Blog : Arts

Assemble envisions diverse neighborhoods of empowered people who create, connect, learn, and transform together. It builds confidence through making by uniting communities of artists, technologists, makers, and learners.

Pittsburgh Shakespeare in the Parks provides free and accessible outdoor Shakespeare and classical theatre for the residents of Southwestern PA in public parks and outdoor spaces.

$7,500 to New Sun Rising for The Blanket to support Lucinda Childs: The Early Works.

Seminal artist Lucinda Childs sets four of her early “silent” works on The Blanket. Outdoors, free and open to the public, see this work for the first time in Pittsburgh against the backdrop of the city skyline.

Performance Dates:

• Friday July 28th – 7:30pm
• Saturday July 29th – 7:30pm
• Sunday July 30th – 3:00pm

Location: The Monongahela Wharf Amphitheater at Point State Park. (map)

The Blanket, co-directed by Caitlin Scranton and Matt Pardo, is a producing organization that exists to expand and improve dance in Pittsburgh. It seeks to help artists realize collaborative projects that bridge the gap between Pittsburgh and the greater dance community. The Blanket commissions choreographers and artists from the wider dance world to create work on Pittsburgh dancers, in Pittsburgh venues, in collaboration with Pittsburgh artists/organizations. They will facilitate and produce new projects and bring revivals to Pittsburgh, giving local artists and audiences the opportunity to experience (and take part in) the very broad spectrum of the dance as an art form.

New Sun Rising empowers networks of business + project leaders to create vibrant communities of opportunity. Click here to learn more about their fiscal sponsorship program.

Unique Projects is acting as fiscal sponsor to support the work of slowdanger, a project based multi-disciplinary performance entity based out of Pittsburgh, PA that creates works at the intersection of movement, sound, and technology. slowdanger brings audiences closer to their own bodies through performance, immersive experiences and open-level workshops, cultivating kinesthetic empathy through creating community in transformational embodied experiences. As a queer non-binary-led organization, slowdanger is invested in the deconstruction of gendered binaries in how audiences engage with performance and performers. They seek to empower audiences to draw meaning from the ephemerality of their own sensation and perceptions, provoking that there is no wrong way to experience performance. The name, slowdanger, was inspired by the road signs that signify a demolition of old surfaces to build upon the remnants. They return to this overarching concept cyclically in performance creation; rebuilding, slowing down to examine the remains and reimagine new futures.

$5,000 to New Sun Rising, providing general operating support to Start with Art: Pittsburgh.

Start with Art: Pittsburgh seeks to create a city of culture in the City of Champions. They accomplish this by gifting original, signed, and numbered photographic prints from a different artist each month to ever baby born at three hospitals in Pittsburgh. This grant allows Start with Art to increase the honoraria for 12 artists and 1 poet. The slate of artists includes a Pulitzer Prize winner, two Emerging Artists of the Year in Pittsburgh, to Artists of the Year in Pittsburgh, and a museum director. Each artist is responsible for creating a photographic print that is given to almost 275 babies each month, while the poet creates written descriptions of each work for the benefit of individuals with vision impairments. Since 2015, more than 5,000 babies and their families have received one of these gifts.

New Sun Rising is an organization striving to find and support fresh, creative solutions to social problems that are more effective, efficient and sustainable than what currently exists. They build programs and new models to progress your concept from idea to impact, whether they are your fiscal sponsor, your mentor or your community connector. New Sun Rising believes that catalyzing social impact can activate your authentic vision and potential. They’re building an engaged, diverse, and cooperative ecosystem which results in solutions that improve your community and that can improve communities around the world.

$25,000 over two years to support the Homewood YMCA Creative Youth Center at the Homewood-Brushton YMCA. The YMCA Creative Youth Center is a creative hub for youth in Homewood and across the East End specializing in project based learning and artistic mastery in media, visual and performing arts. Its mission is to develop young people who are creative, connected and ready for college and career.

Hiawatha Project creates original performances exploring specific social questions through myth, free association, and movement. The company connects true stories and divergent communities through impactful and revelatory theatrical works. Hiawatha Project explores the experiences of living in Pittsburgh and connects these experiences to regional, national, and global social questions. In this way, they strive to illuminate human connections by discovering the universal and infinite in the ordinary and specific.

$4,860 to the St. Bart’s Music Festival, to support the Poco Program. The Poco Program provides under-resourced children at the Urban Academy of Greater Pittsburgh (10-12 years of age) with the experience of learning to play violins, violas, and cellos and to play together as a chamber ensemble. The students receive lessons four times each week with a qualified music teacher. At the end of the semester they will present a program for an audience.

$5,000 to support general operating expenses for Calliope House.

Founded in 1976, Calliope House remains the premier presenter, educator and community-builder of traditional and roots-based music in Western PA, presenting performing artists of national and international reputation, rewarding audiences with experiences of music rarely presented elsewhere in our region. Calliope strives to build community, based on the common ground of shared experiences that engender understanding and respect for each other, each other’s traditions, and our common humanity.

Contemporary Craft offers innovative exhibitions focused on multicultural diversity and contemporary art, as well as a range of hands-on workshops, community engagement programs, and a store. Its mission is to engage the public in creative experiences through contemporary craft. Contemporary Craft has held firmly to the belief that art has the power to change lives. They believe in development, expression, and preservation of art and culture of all communities, groups, and individuals, and strive to create a community where all voices are equally valued and welcomed to engage.