“What if we included arts and humanities in all policies and programs intended to help us deliver on the promise of our nation?” National Endowment for the Arts Chair Maria Rosario Jackson posed this question recently at “Healing, Bridging, Thriving: A Summit on Arts and Culture in our Communities” in Washington D.C. this past January. At Creatives Rebuild New York (CRNY), we firmly believe in the unique power of the arts and artists to improve communities outside the traditional silos of arts and cultural venues. The creativity and out-of-the box thinking inherent to artists often provides innovative and inspiring solutions to create meaningful change in a variety of sectors, from housing to environmental justice to civil rights.

We’re proud that a third of our Artist Employment Program (AEP) collaborations featured artists working in non-arts organizations. Through AEP, artists worked with organizations like the Committee Against Anti-Asian Violence (CAAAV), New York Civil Liberties Union (NYCLU), and the Parole Preparation Project (Parole Prep) and made lasting impacts on organizational culture and the communities these organizations serve. 

Artistry to Fight Housing Injustice

CAAAV works to build neighborhood power among working class Asian immigrants to fight gentrification in New York City. As part of the AEP collaboration, resident artist Tomie Arai worked with CAAAV’s organizers and tenant leaders to infuse culture into their advocacy messaging, through art builds and planning sessions. CAAAV leads tenant unions in the Bengali community in Astoria, as well as with organizers in Chinatown. By focusing on improving creative visuals, Tomie helped unite organizing members across languages, cultures, and generations, thus cohering messaging in materials used at protests and actions. “Expanding the definition of culture to include language, traditions and ways of life was critical to our collaboration,” Tomie shared. “Culture and art are embedded in the people and places we live in; everyone, not just artists.” 

CAAAV’s strong visual presence at actions drew the attention of peer organizers who would then approach CAAAV and, in turn, build connections across the field. Tomie also cultivated a Visual/Narrative team on the staff to kickstart the development of a cultural organizing toolkit for the future, helping CAAAV members tap into their own creative power. 

Artistically Communicating Policy Initiatives

Through their collaboration with NYCLU, artists Jess McLeod and Brandon Michael Nase harnessed the power of artistic expression to amplify communication around policy initiatives to raise greater awareness among New Yorkers. The artists created original artistic works which provided NYCLU new ways to tell stories about policy issues while connecting more deeply with an audience. Jess led the production of “SAFE,” a one-act musical about over policing in New York public schools, working in collaboration with students to represent their real-world experiences on stage. “Spending two years in conversation with students about what safety means to them has deepened my resolve to use art to reinforce the truth of change work,” Jess shared. “The people who are closest to the problem are closest to the solution.” 

Brandon created original performance pieces for the Museum of Broken Windows, a pop-up art museum that sheds light on the costs of over policing in the city. Reactions to both works demonstrated people’s deep engagement with the subject matter—and their desire to become more involved in community matters. Through their art, both artists encouraged NYCLU to see the value of incorporating a more human-centric approach to their messaging.

Art as a Means to Empower Incarcerated Individuals

Parole Prep is an organization that advocates for the release of incarcerated people serving life sentences in New York State prisons. Their AEP collaboration with artists Tyler Morse and Willie Kearse centered on Archive-Based Creative Arts (ABCA), a remote creative arts and writing workshop that they led for incarcerated artists. Prior to this artistic intervention, Parole Prep’s work mainly focused on preparing individuals for parole. Through ABCA, incarcerated artists were able to develop artistic work to populate six chapbooks and two anthologies filled with archival ephemera. 

“Art and art-making is now an integral part of our curriculum, changing the way we offer programming and fellowship to incarcerated and formerly incarcerated people,” said Michelle Lewin, Executive Director of Parole Prep.

This work brought communities together by changing and challenging people’s perceptions of incarcerated artists—and likewise how artists viewed themselves. Interacting with incarcerated individuals beyond the legal system expanded opportunities for the artists to see themselves as part of a creative community, and even gain access to paid arts opportunities upon release. 

Photo of CAAAV and members of the Housing Justice For All Coalition protesting the loss of rent stabilization protections at the Real Estate Board NYC on Park Avenue. Photo by Tomie Arai.