Women of Visions is the longest-running collective of Black women visual artists in the United States. Women of Visions exists to promote the arts, culture, and history of women of African descent, by helping each other to excel as artists and to grow professionally through exhibitions, community collaboration, educational programming, and other progressive opportunities.
RealTime Arts is a community-fueled, performance-based arts company that creates theatrical experiences and public events that celebrate real stories of real people and real places. RealTime seeks to generate connection, curiosity and wonder, and help audiences see the world around them in new and unexpected ways.
The Anthropology of Motherhood project, fiscally sponsored by New Sun Rising, is an ongoing curation of artwork and design that engages in the complex visual, material, emotional, corporeal and lived experiences of motherhood, care-giving, parenting, nurturing and maternal labor.
Afro-American Music Institute (AAMI) creates community through classes and concerts to instill comprehensive knowledge about the Afro-American contribution to the world. AAMI provides a forum both in performing and recording opportunities for otherwise undiscovered talent in the greater Pittsburgh community.
Atasa Solar, fiscally sponsored by the Land Art Generator, co-creates renewable energy public structures and wearable solar garments in collaboration with Indigenous communities to overcome environmental and economic injustice, design racism, and misogyny. Community-led design solutions incorporate Indigenous innovation and the latest in solar and battery technology to provide design solutions supporting environmental justice. Learn more about Atasa Solar’s work in Kenya. Atasa means “Make” or “We made it” in Kimaasai the language of the Maasai community of Olorgesailie, Kenya.
United States Artists (USA) believes in artists and their essential role in society. Each year, USA awards as many $50,000 unrestricted Fellowships as possible to the most compelling artists working and living in the United States, representing every demographic, and at every career stage. With this unrestricted award, recipients decide for themselves how to best use the money – whether it is creating new work, paying rent, reducing debt, getting healthcare, or supporting their families.
Photo courtesy of United States Artists. USA Fellow Amos Paul Kennedy Jr. (2015, Craft) demonstrates how his letterpress works at the 2018 Detroit Artist Crawl.
PearlArts Movement and Sound (a.k.a PearlArts Studios) exists to interpret and mirror culture and community through dance and dance centered multi-media experiences. With diverse casting and programming, Pearl Arts explores innovative conceptual possibilities while participating in meaningful collaboration.
Kelly Strayhorn Theater (KST) is a home for creative experimentation, community dialogue, and collective action rooted in the liberation of Black and queer people. KST has a dynamic footprint in Pittsburgh, with two venues running along Penn Avenue. KST’s Alloy Studios is a cultural hub at the intersection of Friendship and East Liberty, and the historic Kelly Strayhorn Theater is located in the thriving business district of East Liberty. More than 20 years after the founding of the theater, KST continues to use its broad reach to impact the contemporary arts and the community.
Pittonkatonk (fiscally sponsored by New Sun Rising) is a grassroots initiative to connect people through music and to use music to promote fair and just relations between people and society. There are different parts of Pittonkatonk. Their two big efforts are the Young Musicians Collaborative (YMC) and the May Day Brass BBQ. They support other select events throughout the year.
The dynamic group of women that form the Kassia Ensemble strive for more inclusive gender and racial representation in the world of chamber music. They achieve this by promoting women’s entrepreneurship and leadership in the arts, collaborating with artists of all genres, and performing music by composers of all genders and ethnicities.