Celebrating the impact of the Flamboyan Arts Fund
Impacting Artists and Arts Organizations Throughout the Island
Born out of a groundbreaking partnership between Flamboyan Foundation, Lin-Manuel Miranda, his family, and the Broadway musical Hamilton, the Flamboyan Arts Fund has worked to preserve, amplify and strengthen the arts in Puerto Rico. In only a few years – and in response to the devastating effects of hurricanes María and Irma – the Fund has provided critical support to 541 artists and 106 arts organizations including museums, theaters, arts education programs, and concert venues to maintain the integrity of their programming, increase their visibility, and sustain their impact. Read on to learn more about – and help us reflect on – the incredibly humbling impact the Flamboyan Arts Fund has been able to achieve.
PRESERVING THE ARTS
The Flamboyan Arts Fund has provided multi-year, unrestricted grants to 47 arts and culture organizations providing services around the island, totaling almost $8 million dollars in grants. These organizations are pillars of the cultural heritage of Puerto Rico, and these grants have provided the funding and flexibility to ensure that they can continue producing art and connecting with their communities. With the help of a group of advisors, we were able to identify valuable entities working in the field who attend to various communities, including children and youth living in marginalized communities, people with disabilities, and even people within the incarcerated population. See the full list of organizations here.
Flamboyan Arts Fund partnered with four entities to support individual artists across the island. The National Association of Latino Arts and Cultures (NALAC), Beta-Local, CERF+, and the Puerto Rico Museum of Contemporary Art (MAC) managed separate grant opportunities. Through these partnerships, representing over $700 thousand in commitments, the Flamboyan Arts Fund has provided support to artists across all disciplines. From performers to artisans, 95 individual artists have received economic support. Read more about the details of each partnership here. See the 22 Puerto Rican artists who received 2020 NALAC Fund for the Arts grants here.
Get to know the stories of various artisan supported in alliance with Cerf+ here.
The COVID-19 pandemic has forced the world into a new way of living full of uncertainties regarding their health, education, and finances. All kinds of gatherings ceased because of security guidelines leaving thousands of people in despair. Among those people were artists and arts organizations.
The Flamboyan Arts Fund partnered with The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation and Broadway Cares to create a $1.1M Emergency Relief Fund to support the arts ecosystem in Puerto Rico. Since April 2020, we have impacted more than 450 individual artists and 89 arts organizations. See the list of recipient organizations here.
Impact Spotlight: Ballets de San Juan
It has been a great opportunity to be amongst the first chosen to receive funds from the Flamboyan Arts Fund. The allocation of these funds is a recognition of the hard work our organization has carried out for over 65 years.
- Ballets de San Juan
SUSTAINING THE ARTS
Inversión Cultural
Arts organizations with limited financial resources can struggle to build the administrative and operational capabilities needed to reach sustainability and thrive. In addition, administrative tasks can take away from the time that arts leaders spend producing arts and providing services to communities. With the El Nido Cultural initiative, Inversión Cultural and the Flamboyan Arts Fund collaborated to launch an innovative shared service program for arts organizations in Puerto Rico. Through the shared services model, El Nido Cultural provides back-office services including accounting, human resources, legal, fundraising, and strategic planning.
The Flamboyan Arts Fund is financially supporting LabCultural, a project to produce reliable and up-to-date statistics on the arts, culture, and creative industries sector in Puerto Rico for a better understanding of this ecosystem. You can see the reports published to date here.
Causa Local
Causa Local is a nonprofit that provides alternative sources of non-traditional capital for small and medium businesses in Puerto Rico. In partnership with the Arts Fund, Causa Local provides artists and cultural entrepreneurs access to 0% rate interest to support their new artistic and cultural endeavors and help build a strong and resilient cultural ecosystem on the island.
Impact Spotlight: Cerf+ Artisans Support
After Hurricane María, I lost almost my entire home and workshop. This help (from CERF +) represented a lot for me, it represented the opportunity to continue working and building the workshop again.
- Ricardo Nuñez, craftman & plastic artist
AMPLIFYING THE ARTS
The Google Arts & Culture platform makes arts and culture offerings across the world accessible to everyone. Google has worked with 2,000 cultural institutions in 80 different countries, digitalizing arts, and historical collections. In November 2019, four local arts institutions launched a project showcasing hundreds of artworks from across their collections. The Flamboyan Arts Fund has financially supported the collaboration to highlight and amplify Puerto Rico’s cultural offering
The Flamboyan Arts Fund organized two Fiestas de Pueblo (or community festivals), one in Vega Alta and another one in Cayey. These provided multiple performances and offerings entirely free for people to enjoy. Artisans, musicians, dancers, and even aerobic acrobats, our grantees took to the stage and did what they do best. Go to the link to see a few photos from the Fiestas de Pueblo in Vega Alta and Cayey.
World renowned cellist Yo-Yo Ma and his tour “The Bach Project” partnered with the Flamboyan Arts Fund and other entities to present various cultural activities on the island: a solo concert held by the international cello player, a cultural dialogue to discuss the power of art during the revitalization process and a family-friendly block party in the heart of Santurce where some of the Flamboyan Arts Fund grantees had the opportunity to perform. Follow the link to see the pictures of the activities held that day with live music, artisan kiosks, art exhibitions, workshops, dancing, and fun activities for children.
Impact Spotlight: ACIRC
Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, ACirc had to cancel CircoFest -its most significant event. Thanks to The Emergency Relief Fund, they continued their work virtually, achieving a season of 20 episodes of a newly launched TV program.
- Asociación ACirc
