Creativity in the Community (September 2024 – June 2025)

Creativity in the Community is a holistic, trilingual multi-session community engagement and outreach initiative. This program will connect the county’s children ages 2-6 and their families (75% LMI) to an accessible, enriching, multidisciplinary education program, inspired by The Bass’ contemporary art exhibitions, designed to deepen their connection to the arts and literacy in their day-to-day lives.  

The Bass’ team will bring family workshops to Miami’s diverse, underserved, low-to-moderate income neighborhoods of North Miami Beach, Little Havana, and Little Haiti. Workshops will feature six-weekly sessions of trilingual family-centered art and literacy workshops. The sessions will be culturally fluent, tailored for each location, with instruction delivered in the predominant language of the community and literature chosen to explore and expand on the community’s cultural heritage. The program will expand beyond the outreach activity into participants’ homes, and families will be provided with free books to begin their own at-home library and free art supplies to equip their at-home art studio. Participants will have access to monthly free family field trips to The Bass to experience Family Day, with transportation and a customized family-friendly guided tour, hands-on activities and artist-led activations included.  Specific activities include: 1) Hiring and training “AmBASSadors” within each community to lead workshops and recruit participants in English/Spanish/Creole; 2) Increase the Bass’ presence at community events like the Youth Music Festival, Miami Book Fair and Children’s Trust Expo; 3) Actively engage entire families as a unit. Family engagement is fundamentally an active dynamic between caregiver, child, and community. Creativity in the Community nurtures this dynamic since it is crucial to the recruitment, engagement, and retention of participants.

The Bass

Family Sundays (October 2024– July 2025)

Family Sundays at ICA Miami is a series of free, one-hour workshops that take place within the museum’s galleries and sculpture garden on most Sundays throughout the year. Developed to make contemporary art accessible to children ages four through ten and of all abilities, this multidisciplinary arts program employs storytelling, music, movement, and art marking to teach families about contemporary art while making connections to ICA Miami’s exhibitions.

Institute of Contemporary Art Miami

Ballet for Young People (October 2024– February 2025)

The Ballet for Young People series presents 3-4 entirely free performances annually in Miami-Dade County. This program serves as an entry point to the art form, granting thousands of children access to a professionally produced ballet performance in a state-of-the-art theater each year. In addition to colorful take-home study guides, participating educators are provided supplementary instructional materials to develop units and lesson plans around the Ballet for Young People performances that align with Florida's Benchmarks for Excellent Student Thinking.

Free access to performances is also scheduled during the school day, directly eliminating two of the most significant barriers to arts access for young people: financial cost and geographic location.  Further, the format of Ballet for Young People performances includes audience participation, introducing ballet and dance to young audiences in a way that is both educational and fun. Each student is also provided a take-home study guide that serves as an age-appropriate program book, introducing attendees to the creative team involved in the performance while also providing important introductory dance vocabulary and ballet concepts. The study guide also includes concepts in theatre etiquette for students to build both their awareness of and confidence in how to engage in live theater performances. Prior to each performance, MCB staff reviews this etiquette with students and leads them through a 'warm up' exercise to practice the very skills they'll use throughout the production. MCB has also developed a Teacher Guide that serves as the foundation for developing of formative lesson plans to support both teacher preparation and student learning and practice.

Miami City Ballet

Afro Blue by Zest Collective (October 2024)

Miami Light Project commissions and presents the vanguard in contemporary performance – theater, dance, music and multimedia artists who are recognized for risk-taking innovation, technical virtuosity and thought-provoking content.

The grant will support the presentation of “Afro Blues”, a dance production, by Gentry George/Zest Collective (Miami-based African-American choreographer/collective) during our 2024-2025 season activities. “Afro Blue” is Gentry George’s latest installment from his series ‘Roots & Rhythms,’ designed to commemorate Black Musicians of the 20th century. Renditions of the Jazz standard Afro-Blue recorded by American Jazz Vocalist Abbey Lincoln and Cuban Percussionist Mongo Santamaria are the centerpieces for the work. By harmonizing biography, social history, music, and performance, George’s Zest Collective dance troupe celebrates the beauty and triumph of musical pioneers whose songs rang out despite America’s dark history of oppression.

Miami Light Project

Early Childhood and Youth Arts Education Programs (Year-round)

In 2024-2025, MOCA will host the following lineup of innovative education programs for youth:

• Sunday Stories serves ages 1-5 with free storytime and early childhood art projects. FREE
  
• MOCA Mini-Makers ages 6+ tour exhibitions and learn about the elements of art by painting, drawing, and sculpting. FREE
  
• Summer Art Camp serves up to 150 students each year. Offered in two levels - Studio Arts for ages 6-9, and Dynamic Design for ages 10-13 - youth get real-hands-on experience with digital art tools and advanced art & design projects. Scholarships are available for up to 50% of enrolled students prioritizing those who qualify for free meal plans, report disabilities or are geographically disenfranchised. Cost range: 0-$195/wk
  
• Teen Art Force (TAF) provides students ages 13-17 with a foundation in principles of art and art history including Fashion & Textiles; Drawing & Portfolio; Mixed Media & Sculpture; Digital Art & Photography; Museum Experience & Curation. Students earn up to 60 community service hours to apply toward their high school graduation requirements. TAF is a feeder program for high-quality art schools including DASH, New World School of the Arts and YoungArts. TAF students are often hired for their first paid positions as Summer Camp counselors.
  
• MOCA at the Library provides local libraries with free art supplies and one-hour workshops for students in middle through high school at North Miami Public Library and Brockway Memorial Library. Approx. 15 students attend each week per location. FREE
  
• Virtual and in-person exhibition tours are offered to all schools in the district. School tours serve groups of 20-30 students each in grades K-12. FREE
  

Museum of Contemporary Art