A number of compelling conversations have been taking place over the last several weeks as a result of some very thoughtful blog posts about our Arts grantmaking strategy. (Nina Simon kicked it off with this post and then linked to related posts here.) What I find most exciting about all of this is the fact that a range of thoughtful leaders are engaging with ideas that are obviously important to Irvine, and their engagement will help make our grantmaking better. I’d like to take the opportunity to add to the dialogue as well as clarify a few points about our Arts strategy that were raised in the conversation so far.

Irvine has funded the arts since our inception because we care deeply about the importance of a healthy arts ecosystem that connects people and builds communities. We have an interest and an obligation in strengthening the arts system as a whole and we believe that the system will thrive if it focuses on engaging Californians who so far have largely been absent as audiences, visitors and donors. In becoming an adaptive, relevant and responsive field, we become more able to address the fact that the majority of Californians don’t engage with our system---not responding to this situation is clearly not the answer. Our response then, the core focus of our grantmaking that launches later this year, will be to support sustainable, core operational shifts as arts organizations expand engagement.

There’s only one week left before the December 3 deadline to apply to our Exploring Engagement Fund, and we are looking forward to reviewing the creative proposals that many arts nonprofits will submit. As we’ve noted before, this is the only opportunity to apply to the Exploring Engagement Fund until December 2013, so we hope you'll consider applying this year. For those of you that are still working on applications or thinking about applying, we strongly encourage you to review the guidelines for applying to the fund and watch two videos of our grantees describing their Exploring Engagement Fund grants.

Grants from the Exploring Engagement Fund support nonprofit organizations as they investigate new and enriching ways to engage Californians in the arts. Irvine's new Arts program strategy seeks to promote engagement in the arts for all Californians, and the Exploring Engagement Fund is one of three new funds offered to date under the new strategy. The three funds are:

It’s hard to believe, but a year has passed since we announced the first deadline for a grantmaking fund under our new Arts program strategy: the Exploring Engagement Fund. And today we are announcing our third round of this fund, along with the second round of our more targeted Exploring Engagement Fund for Priority Regions. The deadline to submit applications for both funds is December 3, 2012. And please note: we will now have only one round of funding per year — in December — for both funds as we streamline this grantmaking process. This means that if you miss this deadline, the next time you’ll be able to apply is December 2013.

We are excited to see the results of the many projects that we have supported or will support under the Exploring Engagement Funds as arts nonprofits investigate new and enriching ways to engage Californians in the arts. Many grantees from the first round are already getting underway with their projects and I encourage you to watch brief interviews with the leaders of two of our grantees — the AjA Project and MusicianCorps — and hear how they’re thinking about exploring engagement and why it’s important for arts organizations to adapt to the shifting arts landscape.

Recently I was asked to participate in a new “Lead or Follow” debate on ArtsJournal to weigh in on the provocative topic of when and how arts nonprofits should engage audiences. ArtsJournal framed the question in a very broad way: “In this age of self-expression and information overload, do our artists and arts organizations need to lead more or learn to follow their communities more?”

As we recently launched our new Arts strategy with promoting engagement as its core goal, I gladly accepted the invitation to weigh in. After all, this was a key tension over the last year as we considered how best to support arts organizations in being able to respond to the variety of demographic and technological shifts facing the field. The new “leaders,” I wrote, “will be those who are successful at facilitating creative, immersive, active arts experiences alongside our ‘traditional’ expertise of creating something and presenting it whole and complete for a more observational experience.”

The online debate features other guest authors from a variety of backgrounds who also wrote provocative and compelling entries. I think their posts are important contributions to the debate, helping to define the true meaning of audience engagement and spotlighting the need for top arts administrators to do a better job of listening to what their audiences want. Not surprisingly, many of the posts have prompted robust reactions.

I greatly appreciate ArtsJournal’s efforts at putting this very important debate about arts leadership front and center in a new and compelling format that allows readers to track the posts by author or by “lead” or “follow” argument tracks and for providing a number of resource publications that help inform the debate. Please read my ArtsJournal post and let us know your thoughts.