CommonBond Receives Award for Arts and Aging Program

Congratulations to CommonBond Communities, a Vitality Arts grantee, on receiving the Outstanding/Innovative Resident Experience Award at the Minnesota Multi-Housing Association Annual Achievement Awards for their Arts and Aging program. The awards program awards achievement in design, advertising and community support categories.

by S Drebelbis

Bridging Isolation Through Virtual Programming

A virtual movement program for older adults was recently highlighted in an American Alliance of Museums blog post. The Anchorage Museum, a Seeding Vitality Arts in Museums grantee located in Anchorage, AK, received an online learning pilot grant from Aroha to launch their creative aging programs in a live virtual setting. Museum educator Molissa Udevitz shares details about the transition to virtual programming: “The shared experience of moving together—even while apart—helped bridge the isolation so many may feel right now.” Learn more about the Anchorage Museum’s program “Vital & Creative: Expressive Movement for Ages 55+” here.

by S Drebelbis

New Creative Aging Initiative in Partnership with NASAA

Aroha is thrilled to announce a new creative aging initiative in collaboration with the National Assembly of State Arts Agencies (NASAA). With a $2 million grant award, NASAA is offering funding to help state arts agencies develop programs and partnerships that advance creative aging. Learn more about the exciting initiative here.

by S Drebelbis

Advocacy for Museum Education

The president of the National Art Education Association (NAEA) recently published "An Open Letter to Museum Directors, Museum Board Members, and Community Organizations/Leaders," outlining why museum education is more essential than ever. We encourage everyone to read and share this message with museums and community leaders.

by S Drebelbis

SVA Virtual Conversation Series

Twenty-six Seeding Vitality Arts (SVA) grantees recently participated in a series of six weekly learning sessions designed to continue the momentum of their creative aging programs. Aroha and Lifetime Arts facilitated the series, which covered topics such as navigating museum challenges during COVID19, intentional strategies for building responsive and inclusive programming, resources for adapting creative aging programs to online platforms, and responding to senior serving organizations during the pandemic.

by S Drebelbis

Teachers & Writers Collaborative Offers Virtual Programming

Over the summer, Teachers & Writers Collaborative offered an 8-week virtual course for 20 visually impaired seniors in partnership with VISIONS Services for the Blind and Visually Impaired. Led by teaching artist Dave Johnson, participants met for weekly 2-hour classes, creating poetry, fiction, plays (monologue) and song, focusing on personal histories. The course finished with a virtual culminating event featuring participants’ work, featured below.

Things that Make You Go: Huh? by Elizabeth Tarr
Are plates really
Pancakes made of glass?
Do cornbread and grits feel like
Braille letters to be read with your tongue?
Where do the right track
And wrong tracks intersect?
What sound does the human make
According to animals?
Is it better to be
Kissed by the sun or hugged by a tree?
What if oceans were made from
Tears of humans and animals?
Should second chances be more like
Stars or comets?
If life and the world were perfect,
Would lessons be learned or character built?
If there were a parashute for falling in love,
Would you want it?

Questions Oh Lord Questions by Hashim Kirkland
Does the mountains have conversations with the sky?
When the birds sing do the trees listen?
Do the flowers whisper to each other and each word is carried by the gentle breeze?
Do the hills, mountains and valleys argue over who is the best?
Does the moon get a little rest during the day and does the sun get any rest at night?
How does the sky hold up all those big fluffy white pillows without dropping one?
Do birds talk to their eggs like a mother talks to the baby in her womb?
Is the ground the mother of plants, trees, shrubs, fruits and vegetables and so much more?
What is it like to hear all creation worship you JESUS?
Does the arms of a clock ever get tired?
Why is it that time keeps getting older but in a lot of ways it remains the same?
Does a house remember all the great times that were held in and around it?
Where does forever actually start?
Do different animals ever have a peace treaty?
Has there ever been a time when the earth said , I wish they would treat me better?
Where did true love go?

WHY AM I SO CURIOUS? by Elizabeth Hernandez
1. Why does a heart speed up like a racing car when you are near the object of your affection?
2. Whose voice do I hear repeating my name like an echo in the mountains?
3. Mr. Sun, will you poke your nose through my window and chase away the shadows?
4. When can one taste freedom and smell the fresh scent of spring or see rainbows after the rain?
5. If you lend me your eyes could I see the person you really are?
6. If I put you on a pedestal do you promise not to fall?
7. Hey Teacher, may I lend you my ears when you are ready to teach me?
8. Cathy, let’s bury the hatchet; can we be friends again?
9. Do you promise not to tell when I share my secrets?
10. God, I am working very hard on getting ready; could you promise me another day?

Ask Me? by Helen Wong
1. Can a dead roach regenerate after we cut it in half after a period of time?
2. Why does the sun rise every day?
3. When it rains does that mean god is crying because of the sins we’ve committed?
4. What would it feel like if we can fly like a bird anywhere in the world?
5. What would it be like to live all alone in the world without another human being around you or animals surrounding you?
6. What is one critical thing that you would change in our government and why?
7. How does a person measure success based on quality of life or the amount of financial assets one has accumulated over time?
8. What would it be like to be a cake?
9. What career would continue to exist and not be lost even though there is a recession?
10. What is beauty when looking at a person is a based on outer parents physical or inner appearance?

by S Drebelbis

Ageism in the News

The topic of ageism has been receiving increased attention in national media outlets, most recently as it relates to COVID19. Linked below is a collection of articles on a range of topics relating to older adults, including reporting on the pandemic, ageism, the arts, psychology and neuroscience. We encourage you to check out these fascinating stories:

• We Need an Intergenerational Response to the Pandemic
• Why It’s Good to be Old, Even in a Pandemic
• Coronavirus Shows How Ageism is Harmful to Health of Older Adults
• Ageism is Making the Pandemic Worse
• Ageism Strikes Hard In The Age Of Covid-19
• Let’s Wage a War on Loneliness
• Dancing Past 60: ‘I Actually Forget That I Am Aging’
• You’re Only as Old as You Feel
• Older People Are Ignored and Distorted in Ageist Marketing, Report Finds
• Is Ageism Getting Old?
• Everyone Knows Memory Fails as You Age. But Everyone Is Wrong.
• 'New Artists' Don't Have to be Young

by S Drebelbis

Seeding Vitality Arts Organizations Awarded Online Learning Grants

We are pleased to award online pilot grants to twenty-six Seeding Vitality Arts cohort organizations. These organizations are piloting online learning programs for older adults in response to COVID19 restrictions. Online creative aging offerings include mixed media collage, expressive movement, polymer clay, poetry, bookmaking, nature journaling, creative nonfiction writing, zine creation and more.

Congratulations to the following organizations:
Albuquerque Museum Foundation
Anchorage Museum Association
Craft Contemporary
FilmNorth
Garfield Park Conservatory
John Michael Kohler Arts Center
Keshet Dance Company
The Louisiana Museum Foundation
Minneapolis Institute of Art
MOCA Tucson
Museo de Historia, Antropología y Arte
Naples Botanical Garden
The National Museum of Mexican Art
Neon Museum
Ohio History Connection
Pillsbury House + Theatre
Rumriver Arts Center
SchoolOne
Smithsonian Institution
Speed Art Museum
Taller Puertorriqueño
Teachers & Writers Collaborative
Textile Center
Union County Historical Society and Heritage Museum
United Methodist Retirement Communities
Walker Methodist

by S Drebelbis