Photo credit: Samer Ghani
Imagine MKE executive director David Lee
In this Age of Pandemic, artists can continue to create their work. But face the same challenge as the rest of us; how to continue to “get by” until....whenever?
Imagine MKE, a coalition that brings together artists and civic leaders with the business community, recognized the need early on, establishing the Artists Relief Fund, according to its CEO, David Lee. “We quickly recognized that artists and creatives would be dislocated from their ability to perform and sell, as well as potentially cut off from work at their jobs that support their practice,” Lee said. “Given that there was no specific sector-wide safety net for artists in Milwaukee, we saw that this would be an important effort for us to lead.”
Imagine MKE immediately went to work on March 13 and set an initial goal of raising $50,000 by April 10. Many community organizations stepped up to help and by April 10, Imagine MKE doubled its goal. April 30 was then set as the “new” deadline. The results were impressive; $195,000 raised that benefited 423 Milwaukee based artists, with the average amount per artist at $455 based on an approval rate of 86 percent given the application process.
“Because demand far outstripped our week-to-week supply of funds, we had a long wait list of approved artists,” Lee explains. “Because we were able to reach our final goal of $195,000 thanks to a generous grant from an anonymous donor at the Greater Milwaukee Foundation, we are now finishing up distributing the final checks on the wait list.”
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Imagine MKE also assembled a COVID-19 Task Force of Arts organizations leaders to provide a unified approach to garner public support as well as how to best prepare the Milwaukee arts community to survive the pandemic and move forward.
And during the process of reviewing ARF applications, Lee discovered just how important the artists roles are in helping directly with the recovery from the pandemic as well.
“They [artists] are not only the people who create the works that inspire and connect us, but that they are also the people who teach acting and dance to our children, sing and paint with our seniors, and bring their creative talents to our city's many businesses and organizations,” he points out. “At the same time, as demonstrated by the incredible need of this fund, many of our region's individual artists and creatives are also economically vulnerable. By engaging our city's artists and creatives as our storytellers on this issue, we believe that we can build the awareness necessary for change.”
For more information on Imagine MKE, call: 414-928-4653, or visit: www.imaginemke.org
