Episode 35: Intersection for the Arts

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Intersection for the Arts Accelerator, Co-working space, Member Gathering, What Now Program and Pay Artists Tote Bags

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“We're working with artists and arts organizations that use their work in the arts and cultural sector to make a positive impact within their communities”

In this episode our featured voices are Randy Rollison the Executive Director and Allison Snopek the Deputy Director of Intersection for the Arts. This week’s show with Randy and Allison is part of our end of year theme to highlight the importance of nonprofits in our community. Our conversation focuses on the arts and culture organizations they work with and to get their insights into how the Covid-19 pandemic is impacting these organizations that bring joy and inspiration to our communal lives.

We wanted to provide some economic context to our conversation with Alison and Randy, so we asked - “How big is the arts and culture economy in San Francisco?”

The latest in-depth study we could find was a 2015 Arts & Economic Prosperity 5 national economic impact study that was conducted by Americans for the Arts in partnership with the San Francisco Arts Commission. According to the study the nonprofit arts and culture industry generates 1.45 billion in annual economic activity and supports 39,699 full-time equivalent jobs. “This economic impact study sends a strong message that when we support the arts, we not only enhance our quality of life, but we also invest in the City and County of San Francisco’s economic well-being,” said San Francisco’s Director of Cultural Affairs Tom DeCaigny

On a national level according to the Bureau of Economic Analysis, the creative economy employs 5.1 million Americans and contributes $877 billion annually to GDP.

Randy Rollison

Randy’s job is to provide the overarching vision and direction for Intersection for the Arts, which includes finding new ways to support artists. His favorite part of the job is meeting the incredible people who are making a difference in the world through their artistic practices. With over thirty years experience as an artistic director, he co-founded New York City’s HOME for Contemporary Theatre and Art and HERE Arts Center, served as the executive artistic director for Cleveland Public Theatre, and has a long career as an actor and director in NYC and regionally. He joined Intersection for the Arts in 2008 and became Executive Director in 2015. When he’s not keeping the trains running at Intersection, you can find him cooking adventurous meals, traveling, researching his family tree, or working (at a snail’s pace) on his memoirs.

Allison Snopek

Allison’s job is to help Intersection members achieve their creative and strategic goals. Allison is a visual artist and arts administrator who has dedicated her life and career to the arts since moving to the Bay Area in 2009. She has worked for nonprofit arts organizations such as ArtSpan, Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco, and the Red Poppy Art House. She served on the Executive Committee of Arts Education Alliance of the Bay Area, 2014-16, and received an Art Enabler Award from Arts for a Better Bay Area in 2018. As a practicing artist, Allison creates surreal figurative paintings with oil on canvas. She has exhibited her work at City Art Cooperative Gallery since 2012 and currently works out of a studio at Art Explosion. She has also taught multimedia art classes to youth with SF Arts Education and Leap Arts in Education. In her free time, Allison will be found riding her bicycle, backpacking with friends, or finding solitude in her sketchbook.

Intersection for the Arts

Intersection for the Arts has been supporting artists in the Bay Area for 55 years. That's more than half a century of empowering artists to realize their full creative potential, with heaps of exhibitions, performances, happenings, workshops, classes, recitals, readings, and festivals along the way. Since our founding in 1965, Intersection for the Arts has grown to be a critical resource for people working in arts and culture in the Bay Area. We exist to empower artists and cultural workers to continue creating, thinking big, and taking weird and wonderful risks in their practices. We think this is the key to a strong, connected arts ecosystem here in the Bay.

Intersection for the Arts is a bedrock Bay Area arts nonprofit that’s dedicated to helping artists grow. Through vital resources, including fiscal sponsorship, low-cost coworking and event space, and professional development programs, we serve people working in the arts—from artists to educators to administrators to funders.

We believe art and culture are necessary elements of wellbeing. We take the stance that artists should be at the top of the systems that were originally created to support their work. Art institutions would not exist but for artists’ creativity, sweat, blood, tears, and enormously generous hearts. We support those who take matters into their own capable hands and make their own opportunities. We stand by artists every day in their efforts to make our communities better, healthier, more exciting and dynamic places to live our lives.
Follow Intersection for the Arts:
Instagram: intersectionforthearts
Facebook: @intersectionforthearts
Twitter: @Intersection_SF

Donation

Intersection for the Arts is working to raise funds to continue to provide vital resources, including fiscal sponsorship, low-cost co-working and event space, and professional development programs. The Please help Intersection for the Arts raise general funds to operate and continue to empower people to continue creating, thinking big, and taking weird and wonderful risks.

Support the over 150 Members of Intersection for the Arts who work across many disciplines, from visual arts to performance to arts education and advocacy

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“The people who are working in the cultural sector and everything, it’s exposed even further our vulnerabilities, the fact that we’re always working in the margins. And then when something like this hit it’s catastrophic in so many cases”

— Randy Rollison, Executive Director, Instersection for the Arts

Our Sponsorship

We are fiscally sponsored by Intersection for the Arts, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization, which allows us to offer you tax deductions for your contributions. Please consider making a donation to help us provide future shows just like this one. If you want to send us a check, please make checks payable to Intersection for the Arts and write [Voices of the Community] in the memo line of your check. This ensures that you’ll receive an acknowledgement letter for tax purposes, and your donation will be available for our project.