Second wave of Artists in Residence grants awarded in Waterloo: Artists begin projects to strengthen their neighborhood

Seven artists received grants today for community projects in Cleveland’s Waterloo Arts and Entertainment District. A component of the Artists in Residence program, a total of $45,000 in grants this cycle will address three community priorities between Nov 1, 2012 and March 31, 2013. These priorities were identified by the program’s initial neighborhood survey “Picturing Collinwood”: celebrating residents, visibility and awareness of community assets and youth.

• Neil Chastain – Youth:  The Collinwood sound project. Neil will lead a series of workshops for youth designed to engage young people in composing, creating, performing and recording original music pieces. One of the main desired goals is for participants to create a Collinwood sound compilation that they will then market and distribute.
• Ray McNiece – Celebrating Residents: North Collinwood Stories – An Intergenerational Story Circle. Ray will mentor students from Villa-Angela-St. Joseph’s School Honors English Program as they interview and transcribe the stories of elderly residents in the Waterloo area. The project will culminate in an inter-generational story sharing at the Collinwood Arts Café. 
• Lou Ross – Visibility and Awareness of Community Assets: Wheels on Waterloo. Lou will oversee development of a public sculpture for placement opposite the 2013 Waterloo streetscape project. The sculpture will reflect the neighborhood’s rich history of transportation and manufacturing, with wheels representing the movement of time, where we have been, are now and where we are going in the future.
• Jerry Schmidt – Youth: Jerry will instruct teenagers about metalworking, using various welding techniques learned in the studio classroom. Basic mathematics, reading a tape measure and preliminary design sketching will also be taught. They will apprentice Jerry as he completes art pieces and utilitarian projects for Collinwood area merchants.
• R.A. Washington – Youth: North Collinwood Youth Choir and Performance Ensemble. R.A. will engage North Collinwood teenagers in a series of workshops to form a performance group. He will teach the ensemble the basics of performance poetry, musical theatre and songwriting and will work with them to create new arrangements for a songbook of historic songs.
• Doug Wood – Youth: The Music Education Series. Doug will continue his music program with a series of five 1-hour classes for children ages 6 – 9. The classes will take place weekends this winter, each with different guest performers from different genres of music. As curator of the class, Doug will help the artists share their music and engage in a question and answer session with the children.
• Linda Zolten Wood – Visibility and Awareness of Community Assets: Rain Barrel Art Auction. Linda will organize a juried competition for neighborhood artists to document neighborhood history on rain barrels. The top 10 will be selected, and the artists will be paid $500 each to paint them. Finished rain barrels will be displayed in highly visible locations throughout the neighborhood.

Every artist who receives an Artists in Residence grant is a resident or works in the broader North Shore Collinwood neighborhood. All activities will take place in North Shore Collinwood, with the majority of activity in Waterloo. For more details and map defining the target area, please download the guidelines at http://www.cultureforward.org/Our-Programs/Residence/Grants.

Artists in Residence is a new initiative in North Shore Collinwood, designed to increase artists’ access to affordable space and to get them more involved in neighborhood revitalization. In addition to the grants program, Artists in Residence includes newly rehabbed artist housing at a fraction of the construction cost and low-interest loans for creating art space in the neighborhood.

Over a two-year period, CPAC and Northeast Shores are awarding $125,000 of funding to support North Shore Collinwood artists’ community projects in the neighborhood. The grants are designed to provide artists with incentives and capital to propose creative solutions to some of the issues the community cares about most.

Seth Beattie is the Artists in Residence Coordinator for Northeast Shores.