Schedule

Times are in Central Time
Subject to change. Registered attendees will have access to more details.

ON-DEMAND RECORDED SESSIONS

These are available through the app for registered attendees from March 24-May.

Arts Writing and Publishing as Creative Infrastructure

Led by Xiao deCuncha and Nyonu Branch-Watkins

In this panel discussion, arts writers, critics, and publishing professionals will discuss how arts writing is an essential link in the arts & culture infrastructure. Some topics to be discussed include:

How do local arts and culture-focusing publications contribute to the development of the artistic community and connect the public with the arts?
How do art writers and artists mutually benefit each other when it comes to professional development?
What is the impact of the general lack of structured training for new art writers?
What type of programs can be incorporated into public and private programming from schools, galleries, organizations, and cultural institutions to ensure a robust art criticism community, especially in the Midwest (outside of Chicago)?
Faced with worsening funding struggles, how can independent publishers, art critics, and publications find creative ways to sustainability and lasting growth?
How can art writing serve as leverage to propel local artists into larger markets? And vice versa, how can art writing bridge the gap and bring in new ideas into local art scenes?
How do art writing and art/culture publications interact with activism, policymaking, and other pressing matters in civic spaces?

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Becoming a Teaching Artist

Led by Gowri Savoor and Heather Bryce, Co-directors of Teaching Artists Connect

In this fun and engaging session, participants will be introduced to the field of Teaching Artistry, and find alignments with the Artists Thrive Rubric, Planning and Capacity. We’ll explore what teaching artists do, what settings they work in, and how to generate income. We’ll define how teaching artists are different from art teachers and/or art therapists, and explore different residency settings where teaching artists can thrive. For those new to teaching artistry, we’ll introduce participants to different pathways to entering the field of teaching artistry, and offer strategies for assessment and documentation. In our final section, we’ll discuss what success looks like, and ask participants to complete a worksheet defining their unique attributes, passions, and goals, and how they can use their creativity to activate the artistry of others.

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Creating Your Own Artists’ Collective: Why, How, Where?!

Led by Alana Ladson, Freelance Artist

This presentation is about creating your own artist collective wherever you live or virtually. Alana will be speaking on her journey into creating her artist collective, The Rooted Collective, in Connecticut, and how she was able to run three cohorts of the fellowship and foster a sense of community amongst the members during that time. Here's how she did it, and here's how you can create your own!

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Creative Futures: Understanding Arts Alumni Experiences and Trajectories Through SNAAP Pulse

Led by Lee Ann Scotto Adams and Christian Folk, SNAAP

How do arts graduates build meaningful and sustainable lives in today’s creative economy? This session introduces insights from SNAAP Pulse, a new initiative of the Strategic National Arts Alumni Project that explores how arts alumni define success, sustain creative work, and adapt to challenges such as AI and financial precarity. Drawing on national survey data from thousands of graduates, presenters will highlight trends in creative careers, equity, and artistic identity after graduation. Participants will learn how institutions and arts organizations can apply SNAAP findings to strengthen alumni engagement, reimagine curriculum, and advocate for creative labor. By centering alumni voices and data-driven insights, this session invites educators, funders, and arts leaders to re-envision how we support artists across their careers and to imagine creative futures grounded in connection, evidence, and care.

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Estate Planning and Readiness for Musicians and Its Possibilities

Led by Gene Meneray & Ashlye Keaton, Co-founders of The Ella Project and Elizabeth Meneray, Founding Partner of the New Orleans law firm, Meneray Family Law, L.L.C.

The Ella Project presents Rampart: A Legacy Planning & Readiness Guide for Musicians. This is a step by step guide for musicians and/or their heirs to protect their legacy, their intellectual property, and prepare their estate. Rampart also provides guidance to heirs whose loved ones may have died without complete estate planning.

In this Guide, you’ll learn:

How to document your work right now to develop an estate plan.
How to work with museums and institutions if you are interested in leaving them assets.
How to protect your digital afterlife.
How to protect your files from loss, theft, fire, hurricane, flood or other disaster.
What information you need to draft a will.
What to do if someone dies without a will.
What documents you need (living will, power of attorney) to prepare to take care of your needs when you no longer can.
How to open a succession for a large or small estate.

