Category: Grantee Stories

Close to twenty boys and girls gather in the cafeteria of the St. Johnsbury School. It's 2:30. Some finish a school lunch, others work in books or on pages of staff paper. In a few minutes, they’ll move to a classroom to play their violins as an ensemble. Learning music this way is a cornerstone of El Sistema, the program that inspired the beginnings of EPIC Music. Free violin instruction is offered after school Monday-Thursday. Read More

THRIVE! was a unique community art celebration presented by Burlington High School students taking part in the new Burlington City & Lake Semester program (BCL) in collaboration with Vermont artist Mary Lacy. The opening on December 12 exceeded all expectations. The students' work was looped, then projected in giant scale on the North facade of the Old North End (O.N.E.) Community Center. The result was striking and beautiful. Or as one student, Isabel, put it in her journal the next day, “It was majestic.” Subsequent showings were hosted at Burlington High School (outdoors), Arts Riot (indoors) and Burlington’s Highlight New Year's Eve celebration (indoors). Read More

Artist in residence Mary Lacy led an immersive, semester-long exploration of art and community for high schoolers in the Burlington City & Lake Semester program (BCL). Near the end of the semester, each student made an original piece of art in response to the question, "What makes community thrive?" Read More

“It’s really a blessing when you get to love what you do.” Heather Geoffrey, the new managing director at Main Street Arts in Saxtons River said that about her job. Few people are as qualified as she to make that statement. Heather teaches people to uncover self-expression through art and through the shaping of their life. She has decades of experience in nonprofits; having served as education and outreach coordinator, executive administrator, assistant director, and director in different organizations. She is also an artist, painter, poet, and photographer. She is a teacher. How about mystic or healer? "All of those are accurate," she says. Read More

Upcoming grant rounds for the Artists in Schools and Animating Infrastructure Grant programs will speak volumes about the Council's priorities in grantmaking. We leave the ignition of wonder and insight in classrooms and communities to qualified, skilled professionals — the celebrated artists of Vermont. In supporting their work, we strive to expand arts opportunities, cultivate creative placemaking, and energize Vermont's creative economy. These concepts are not new; it is with renewed focus the Council pushes them into the limelight. These excerpts from our last Annual Report foreshadowed the direction of the Council's grantmaking. Read More

Seven speakers and three performers will take the stage at the Spruce Peak Performing Arts Center in Stowe Saturday, August 4. Each will explore, through the lens of the arts, the topic of women and power. “Reclamation” at Stowe’s Helen Day Art Center is the show from which these talks spring. Portraits of women, painted by women, and curated by women express joy, fear, solidarity, defiance, and wondering. Twenty-three paintings and two lithographs make an exhibit inspired by the #MeToo and #TimesUp movements. The art asks to be witnessed, celebrated, and discussed. Through these acts power is taken back, which is reclamation. Read More