is documenting artists, events, sites, and venues associated with nationally significant traditions of African American music in the eastern region of the state and linking these resources to heritage tourism trails marketed to visitors and residents. Project partners will follow the model of the Blue Ridge Music Trails, a highly successful project that combined folklife fieldwork and community collaboration to create tourism products that focused on living cultural traditions.

Description: The first phase of the African American Music Project has focused on Lenoir, Wilson, Jones, Greene, Edgecombe, Nash, Wayne and Pitt counties. Utilizing GAP funds for this project will allow arts councils in other counties to document and present local and regional African American music traditions and may create opportunities for participating counties to connect with the larger trails project.
Examples of traditions that may be documented by folklore fieldworkers include older genres such as fiddle and banjo music, work songs, ragtime, blues, and rhythm and blues, as well as newer traditions of jazz, soul, funk, rap, and hip hop. Sacred music performance traditions are even more pervasive in North Carolina communities and encompass spirituals, quartet singing, hymn choirs, shape-note singing, shout bands, and a wide range of traditional and contemporary gospel music styles.

The following will be provided to participants:

• Resource inventory of sites, venues, and artists related to African American music traditions in your county
• Copies of selected interviews, photographs, and sound/video recordings generated through fieldwork
• Report on fieldwork
• A public program that presents some of the musicians documented through the project

Requirements: The sponsoring group must provide working space for the folklorist or folklife specialist (desk, computer, phone, copy machine, business cards).

Cost: $7,500
Covers costs of folklorist's fees and travel expenses, equipment purchase or rental, supplies, and honoraria.

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Train to Sustain: Training North Carolinians to Document Community Traditions

Train to Sustain is designed for counties where rich folklife traditions flourish but where communities lack the resources necessary to hire folklorists to document these traditions and present them in public programs.

Description: Train to Sustain has two components: 1) training residents from your county through participation in the Community Folklife Documentation Institute; and 2) planning and implementation of a documentary project in a community or communities in your county.

An intensive five-day residential course held at Duke University's Center for Documentary Studies will provide trainees with topical seminars, technical workshops and practice sessions, field documentation experiences, and project consultations. At the conclusion of coursework, mentors will monitor and advise trainees as they plan and implement a folklife project in their county. Participants will reconvene to share project progress and to attend workshops determined by needs and interests (i.e. editing techniques, grant-writing, exhibit design, archiving, material culture documentation, etc.).

Requirements: The sponsoring group should identify a candidate for the Community Folklife Documentation Institute and collaborate with the participant to create a documentation project or to join a project already in place. The sponsoring group will actively support the documentation project by helping to secure funding, locate materials and supplies, and/or provide work space, as needed.

Cost: $6,000
Covers the cost of tuition, travel, hotel, and meals associated with attending the Institute, and equipment purchase or rental, supplies, mileage, honorariums and other costs associated with planning and implementing a documentation project.

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Counting Quilts

Quilting, an ancient textile art, remains one of the most vibrant traditional arts in our state. Every region, every county, every community in North Carolina can boast of quilts and their makers. Yet, often, little is known of the local artistry that contributes to this robust tradition.

Description: This documentation project creates "Quilt Documentation Days" and enlists the expertise of a team (quilt scholars, photographer, and volunteer assistants) who will document the quilts and interview their owners. The resulting data will be made accessible to project sponsors and can become the basis of a gallery or Web site exhibition plan utilizing area quilts and the stories of their makers and users. A folklife consultant will develop the exhibition plan in collaboration with the sponsoring agency and community members. Quilts documented through this program will be entered into a state-wide quilt database.

Products:

• Quilt documentation day events
• Quilt documentation records with digital image collection
• Videotaped interview collection
• Exhibition development plan

Counting Quilts may be chosen for a second year, with Grassroots funds used to implement the exhibition plan and to develop accompanying programs and publicity.

Requirements: The organizing group will provide volunteers to assist the quilt documentation team, and assist in identifying local photographers and videographers.

