Kansas Arts Advocacy Toolkit
This toolkit is to help guide you, citizens and arts supporters, in advocating for the arts to build new, more and more consistent support for the arts.
The arts bring a ripple effect to our communities – touching and enhancing everyone and everything in them.
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An arts center brings life and beauty to a downtown: children come to take classes; seniors get involved in life again.
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A theater entertains, brings pleasure and brings people together. There’s nothing so sweet as the sound of laughter and applause.
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Dance, music, creative writing and storytelling – all of these add joy to communities, change people’s lives, and make our communities great places to live and raise our children.
And yet, we in the arts don’t tell that story enough. We need to get better at talking about why we exist, how we serve our communities, how we bring tourists and energy to our cities.
Everyone who cares about the arts needs to tell that story. Tell the story of the organization you are closest to – why it exists, why you are involved in it, why you care – and why others should care too.
Shape that story, make your case, bring it with you and tell it – not only to the annual Arts Day at the Capitol, but every day, in your communities, to your local, state and national legislators. Attend candidates’ forums and ask where the candidates stand on the arts. Let them know you care about the arts – and you vote.
Talk to them and learn from them what their personal involvement in the arts is. You will be surprised and pleased.
We can address so much through the arts – and we already do. Every issue that the public cares about – education, public safety, business development and investment , community building, healthcare – all can be addressed through the arts.
A special thank you to the Arizona Commission on the Arts and the Arizona Citizens/Action for the Arts. This toolkit was based on their booklet, Building Public Value for the Arts in Arizona: Advocacy, Promotion, and Audience Engagement. |
