Local Artist Receives Inaugural Gloria Burt Fellowship
Fellowship honors local force in arts community
Sacramento, Calif. (9/7/2017)
Sacramento artist Marianne Bland recently received the inaugural Gloria Burt Sacramento Region Arts Fellowship. Selected from a competitive cohort of area artists, Bland will use the $10,000 award to produce new work through collaborations with local businesses for her project, The Bee Victorious Initiative.
A joint project of the Sacramento Region Arts & Business Council, Blue Line Arts, and the Sacramento Region Community Foundation, the Fellowship honors Gloria Burt, whose advocacy for local arts invigorated the capital area’s creative community until her passing earlier this year.
“Gloria was a force in the local arts scene for so many years,” said Linda Beech Cutler, the Foundation’s chief executive. “Simply put: there is no better way to celebrate Gloria than to support artists like Marianne, and invest in creating a community where work like hers—work that is innovative, inclusive, and inspirational—will help our region flourish.”
Cutler noted that the Fellowship aligns with the Foundation’s sustained support of the capital area’s creative community. It follows the Foundation’s recent investment in Sacramento Mayor Darrell Steinberg’s new cultural plan, and complements the funding it directs to arts nonprofits throughout the region through its Strategic Initiative to Transform the Creative Economy, which exceeded $150,000 last year alone.
During the year-long Fellowship, Bland will partner with three local businesses to create painted and sculptural artworks that “emphasize the inherent beauty in sustainable practices like beekeeping and gardening,” she says. “For this project, I want to use art to connect people with local businesses in a way that has longevity and gets them thinking about these topics, and acts as a model for other artists, too.”
“We are proud to be able to support artists in our region through the Fellowship,” said Eric McIntosh, President of Blue Line Arts, who added that the Fellowship is one of the Sacramento Region Arts & Business Council’s key creative investment strategies. “As a business person, I join the many who care about the arts and our creative culture, knowing it builds connectivity, community and improves the bottom line.”
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About the Foundation: Sacramento Region Community Foundation has been the trusted steward of charitable assets, a community catalyst for meaningful change and the advocate for shaping vital impact through philanthropy since 1983. As the center of philanthropy in the Sacramento Region, the Foundation's mission is to transform our community through focused leadership and advocacy that inspire partnerships and expand giving.
About Arts & Business Council: The Arts & Business Council, Sacramento Region (ABC Sac Region) is an independent nonprofit 501c3 chapter of Americans for the ARTS, established in Sacramento, CA in 1987, managed by Blue Line Arts. The ABC Sac Region promotes partnerships among the business community, artists and arts organizations in the counties of El Dorado, Placer, Sacramento, Sutter, Yolo, and Yuba.
About Blue Line Arts: As a leader in the arts in our region, Blue Line Arts’s has for fifty years, endeavored to provide accessible arts educational opportunities for all - with an emphasis on providing free, or the lowest possible cost, to the underserved; a creative cultural and learning experience through high caliber arts experiences in our gallery in Roseville and encourage private-sector support for the arts as a means to fuel economic development for our creative community through the Arts and Business Program of the Greater Sacramento Region