The Arts Fund for Region One: Helping young artists to grow, create, thrive

FALLS VILLAGE —  Of course, there can never be enough arts events and classes for young people to choose from, but certainly the choices  for area students have grown in recent years.

 Much of the credit for that must go to the nonprofit Arts Fund for Region One. It not only sponsors events and classes but also offers essential financial support to area families who need help paying for ballet or art classes, piano lessons, creative writing, drawing or playing the violin.

 The fund was created in 1992. Susan Fellman, who had the idea and created the organization, has since passed away, but the organization has continued to grow and thrive under a succession of  leaders. Brad Faus, an art teacher at The Hotchkiss School in Lakeville, is the current director.

 â€œBack in 1992,†Faus recalled during a recent interview, “there was no TriArts in Sharon. There weren’t any summer arts camps and programs. There was no Space [which teaches yoga and also used to offer art for youngsters]. There weren’t after-school programs.â€

 Happily, most schools in the Region One school district have art teachers and classrooms dedicated to teaching art. (The Region One towns are Cornwall, North Canaan, Falls Village, Kent, Sharon and Salisbury; the six towns share Housatonic Valley Regional High School.) But, Faus said, “we felt there was a need beyond what was being offered in the schools.â€

 One of the most visible events the Arts Fund volunteers created is the annual Fourth-Grade Arts Day. Children from the six regional schools meet at Hotchkiss. Students move in groups from seminar to seminar and stimulate all parts of their brains and bodies with dance classes, music classes, drawing and sculpture sessions. Artists from area towns and Hotchkiss teachers lead the seminars.

 â€œIs that program in its 14th year or its 15th now?†Faus mused. Whatever the exact number, the program has been around long enough to have become something of an institution — and an extremely popular one.

The artgarage

 â€œPatricia Chamberlain was instrumental in helping us get that off the ground,†Faus said, “when she was still principal at Sharon Center School.â€

 Chamberlain is now the superintendent of the entire regional school district, and remains a staunch supporter of the fund and its programs.

Closer to her Falls Village office is an after-school arts studio called the artgarage, on the campus of Housatonic Valley Regional High School.

The artgarage was inaugurated with help from the Arts Fund. One of the old agriculture education buildings at the high school was supposed to be torn down several years ago; a group of community members and teachers rallied around and saved it.

Part of that rescued space is now an open-plan studio where students can come after school and work on everything from poetry to painting, with help from artist-volunteers from the community.

Children’s Theater

 The Falls Village Children’s Theater is another program that the Arts Fund is nurturing and helping to grow. The volunteer board of the fund, which includes everyone from Hollywood film stars to local art gallery owners, offers advice and financial support.

 â€œOur goal,†Faus said, “is to make ourselves obsolete. We want to help these kinds of organizations get off the ground — and then thrive on their own, so it becomes less about us.

 â€œAnother of our goals is for every school to become a venue for visiting artists; and for there to always be money available for kids who want to study an instrument or take classes at TriArts.  What’s fun for us is when folks in the schools take responsibility themselves and make it ‘their own’ — and we know that our funding has helped make that possible.â€

In addition to these larger scale ongoing efforts, the Arts Fund also supports activities such as museum visits for schoolchildren and trips to see Broadway shows. The fund has helped school bands travel to other cities and states and take part in music competitions.

Annual appeal has begun

 The funds that pay for these many efforts come mainly from donations (the annual appeal has just begun, with postcards sent out to households across the school district). “Much of our money has been raised through donations of $25, or tickets to a fundraising event that cost $25. We are the essence of a ‘grassroots’ organization; there is no sugar daddy,†Faus said.

 The board is now beginning to reach out to larger donors, and to foundations with links to the region. But even those $25 donations have added up over the years: the Arts Fund has been able to give more than $175,000 to cultural programs and about $58,000 in scholarships for summer study in the arts.

A $250,000 endowment campaign was begun in 2005; so far, half that money has been raised.

Innovations continue

New programs are in their infancy but are on their way to becoming regional institutions, like Fourth-Grade Arts Day.

The most recent is an annual pilgrimage to Music Mountain in Falls Village, where children in third grade get a chance to hear a concert of jazz or chamber music in a cozy, friendly setting (often after a welcome from Music Mountain President Nick Gordon and his large and cuddly dog, Boulder).

 It might sound as if a lot of those programs are in Falls Village, but in fact the Arts Fund makes a special effort to reach out to the farther edges of the school district, especially to North Canaan and Kent. And of course, much of the energy in summer is at TriArts, which offers workshops in acting, writing and stagecraft.

It all goes into programs

 Nearly all the funds raised by the Arts Fund team are plowed back into programs and scholarships.

 â€œThis fund costs barely anything to operate,†Faus said. “It’s an all-volunteer group, and we’re very efficient. Ninety-nine percent of the donations we receive go to support someone doing something somewhere.â€

Come help out!

 Helping hands are eagerly sought by the Arts Fund as well.

 â€œWe need help with Web site management, the Scholarship Fund, Arts Day, creating graphics for our annual appeal,†Faus said. “We find that when there are five or six people all working on one activity, it relieves some of the stress. When you plan one of these special events, it can be consuming. We’ve learned to streamline.â€

 Anyone is welcome to sit in on any Arts Fund meeting. The locations change (the elementary schools take turns hosting the board meetings) but the date is generally the third Thursday of the month. To get details, send an e-mail to bfaus@hotchkiss.org.

How funding is used

 Organization: The Arts Fund for Region One

 Director: Brad Faus, volunteer

 Web site: theartsfund.net

 Founded in 1992

 Mission: To increase arts opportunities for all children of the six towns of the Northwest Corner of Connecticut.

 Biggest annual fundraiser: Fall annual appeal by mail; every two years a major performance benefit

 How long does it take to plan? Annual appeal, three months; benefit, 12 months

 Cost to set up: Most costs are in the form of volunteer efforts. There are financial costs for mailings, publicity, and catering experiences for events. These expenses are a small and very reasonable percentage of the total raised.

 Number of people involved: 15 board members and 10 to 15 scholarship and special event volunteers.

 How much does it raise? Annual appeal raises about $11,000 and performance benefits raise between $25,000 and $35,000.

 How much total money is raised each year and how? Donations come through our annual appeal, gifts to our endowment, our biennial performance benefit, and periodic fundraising events shared with the Education Collaborative. This amount can range from $15,000 to $35,000.

 Any funds or other support from local towns: Fourth-Grade Arts Day receives annual support from the Region One School District and, last year, from the North Canaan PTO.

Total Assets: $130,000.

 How is the money spent? Summer study arts scholarships, annual Fourth-Grade Arts Day, artgarage, visiting artists in the schools, musical theater, creative writing, student programs at Music Mountain and more.

What can volunteers from the community do to help? Donate to our annual appeal! Donate to our endowment campaign! Volunteer for special events! Join our board!