What data supports the need for Street Works?
This data bank helps us hone our theory of change and how we act, plan, and design. We welcome your thoughts!
Street Works serve justice in the arts
We seek alternatives to the mainstream institutional infrastructure of art, which has not served justice. While there's always room for reform from within, a wildly insufficient amount of funding goes to new and small organizations willing to think radically differently in order to serve justice. Read here for a full explanation.
Notes authors Prianti and Suyadnya: “From the coloniser’s perspective, decolonising museums requires acknowledging the dark past of their nation’s history. In a postcolonial nation, decolonising museums requires challenging the status quo by acknowledging that their entire museum practices are embedded with colonial legacy.”
Noted Dr. Moana Jackson, Maori scholar: “Museums are dangerous places because they control the storytelling.” Are museums, by virtue of their history, “colonial archives,” notes Dr. Jackson?
Museums have long positioned themselves as neutral spaces that preserve humanity's cultural heritage. But their roots in colonialism, still shape how they control and hide truth.
An investigation identified hundreds of artifacts at the Met Museum linked to indicted or convicted traffickers. Noted former director Thomas Hoving: being an “accomplice smuggler” was a necessary role for a Met director.
Wealth inequality + financialization of the art world prioritizes the acquisition interests of the super-rich. By extension, they shape culture, including who has gallery representation, valuation of cultural assets, and which institutions are sustained.
Most US creative workers identify as contractors or gig workers. 25% of gig workers have health insurance; 38% of have some retirement savings.
Of 4,060 music executives, (VP and above) at 119 music companies, 19.8% were from “underrepresented” racial and ethnic groups. Of those, 7.5% were Black.
Prolonged TV exposure predicts a decrease in self-esteem for all girls and Black boys, but an increase in self-esteem for white boys. Depictions of nonverbal features of BIPOC influence white viewers’ racial biases.
The report analyzes over 900 publications in English and Russian to reveal that arts affects the social determinants of health — including supporting child development, and helping to prevent ill health — and helps people experiencing mental illness, including supporting people with neurodevelopmental and neurological disorders.
Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History and The American Museum of Natural History are among museums that have gathered and kept the remains of peoples without consent and in violation of the graves protection and repatriation laws.
From 2008-2020, artwork by Black American women accounted for 0.5% of acquisitions at 31 U.S. art museums. 11% of acquisitions were of work by female-identifying artists.
Anti-Black narratives feed false justifications for the racial wealth gap and ultimately go on to shape minds and large-scale decisions in policy, finance, and more.
Street Works serve democracy and community health
We're studying ways in which artists can serve justice in the cultural asset ecosystem overall, but Street Works are for artists who work on the street, are guided by principles of democracy, center BIPOC communities, and prioritize relationships and connection. Read here for a full explanation.
A report from the European Union finds that participating in cultural activities increases likelihood to vote. It also increases positive feeling associated with civic and democratic values. These correlations are independent of socio-economic background or education level, but neither access to culture activities nor democratic process are equal for all residents.
This article explores the question of democracy in the arts and the role of institutions in embodying democracy where artists may not. It posits that art is about an individual vision imposed on the world — not majority consensus. We don't entirely agree.
The report analyzes over 900 publications in English and Russian to reveal that arts affects the social determinants of health — including supporting child development, and helping to prevent ill health — and helps people experiencing mental illness, including supporting people with neurodevelopmental and neurological disorders.
These studies explore whether engaging in arts and culture affect depression in adults. Every one of them found that engaging with arts decreased the odds of depression and/or supported social connectedness among the surveyed population.
Any amount of arts participation in the prior year is associated with a 4% point increase in the likelihood of engaging in civic activities on any given day, the equivalent of nearly 15 additional days with some civic activity across a year.
Street Works center BIPOC-led micro-organizations
Place-based programming should be in the hands of local residents and agile community based organizations that meet on the street, know their neighbors, and love their homes. But they're not often set up to scale quickly or manage the cash flow complexities of events. We need a national platform that structurally enables — without appropriating — the brilliance of micro organizations. Read here for a full explanation.
2% of all cultural institutions receive nearly 60% of all contributed revenue, up ~5% points over a decade.
Global Giving discusses ten reasons to support community led nonprofits.
A 2021 Urban Institute study found that a greater share of small NPOs experienced donation decreases in 2020. From 2015-2019, a greater share of BIPOC-led organizations experienced declines in donations.
Mainstream narratives have not sufficiently served, nor recognized, the unique contexts of smaller nonprofits. This essay explores how the researchers situate small and local nonprofits in dominant narratives.
Justice in climate and environmental action
Climate change narratives — the climate stories and worldviews that pervade mainstream media — don't spark action. Instead, they have caused depression, anxiety, and hopelessness among people that care and alienation among others that can't relate to the cultural contexts that climate writers seep their stories in. At the same time, we have reasons to be suspicious of the climate solutions put in front of us. Read here for a full explanation.
2023 marked one of the largest public investments in climate action in American history. But behind the large sums of the Infrastructure Reduction Act (IRA) is a maze of capital deployment, says Ana Baptistadana Johnson in Common Dreams, including in carbon capture and sequestration (CCS), utilization (CCUS), and direct air capture projects, that often enable further fossil fuel reliance.
Be inclusive; organize bottom-up; let people speak for themselves; solidarity and mutuality; just relationships; commit to self-transformation.
Principles to build a BIPOC movement to fight the destruction and taking of our lands and communities, re-establish spiritual interdependence to the sacredness of Mother Earth; respect and celebrate our cultures and beliefs about the natural world and our roles in healing ourselves; promote economic alternatives; and more.
A study suggests that mainstream climate change news doesn’t spark change. Instead, it might be backfiring, provoking denial and avoidance.
Principles to build a collective movement to fight climate change and redefine climate change as a social and human rights issue, not merely a logistical or technical problem with logistical and technical solutions.
In a survey on climate anxiety felt by 10,000 young people aged 16-25 from countries in the global south and north, 77% said ‘the future is frightening,’ 68% feel sad, and 63% feel anxious. 39% feel ‘hesitant to have children.’
