I've been wondering when I'd be getting around to updating my blog, much less, make some art! Well, yesterday I finished the third and final deliverable for the City of Rancho Cordova's Community Enhancement Grant for Visual Arts Capacity-Building. And now - I'm doing my happy dance!
For five years, Cordova Community Council (CCC) has gathered local artists together, brought them educational speakers, engaged them as volunteers in the quarterly juried art shows at City Hall, given them opportunities to show their work (Brushes & Brews, Holiday Pop-Up Gallery), and encouraged them to involve the community in art activities by piggybacking on their events (Kids' Day, International Festival, 4th of July). The artists have been an informal group, working together when called to, and casually learning new art techniques from each other.
And now we're our own organization! One of the things that CCC does is 'incubate' non-profits for the purpose of enriching Rancho Cordova. The civic band and the civic orchestra flew out of the nest first, and we've just done the same. We are now a public benefit non-profit corporation in California, and yesterday, we applied to be a 501(c)3 entity under federal law.
CCC secured the Community Enhancement Grant for us to do three things: incorporate, build a website, and send our newsletter. And now we've done it! Here's the link: www.RanchoCordovaArts.org . The newsletter is in there, too.
What's more, the board of directors will be deciding on a calendar of events - workshops, public demonstrations, and art shows for our first year - soon! I'm so grateful for all the people who have worked so hard to bring this together! Going forward, we'll be busy promoting the visual arts and developing artist skills.
I dream that some day, when this city of some 70,000 will become 300,000+, that Rancho Cordova will have the enriched environment that my hometown of Seattle has now - lots of art events and art-filled public spaces. Stay tuned! The best is yet to come!