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Findings from the National Survey of Artists

Led by Gwendolyn Rugg, Senior Research Scientist at National Opinion Research Center (NORC) and Jessica Feldman, Senior Research Associate at the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation

The recent National Survey of Artists was commissioned by Mellon and conducted by NORC. This nationally representative survey provides a new perspective on the lives, work, and economic realities of artists across the United States. This was recording was shared by SNAAP who supported the project by administering the National Survey of Artists to arts graduates participating in the SNAAP Pulse project. The recording invites you to explore the findings report which shares key statistics on artists’ job holding, sources of income and benefits, health and well-being, and economic precarity. The technical report provides information on how NORC designed and fielded this innovative new survey.

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The Next Leader is You: Why Local Office Needs Your Voice

Led by Tom Tresser, 100K Project (www.100kproject.us)

Are YOU a leader? This presentation will help you realize that the answer is a loud “Hell, yes!” The presenter, Tom Tresser, has been mixing civics and the arts for over 30 years. He will demonstrate that the values, skills, and experiences that you use every day in your creative work are assets desperately needed in public life right now! The presentation will contain links to worksheets and other resources that will help you if your journey to lead in public life – including running for local office, helping someone run, and organizing for political power in order to serve and solve. Hey. It’s what we do!

11:00 am CT

Registration Open

12:00 pm CT

Local Welcome Session and Lunch

1:00 pm CT

National Welcome Session

Kick off your Summit experience with intention and excitement! Join us for this essential opening session where we'll ground ourselves in the spirit of Artists Thrive, setting a positive and collaborative tone for the days ahead.

We'll guide you through a brief exercise to help you write a meaningful goal for your time at the Summit, ensuring you focus on what matters most to your artistic journey.

Finally, we'll equip you with everything you need to navigate the Summit Whova app like a pro! Discover all the "bells and whistles" – from session locations and networking opportunities to recorded content and helpful resources. We'll ensure you have the inside scoop to make the absolute most of your week and leave feeling energized and empowered.

Don't miss this crucial first step in your Summit adventure!

2:00 pm CT

Networking Game

3:00 pm CT

National Breakout Sessions

I am For A Nation…

For this session, Mark will invite all 6 sites to create a collective manifesto for our country: "I am for a nation…." The workshop starts with a discussion about social sculpture and the ways we shape the world through our words, thoughts, and actions. This will be the foundation for our time together. Participants will then complete their "I am for a nation…" statements at their tables. They would also share with each other at their tables, then from each location. By naming the kind of city we want, participants can begin to name next steps in their own creative practices that align with the collective manifesto. After the workshop, we will compile the statements together into a document to be shared with all participants across all 6 locations. Participants would also be invited to activate the project in their own contexts, at any time, without the need for permission. This form is a tool that can be used by anyone.

Lead Presenter: Mark Menjivar, TX

The Art of the Pivot (Strategic Change Management for Arts Leaders of the Global Majority)

We are living in an era marked by uncertainty and precarity in our sector and society in ways that are unprecedented in recent decades. One that requires us to be grounded in our center and equipped to pivot the ways we steward, manage and lead change. This workshop will provide insight into a step-by-step process developed by a table of arts leaders of the global majority across US and Canada. This resource exists to support arts leaders of color to dynamically navigate pivots and steward change (both externally imposed, and internally devised).

Lead Presenter: Phoenix Sun Park, Voice of Purpose

Local Breakout Session

Lessons from Nowville: Collaboration and Partnership in Nashville's Contemporary Art Renaissance

Nashville's contemporary art scene didn't emerge from commercial galleries and institutions. It was forged through partnerships and collaborations among "art punks, art monks, radical students, and visionary pioneers." Drawing from Nowville: The Untold History of Nashville's Contemporary Art Scene (Vanderbilt University Press, 2024), this 45-minute presentation explores how DIY collectives (like Untitled Arts), pop-up exhibitions, artist-run spaces (like Fugitive Art Center), and cross-community alliances in the 1990s turned frustration with gatekept galleries and institutions into a thriving, inclusive contemporary art ecosystem. We'll trace from foundational influences to modern adaptive collaborations, demonstrating how Nashville's "infectious do-it-yourself spirit" can be a model for creative communities nationwide. The session includes storytelling, visuals from the era, and time for discussion on applying these partnerships today.

Lead presenter: Joe Nolan

4:30 pm CT

Lay of the Land Session

6:00 pm CT

Dine Arounds with art experiences

Breakfast on your own

10:00 am CT

Local Breakout Sessions

Activating Your Arts Ecosystem: Let’s Build a Movement Together!

