TruArtSpeaks receives $500,000 grant, named a “Regional Cultural Treasure”
Funded by the McKnight and Ford Foundations, the award recognizes the organization’s “significant impact on our region’s cultural landscape over decades.”
The TruArtSpeaks team is honored to announce that TruArtSpeaks has been named a ““Regional Cultural Treasure,” sharing that honor with nine other Black, Latinx, Asian, and Indigenous-led arts organizations in Minnesota. From the official announcement:
Regional Cultural Treasures, the first phase of our America’s Cultural Treasures Regional Challenge initiative is funded by McKnight and Ford Foundations to acknowledge and honor the diversity of expression and excellence of the awardees and to spotlight the vital contributions your work has made in Minnesota despite, having historically been undercapitalized and faced with other racialized challenges to your existence and survival.
The designation accompanies a $500,000 grant, which TruArtSpeaks will put to work, over the next five years, expanding the organization’s reach, revamping vital programs, and making sure that our mission of “cultivating literacy, leadership, and social justice through the study & application of spoken word and Hip Hop culture” is as accessible to the populations we serve as possible.
As Carlton Turner, Lead Artist/Director of the Mississippi Center for Cultural Production, put it, “We are always at the brink of generational transformation. Art grounded in truth and deeply embedded in culture will get us there. TruArtSpeaks holds space for the embodiment of Black truth as a window to the world that is possible. I believe in their leadership and their vision. Visionary art for transformational times!”
This is a moment of celebration, and it is also a moment of reflection. So many people have supported this organization through the years, through donations large and small, through attendance at events, through participation and creation, and through so many other avenues. We are humbled, not just by this grant, and this recognition, but by the ongoing recognition of our community. We can’t wait to keep building with you.