News
Friendship Blossoms through Vitality Arts
Designed to inspire creativity for ages 55 and better, Aroha’s Seeding Vitality Arts® initiative has funded 10 "Interlace: Art to Wear" classes during the span of two years at the Textile Center.
BarbAnn Pappas and Robin Wingo met at one Aroha's Seeding Vitality Arts® programs at the Textile Center and developed a fast friendship. “We probably would have never met without the ‘Art to Wear’ class,” says Robin. BarbAnn adds: “Robin and I realized we have a common understanding for techniques, and the class was so wonderful because from the very beginning everyone in the class got to experience each other’s creative process week after week.”
BarbAnn, Robin and 14 other Textile Center travelers joined Karl Reichert, Executive Director, on a Moroccan excursion in May of 2019. More details regarding the Morocco trip can be found here.
Photo Credit: Textile Center
Connecting LGBTQIA+ Youth and Elders
In the spring of 2019, several LGBTQIA+ adults and youth at the Museum of Contemporary Art Tucson came together to share their stories, either real or imagined, through the art of drag performance. Featured in an American Alliance of Museums (AAM) blog post, the intergenerational “School of Drag” program recently showcased a successful culminating event.
“LGBTQIA+ youth and elders can learn so much from one another if we can just create the opportunities for them to do so,” says Eli Burke, Education Director at MOCA Tucson. Learn more about this inspiring Seeding Vitality Arts® program by reading the blog post.
Photo Credit: Eli Burke
Barry’s Blog
Members of Aroha’s Seeding Vitality Arts® (SVA) initiative are showcased in an exciting new creative aging series by Barry Hessenius of Barry’s Blog. The series encourages arts and other kinds of organizations to fully engage in the creative aging agenda by creating and launching their own programs. The series includes interviews with SVA grantees, testimonials from older adult participants, and results of a midterm evaluation of SVA grantees from Touchstone Center for Collaborative Inquiry. Check out the blog posts by visiting blog.westaf.org.
StoryCorps
Aroha grantee Next Avenue has published a series of four conversations between Minnesota teaching artists and their students 55+. The moving and insightful interviews were conducted by StoryCorps, a national nonprofit media organization that has been recording personal stories since 2003, for Next Avenue’s Vitality Arts series.
- Dance instructor David DeBlieck, who expressed admiration for the “adventurous spirit” of his student, Roni Trulson, after she overcame her fear and returned to dance;
- Ceramics instructor Ken Ferber and his student, Linda Schmidt, who has learned how art can impact life in many ways;
- Karen Gasche, who tells how she ‘had nothing to lose’ by enrolling in an opera class taught by Marcia Aubineau; and
- Lynda Monick-Isenberg and Zach North, describing how they were inspired by their older students, who found joy and delight in a drawing class.
State Arts Agencies Feature Creative Aging
NASAA’s report summarizes the many ways state arts agencies can foster creative aging as well as the current status of the field in a number of states. It lifts up model programs and discusses how the arts can support older adults in community settings as well as medical facilities. The research report notes, “State arts agencies are poised to be key facilitators in leveraging the arts—including music, poetry, literature, storytelling, dance, theatre and the visual arts—to ensure our nation's population ages not only with sound health, which will lead to significant medical cost savings, but also with independence, dignity, purpose and joy.” The report highlights creative aging efforts supported by state arts agencies and offers an array of resources to readers.
Alive & Kickin
Aroha is pleased to announce our support for Alive & Kickin, a talented ensemble of rockin’ senior performers ages 60-94+ “years young” on a mission to give seniors voice! Aroha made a three-year grant of $120,000 to allow Alive & Kickin to expand its capacity and grow its impact.
Alive & Kickin’s 34 members rehearse 48 weeks a year to produce an original show that artfully combines personal stories from cast members. The show features contemporary music, costumes, staging, sound and lighting to surprise, move and inspire audiences of all ages. Watch them in action here.
