The CRNY team is committed to ongoing reflection about our programs, the impact they are having on participants, and the broader socio-economic conditions in which our work exists.

To that end, CRNY is conducting a range of research, advocacy, and narrative change efforts with a strong commitment to equitable evaluation practices and artist-centered storytelling. We are committed to research that centers equity in its processes and methods—prioritizing the perspectives and knowledge of program participants and ensuring that they are the ones best positioned to use or benefit from the findings.

As articulated by the Equitable Evaluation Initiative, we “embrace new concepts of objectivity, rigor, validity, and complexity” and commit not only to compensation of research participants but also to care, trust, and respect for the beliefs, ideas, and expertise they bring to our learning processes.

The following efforts are designed with an eye towards replicability and integration of learnings into policy at the local, state, and national levels.

Process Evaluations

In 2023, CRNY collaborated with external research partners to document and assess the design and implementation of both of our programs. These partners reviewed internal documentation and surveys, conducted interviews and focus groups with program participants and key partners, and worked with staff to synthesize the strengths, weaknesses, and key learnings that have emerged from our programs. These process evaluations are intended to provide transparency into CRNY’s process—including the choices we made and the implications of those choices—so that others who are considering launching similar programs can learn from and build on CRNY’s experiences.

Click here to read the full Guaranteed Income for Artists report, authored by Alexis Frasz of Helicon Collaborative:

CREATIVES REBUILD NEW YORK GUARANTEED INCOME FOR ARTISTS PROCESS EVALUATION

Click here to read the full Artist Employment Program report, authored by Danya Sherman and Deidra Montgomery of Congruence Cultural Strategies:

CREATIVES REBUILD NEW YORK ARTIST EMPLOYMENT PROGRAM PROCESS EVALUATION

Working Groups

Because CRNY is a time-bound entity that will close in December 2024, we believe it is critical to workshop our process evaluation learnings with a community of peers who are leading similar programs across the country and beyond.

In Fall 2023, CRNY convened two working groups—one focused on guaranteed income for artists and another focused on artist employment—to collectively reflect on challenges, opportunities, and best practices. Both groups considered how to amplify our shared learnings to leverage new support systems for artists, resulting in a set of strategic recommendations for the field.

The Guaranteed Income for Artists working group identified five areas where strategically aligned action between the guaranteed income and arts sectors can help advance the guaranteed income movement’s goals:

1. Challenge harmful narratives about work and deservingness
2. Build a base of artists who support guaranteed income
3. Focus on public policy wins
4. Match new pilots with movement priorities
5. Don’t wait! Integrate GI values into arts funding now

Click here to read the full recommendations:

Advance Guaranteed Income Now: Recommendations from Creatives Rebuild New York’s Guaranteed Income for Artists Working Group

The Artist Employment working group saw an opportunity generated by policy shifts and artist employment programs initiated during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, and offered six recommendations to build on this momentum nationally:

1. Deepen the analysis of artist employment programs nationwide
2. Develop tools, resources, and guidance for future artist employment programs
3. Create a national research and policy center focused on artists’ lives and livelihoods
4. Pilot a national worker cooperative for artists and cultural workers
5. Develop an artists’ and cultural workers’ bill of rights
6. Convene state policymakers committed to creative workforce development

Click here to read the full recommendations:

Advance Sustainable Livelihoods for Arts and Cultural Workers: Recommendations from Creatives Rebuild New York’s Artist Employment Working Group

We invite fellow funders, government officials, cultural leaders, artists, and organizations to build better economic and financial support for artists and cultural workers. Please consider partnering with our working groups to help move the strategic recommendations forward. 

Impact Evaluations

Honoring the many ways that knowledge can be collected, understood, and shared, CRNY has commissioned multiple approaches to evaluating the impacts of both the Artist Employment Program and Guaranteed Income for Artists program. The following work is taking place July 2023 through December 2024, and the results will be disseminated through convenings, social media campaigns, webinars, and more being planned by CRNY and its partners.

Artist Employment Program

• Using data and cases from the Artist Employment Program, Urban Institute conducted research that focuses specifically on the two employment models comprising the AEP: artists were either employed directly by their partner organization or employed by Tribeworks, a worker cooperative that provided salaries and benefits for artists. Tribeworks made it possible for smaller organizations with less infrastructure to support employment and benefits for AEP artists. The resulting report, Empowering Artists through Employment, along with an accompanying web feature, captures the results of the two-year-long employment period and analyzes the implementation, outcomes, and impact of the AEP through these employment models. For more information, read the November 22, 2024 press release.
• CRNY Artist-Organizer Kevin Gotkin is conducting a series of qualitative interviews with Deaf and disabled artists to understand how the program is affecting the artists’ work and lives, with a consent process that foregrounds their agency and collaboration. This research will help CRNY document opportunities for future disability-affirmative artist employment program design and will inform Gotkin’s public programming.
• Through a competitive RFP process, CRNY selected a team led by Hester Street Collaborative, working in collaboration with Museum Hue and SUNY Empire State, to conduct state-wide participatory action research (PAR) focused on the impacts of AEP on artists and organizations. This team led the creation of a PAR evaluation toolkit co-designed with program participants, including data collection methods to be conducted by participating artists and organizations. Due to changes among the research partners in 2024, the study and final deliverables are being completed by Maria Figueroa, the Labor Policy Director at SUNY Rockefeller Institute of Government; social practice artist and scholar Sol Aramendi; and independent researcher Ryan Westphal — all of whom were part of the original team assembled by Hester Street. A final report will be released in February 2025. 

Guaranteed Income for Artists

• The Center for Cultural Affairs (CCA) at Indiana University is leading a qualitative and quantitative evaluation of the Guaranteed Income for Artists program. The study is evaluating the social, economic, and artistic wellbeing of artists as a result of participating in the Guaranteed Income for Artists program. As part of the study, the CCA has convened an advisory group of artists to provide input on the research design. In addition to the evaluation, the CCA is also conducting an analysis that simulates the population served in the Guaranteed Income for Artists program within other geographic areas, including nationally, in order to understand the feasibility of operating similar programs in different contexts.
• Guaranteed income scholars from NYU Cash Transfer Lab, Jain Family Institute, Appalachian State Family Economic Policy Lab, and Washington University in St. Louis Social Policy Institute are collaborating on a mixed-methods evaluation of the Guaranteed Income for Artists program, working with the Center for Cultural Affairs to survey both applicants to and participants in the program. This team is focused on outcomes of interest to the economic justice and guaranteed income policy community—such as mobility and geographic diversity, spending data, social safety net access, and physical and mental wellbeing—to add important context to the national conversation and evidence base surrounding cash transfer policies and programs.
• In Fall 2024, CRNY released Guaranteed Income for Artists: Preliminary Findings in collaboration with both research teams above. Early findings on the impact of Guaranteed Income on program artists—based on preliminary analysis of spending data, survey insights, and qualitative data—illustrate that Guaranteed Income works for artists across the domains of financial stability, professional growth, and personal wellbeing. A robust set of formal findings will be released in January 2025.

To learn more when the results of these studies are released, follow CRNY on Facebook and Instagram.