MPR News: Minnesota Arts Coverage and Art Hounds
In FY22-23, MPR News will undertake a systematic, sustained effort to intentionally expand our arts and culture coverage beyond the Twin Cities - and on platforms well beyond radio. To be successful, this work must be collaborative. To help weave it together, MPR News will add a position to our arts reporting team, an arts and cultural editor/producer who will work as an editor, coordinator and project manager across our current MPR News arts reporting teams. This position will coordinate efforts across our Art Hounds team, regional reporting team, programming teams, digital and visuals teams and reporting teams across the newsroom as well as with outside organizations and news partners.
Arts Coverage: MPR News will continue to produce regular segments covering news and important stories within Minnesota's arts and cultural community, with an emphasis on the following:
- The impacts of 2020 as a watershed year -- and one from which artists and arts organizations will be recovering and evolving for years to come.
- The stories of the arts community are a crucial piece of Minnesota life -- with a significant role and ripple effects in everything from education to the economy.
- The work of artists from un- and underserved communities, and particularly those whose work is rooted in rural and small-town Minnesota -- and who are often unaffiliated with some of the state's largest institutions.
- A strong digital and social media presence to help amplify the work of Minnesota's arts community to new audiences.
Art Hounds: In weekly segments on the air and online, Art Hounds will continue to create a generous space for artists and art lovers throughout Minnesota to recommend and celebrate work by others they admire.
Art Hounds is based on a pay-it-forward model. Artists recommend the work of other artists, lifting up the work within their community -- or beyond it, in other parts of the state. The project highlights artistic endeavors that do not often receive the attention of major arts organizations or companies, and includes artists who do not otherwise benefit from significant attention.
With its heavy emphasis on geographic and representational diversity - at least one of the three featured artists/events each week is based outside the Twin Cities, and our team puts a significant emphasis on representing artists whose mediums, backgrounds and experience cover a broad spectrum - the project makes art relevant and accessible to an ever-broadening range of listeners and readers.
This biennium, Art Hounds will sharpen its digital presence, and focus on using social media as a way to reach potential Art Hounds
Minnesota Public Radio
$1,891,500 the first year and $1,891,500 the second year are for Minnesota Public Radio to create programming and expand news service on Minnesota's cultural heritage and history.
Legacy Outcome:
- Arts, culture and history will thrive in Minnesota.
- Increase in the locally focused content and Minnesota focused content produced by public television and radio and an increase in the number of local artists, historians, writers, and others that have their work showcased through public broadcasting.
MPR News Arts Coverage and Art Hounds Outcomes:
- Audiences indicate increased awareness of the wealth of arts and cultural work being done in Minnesota.
- Audiences report increased understanding of Minnesota's arts and cultural community as it works to recover from the significant disruptions of 2020.
- Artists and arts and cultural organizations featured on MPR News indicate that they feel the coverage helped support the visibility of their work.