NY Times
An April 26, 2019, New York Times article examines “prevalent and insidious” ageism and the World Health Organization’s fledgling efforts to curtail it. According to the Times, “Four teams around the world are collecting and assessing the available evidence on ageism — its causes and health consequences, how to combat it, and how best to measure it.”
Introducing Judith House
Thanks to Aroha Philanthropies, three clients have found a permanent home in Judith House, a duplex purchased and renovated by Tasks Unlimited, a Minneapolis-based nonprofit that provides supportive housing and services for people with mental illness.
In 2018, Tasks acquired and renovated a duplex in south Minneapolis in order to provide permanent homes for four women with mental illness. Aroha Philanthropies funded the acquisition and renovation of the home, named Judith House in honor of Ellen Michelson’s mother. Judith House provides Tasks clients with the support of a roommate and housemates while allowing the privacy of independent living.
Such homes are hard to come by. The shortage of affordable supportive housing is exacerbated by current real estate market conditions. As the cost of housing increases, more Tasks clients in community housing are finding themselves priced out of their homes. Judith House allows Tasks to provide housing that anyone would be proud to call home, at a price that its clients can afford.
According to the National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI), approximately 1 in 25 adults in the U.S.— 9.8 million — experiences a serious mental illness that substantially interferes with one or more major life activities in a given year. For this population, “the lack of safe and affordable housing is one of the most powerful barriers to recovery. When this basic need isn’t met, people cycle in and out of homelessness, jails, shelters and hospitals,” NAMI explains.
NAMI argues that housing should be affordable, provide the right amount of independence, meet the individual’s physical needs, and be discrimination-free. The NAMI site includes a wealth of information on mental illness and the changes we need to make to meet this challenge. https://www.nami.org/Find-Support/Living-with-a-Mental-Health-Condition/Securing-Stable-Housing
Tasks Unlimited provides supported employment, housing and recovery services for people with mental illness “so that they achieve a full life with the rights and responsibilities of adults in our society.”
AAM Launches National Creative Aging Initiative
In 2018, Aroha and the American Alliance of Museums (AAM) announced a new national partnership to support creative aging. AAM collaborated with Aroha and Lifetime Arts to create a cohort of 20 museums that will develop Vitality Arts® programs in 2019 and 2020.
AAM also created the position of Aroha Senior Fellow for Museums and Creative Aging, which is funded by Aroha. Over the course of two years, the Fellow will work with museums and with organizations and individuals in the creative aging sector to:
- Raise awareness about the pervasive and negative effects of ageism
- Instigate change by using the Alliance’s extensive network and diverse platforms to disseminate information and tools museums need to implement age-inclusive practices in all areas of operations, including programming, marketing, and hiring
- Promote evaluation and research that contributes to the growing body of knowledge on creative aging, and encouraging application of the latest research findings on the benefits of arts participation
- Foster partnerships between museums and organizations devoted to creative aging
AAM writes, “It is our intent that, as a result of the fellow’s work, more museums will integrate creative aging practices into their work as a matter of course, and we will increase the number of national and community-based organizations dedicated to creative aging that see museums as vital partners for their work. The major components of the fellow’s work will be generating content (writing and speaking); networking; and organizing a multi-day symposium to be held in the fall of 2019.”
CommonBond Showcases Art by 55+
CommonBond Communities, an affordable housing provider and Seeding Vitality Arts® Minnesota grantee, featured the work of residents who participated in The Drawing Project, an arts class for older adults, in a February event. Once again, the power of learning, making and sharing the arts shone through. At the event, one resident noted that prior to this program, the community had felt stale, that residents almost never came out of their apartments to socialize, and that she had become very isolated. She signed up for the classes purely out of curiosity and they changed her life. In fact, she said, the entire community changed; the class gave residents something they could relate about, and now they are constantly engaging in conversation and have developed meaningful friendships.