$500K Hartford initiative to support Black artists
To honor Joyce C. Willis, a board member who died of COVID-19 in June, the Edward C. & Ann T. Roberts Foundation has begun a half-million dollar initiative to support Black artists.
The foundation announced Wednesday that it would distribute $500,000 among three major Hartford-based arts organizations — Hartford Stage, the Hartford Symphony Orchestra and the Amistad Center for Art & Culture. Each organization will receive $150,000, then be able to apply for additional money from a $50,000 fund earmarked for “ancillary programming.” Willis, who served on the boards of the Amistad Center, the symphony and the foundation, and was a subscriber and
donor to Hartford Stage, was Vice President of Corporate Communications at Hartford Financial Services Group until her retirement in 2005.
Roberts Foundation executive director Lisa M. Curran says that it approached Hartford Symphony, Hartford Stage and the Amistad Center because they were “near and dear to Joyce’s heart.”
How the organizations will use the money has already been determined.
The Amistad Center, which maintains a massive collection of African American art and is dedicated to African American culture and history, will provide a residency for an “emerging or mid-career Black artist” to create new work for a scheduled exhibition in 2022.
Hartford Stage, which has a history of producing new works by Black playwrights and working with diverse artists, “will contract a Black director for a two-year residency who will work with other artists of color to create a powerful production for the theater’s main stage each year,” according to the foundation.
Hartford Symphony Orchestra will host a residency as well, for a Black musician, to work with the orchestra and in the community,” and will also create “an Educational Diversity Fellowship for student musicians of color.”
The Joyce C. Willis Fund is limited to these three residencies “right now,” Curran says, “but hopefully in the future we will continue to honor Joyce’s legacy” with similar grants.
In announcing the grants, the Roberts Foundation invoked the death of George Floyd and subsequent national protests as the impetus for a recent investment “in new and expanded programs that will advance racial equity in arts by increasing its investment in Black artists and all artists of color as well as providing high quality arts experiences for students and families of color in the Greater Hartford area.” The foundation recently put a statement to that effect on its website.
“Wewere working on that statement when Joyce passed away,” Curran says. “We’ve lost Joyce, but we can honor her with these residencies.”
Curran further describes the grants as “a wonderful shot in the arm to three significant Hartford arts organizations when they need it the most.” She realizes that due to the COVID shutdown, Hartford Stage and Hartford Symphony may not be able to implement the residencies right away, but notes that the Amistad has already begun the application process for theirs.
The Edward C. and Ann T. Roberts Foundation has been active since the mid-1960s, known for its quarterly “Excellence in the Arts” grants and annual “Creation of New Work” initiatives for Hartford arts organizations. The foundation estimates that it has given $10,00,000 to nearly 200 arts groups large and small in its half-century of existence.