surprise art
Surprise Window Galleries
We love surprises -- especially serendipitous art, the art in places and at times you don't expect it. For the 2011 community campaign for the arts, we sponsored several surprise art events all across the community - including one event at the airport!
In April, we collaborated with local developers and artists to create pop-up storefront window galleries in temporary space on the 1400 block of Vine Street. Visitors can learn about the collaboration by scanning a QR code we placed in the windows.
The art gives life and energy and provides a fun surprise for shoppers and residents. This kind of serendipitous art makes places exciting and unique -- creating neighborhoods where people want to live, work, and play.
Local artists and teachers Pam Kravetz, Daisy Cunningham, and Karen Saunders worked with Carla Lamb and Bryan Carr, along with young people at Clark Montessori School, Harrison High School, and Lakota East, to create spring-inspired pop-up art for the windows in Parvis Lofts' storefronts.
Karen, Carla, and Pam (remember them from Paint the Street?) said they were inspired by Sandy Skoglen's installation art pieces, and their students took on the challenge and had a lot of fun with this playful and creative surprise art.
"We love how art connects to a community, and how it influences and enriches a neighborhood," said Pam. "For our students, the work became bigger than just themselves and their individual schools. Three very different, diverse communities from all over the Cincinnati area came together for this big installation that affects a completely different part of the region - one they're eager to influence and explore."
Dancers Surprise and Delight Passengers at CVG
Passengers at the Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky Airport on Thursday, April 21 were surprised by dancing in the middle of Concourse B. We collaborated with CVG officials to bring dancers from Cincinnati Ballet to the airport.
This surprise event is one of several we've organized throughout our annual community campaign, showing how the arts make our community a place where people want to live, work, play, and stay.
"We love showing everyone who is visiting and returning home some of the fun and great art that makes our community special and exciting, and surprise dancing is a great way to do that!" said Margy Waller, Vice President of ArtsWave.
Earlier in the year, we invited CVG officials to a meeting with arts representatives to discuss possible events at the airport. We are excited to facilitate arts - music, dance, theatre, and more - for travelers. We look forward to working with CVG in the near future to organize more events like this as part of the airport's Friends of CVG initiative.
Our 2011 community campaign for the arts continues through April 27th. Last year, almost 40,000 people contributed $11 million to ArtsWave to support more than 150 large and small arts organizations throughout the region. We're hoping for many new donors this year - and every bit helps. If you haven't had a chance to give yet - please consider a donation of ANY size right now.
Surprises Celebrate Annual Community Campaign for the Arts
The 2011 Community Campaign launches NOW with new activities that highlight our mission, vision, and new name. The annual community campaign runs for twelve weeks, concluding on April 27, 2011. 
“We’re very committed to our goal of engaging even more residents in this campaign for our community’s arts,” said Edgar L. Smith, CEO of World Pac Paper, LLC and ArtsWaveCampaign Chair. “For the first time ever, we’ve asked our volunteers to set their sights on increasing the number of donors. At the same time, we are aiming to get people to enjoy the diverse arts experiences in the region, in order to build our base for the long-term.”
For 2011, we are planning a number of new initiatives and some surprises for the campaign – building on our history of taking up new ideas and surprising area residents in recent years. In 2010, we conceived and organized one of the first-ever flash mob surprise dances in the nation with Splash Dance and last February, we kicked off the campaign with surprise art on public transit and in public spaces. And this fall, we amazed residents when 1500 people came together to create a six-block long, football field sized painting.
This month, we are taking a more virtual approach with plans to launch a new digital game that offers people all over the region a fun way to share the art all around. To get information about the game when it launches, sign up here.
Last year, people contributed $11 million to ArtsWave to support grants to the community’s arts organizations. In 2010, we changed our name from the Fine Arts Fund to ArtsWave to reflect our new and expanded mission to create community through the arts.
With this year’s campaign we hope to secure contributions at least equal to last year’s goal, while also increasing the number of people who participate in the campaign. This approach will in turn increase the number of people who choose to participate in and support the arts – local music, dance, theaters, museums, art centers, and more.
Also this year, the campaign’s annual Sampler Weekend, sponsored by Macy’s, will expand to six days over six weekends during the 12-week campaign for the arts from mid-February through April. The new Sampler days will provide many more options for families and friends to experience the region’s arts without making the tough choices of past years when all events took place in one weekend.
We are offering a new online scheduling tool to area residents who want to plan ahead for the free arts event weekends.
Campaign leaders are excited about sharing our expanded mission and new name. “One of our most important accomplishments for this year will be spreading the word about our expanded mission with as many people as possible," said Mary McCullough-Hudson, CEO & President of ArtsWave. “We’re already hearing that our volunteers believe more people are getting involved in the campaign now that we are clearly sharing our goal of building community through the arts. And I am thrilled to announce a grant of $100,000 from The Carol Ann and Ralph V. Haile, Jr./U.S. Bank Foundation to match contributions from new donors to the campaign.”
We encourage everyone to stay tuned for more surprises in coming weeks, including the Friends For the Arts first-ever Surprise Party on Friday, March 4th from 7 p.m. to 11 p.m. at the Contemporary Arts Center. And for our first surprise, check out the video of Paint the Street, a time-lapse film of the event with special expanded footage and local music.
ArtsWave 2011 Community Campaign Video from ArtsWave on Vimeo.
Surprises Celebrate Fun Things around Cincinnati
Watch this video to share in the fun things going on around Cincinnati!
Cincinnati area artists and their friends came together to celebrate the kickoff of our annual community campaign for the arts with surprise events all over – at lunch-spots, shopping areas, and even on buses!
On February 17, people encountered dancers, singers, musicians, and bright, fun artworks in unexpected places!
Lots of people told us they loved the surprises and the bus riders I met couldn’t stop talking about it.
We loved the surprise art because it celebrates the way art creates surprising benefits for everyone in our community.
Art makes our neighborhoods colorful and exciting, creates places where people want to visit, live, and work. And art brings people together – people, who might not ever have a chance to meet otherwise, share an experience and have something new to talk about together.
In the last few months, we’ve been part of surprise singing at the holidays, and surprise dancing in the rain on Fountain Square.
If you are on our mailing list, follow us on facebook, and twitter here and here – you get advance notice about these events.
Like – these tweets from the day of surprises!
Express Cincinnati Shares our Surprise Art
This year, we kicked off the 2010 Annual Community Campaign for the Arts with something new: surprise art happening all across the region -- from transforming buses into mobile galleries to surprise shows on buses and public spaces in our community.
Margy was a witness to many of the surprise art performances and shares the experience in a column for Express Cincinnati, which you can read here.
“We should all be proud of what we’ve created and make sure we keep the arts all around us,” she concludes.
Next up: A special video of the surprises on kickoff day. Watch this space or sign up for our occasional emails about the fun things in Greater Cincinnati here.
You can show your support for the arts in our community by giving to the Fine Arts Fund today. DONATE HERE.