Cost: $7,000

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Traditional Arts Programs for Students (TAPS)

TAPS provides community organizations (arts centers, schools, community centers) with funding for after-school programs that partner North Carolina elementary and middle school students with local traditional artists. TAPS succeeds when the traditional arts selected for instruction are highly valued by the community. In western North Carolina, TAPS include the popular Junior Appalachian Musicians (JAM) programs. In other areas of the state, TAPS programs foster the traditional arts of second and third generation Koreans in Raleigh; provide elementary school students with instruction in turning ware by master potters in Seagrove; teach Haliwa-Saponi students the contemporary arts of their tribe and enlists the talents of jazz and funk artists to further middle school students' musical explorations in Kinston.

Description: Students receive instruction in an art form that has deep cultural roots in their community, taught by experts utilizing traditional instructional techniques. For that reason, N.C. Arts Council staff recommends TAPS for counties where a folklife survey has been completed. Documentation of a community or region's living traditions facilitates recruiting instructors for TAPS and also makes accessible information about the area's living traditions and its people. TAPS requires a host institution, such as an arts organization, to manage the project. After school instruction may take place at a school site or a community center. In several cases, TAPS participants have found it beneficial to partner with other after school programs that provide snacks, supervision, transportation, and facilities.

Requirements: The organizing group must identify a project manager to oversee all aspects of the TAPS Program.

Cost: $8,000–$10,000
Covers the cost of honoraria, equipment purchase or rental, supplies, and travel expenses for the first year; and $8,000 in succeeding years.

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Live and Learn: Apprenticeships

An apprenticeship is a designated period of one-on-one training during which a student (the apprentice) studies an art form through practical, hands-on experience under the guidance and instruction of a respected, accomplished artist (the master). The one-to-one relationship between a master and an apprentice fosters direct communication, provides high quality instruction tailored to the needs of the student and results in artistic production that achieves established standards of excellence.

Apprenticeships may be appropriate for aspiring students of a traditional art, performance art or contemporary craft when formal learning opportunities to study the art form in depth are not available in the county. Apprenticeships may incorporate a wide range of ethnic, regional, and occupational artistic traditions.

Description: Apprenticeships pair a master artist recognized for having achieved a high level of expertise in his or her art form with a less-experienced apprentice. The master and apprentice jointly plan how the student learns from the master artist during the course of the apprenticeship. Both master artist and apprentice should be residents of the county.

The Apprenticeship program provides:

• Stipends for master artists and a smaller sum for apprentices
• Funds for a public program
• Funds for materials

Requirements: Master artists and apprentices must be approved by the N.C. Arts Council staff unless drawn from the N.C. Arts Council Touring directory or the Heritage Award recipient directory. At the conclusion of the apprenticeship master and apprentice provide a public program facilitated by a local arts council or DCP. The program can be a concert, exhibition or workshop that demonstrates the accomplishments of the master-apprenticeship relationship to the general public. A written evaluation of the apprenticeship is required when the project concludes.

Cost: $3,000
Covers $1,500 to master artist; $1,000 to apprentice and $500 for travel and supplies.

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Discovering Ourselves: Community Folklife Surveys and Programs

Organizations that want to discover, understand and present traditional arts practiced within their communities will benefit from this documentation project that utilizes the skills of professional folklorists and community folklife specialists.

Description: Discovering Ourselves begins when N.C. Arts Council staff consult with DCPs to identify potential music, dance, craft, narrative and other arts traditions that are possible to document within a four-week time frame. Once agreement has been reached regarding the goals and scope of the project, N.C. Arts Council staff recommends professional folklorists to identify and document artists living within the county served by the DCP. The documentation produced may include sound and video recordings, interview transcripts, photographs, and reports. A final report provides sponsoring organizations with profiles of local traditional artists and recommendations for presenting public programs that sustain county arts traditions and share North Carolina's cultural heritage with residents and visitors, alike. For an additional fee, DCPs have the option of adding a programming component to the scope of work performed by the folklorists employed through the project.

Products:

• Photographs, sound and video recordings, and interview transcripts
• Contact information and profiles of traditional artists and of community organizations that support traditional practices
• Survey Report with programming and other recommendations for sponsoring organization
• Identification of community residents or arts organization staff member for training through the Community Folklife Documentation Institute
• Programs planned and presented by folklorists working in collaboration with local arts councils (Optional)

Benefits:

• Expanded roster of local artists
• Increased knowledge of local organizations and events engaged in artistic production
• Increased identification of and relationships with diverse ethnic, religious and traditionally-based communities and audiences

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