Creatives don’t thrive in isolation—they thrive in ecosystems. This interactive fireside chat and working session invites participants to collectively map Nashville’s arts ecosystem and explore how artists, organizations, leaders, funders, and cultural influencers can move from fragmented efforts to a shared, activated movement. The session begins with a real-world case study of ecosystem-building work—why it was designed, what worked, what didn’t, and how intentional collaboration creates systems-level change.

Participants will then be guided through a practical ecosystem mapping process, identifying:

* Key community leaders and cultural influencers

* Arts organizations and institutions

* Gaps, overlaps, and underutilized connections

* Opportunities for alignment and collective action

The session culminates in collaborative table discussions, where attendees co-design early ideas for a movement rooted in Nashville’s arts community, emphasizing shared leadership, collaboration, and sustainable impact. This is not a theoretical conversation—it’s a live ecosystem-building exercise designed to spark momentum beyond the room.

Fireside chat moderated by Kamilah Sanders (Founder & Ecosystem Strategist, Greater Than Equal Institute), with featured guests Megan Jordan and Evan Brown

Reclaiming Power in Systems Designed to Drain It: A Creative Play Framework for Co-Creating Sustainable Artistic Work

Of course you're being creative when you make your art. But here's what could change everything: building your career, pricing your work, choosing partners, marketing, negotiating is also a creative act. When you apply creative play to your professional life the same way you do in your studio practice, everything shifts from burden to possibility.

Systems that were supposed to support creative work often drain power instead. Pay to play grant applications requiring "worthiness" proof. Organizations and venues extracting labor while keeping decision-making power. Career advice telling you to "build resilience" rather than addressing exhaustion. What if the solution isn't fighting or surviving these systems, but recognizing you already have the creative problem-solving skills to redesign them and invite those systems to co-create something better?

In this 60-minute interactive session, Stephanie Pruitt-Gaines introduces The Creative Mirror™ Framework, using embodied creative play to help artists identify opportunities to invest their energy more sustainably in their creative processes: making art AND making a sustainable career. Through teaching, hands-on activity, and dialogue, participants discover how the five stages of the creative process reveal where we might be at most risk of burnout and how playful approaches transform career-building from drudgery into joyful creative design.

This approach sees clients, venues, funders, and institutional partners as potential co-creators, not gatekeepers. When artists approach professional relationships with creative curiosity (How can we all get what we need?), it shifts from extractive transactions to collaborative innovation. The result is healthier for the entire arts ecosystem, especially for artists previously told to accept crumbs and practice resilience.

This practical toolkit talk features specific Nashville-based projects, examples, and lessons born from Stephanie Pruitt-Gaines's 25+ years as a working artist, 10 years teaching healthy artrepreneurship, and recent foray into venue ownership, launching The Creativity Bar, where thousands of adults have made tangible shifts in how they work and live by strengthening their creative capacity."

Led by Stephanie Pruitt-Gaines

11:00 am CT

Lunch

1:00 pm CT

National Breakout Sessions

A Rally for Cultural Placekeeping: Building Affordable, Accessible, and Creative Communities

Across the country, creative spaces are disappearing due to market pressures, displacement, and inequitable growth. As a response, artists and cultural leaders are partnering with civic and economic organizations to redefine what equitable development looks like. This panel highlights Rally Austin, a real estate nonprofit created by the City of Austin to steward public and private assets toward community benefit through initiatives like the Austin Cultural Trust and Iconic Venue Fund. This panel will explore innovative, artist-centered approaches to real estate and cultural infrastructure, strategies for growth, and replicable models of creative placekeeping. Attendees will gain practical insight into frameworks that support equitable, creative ecosystems and learn how artists and cultural workers can be active stakeholders in shaping the cities and communities where they live and work.

Panel organized by Sara Vanderbeek, TX

Money Mindfulness: Rewriting Your Financial Story with Self-Care and Vision

This workshop invites artists and creative entrepreneurs to explore the intersection of money, mindfulness, and self-worth. Through guided reflection, group dialogue, and a hands-on table activity, participants will examine personal money narratives, identify scarcity patterns, and map a values-aligned vision for financial resilience. Rooted in contemplative practices and practical tools, the session supports shifting limiting beliefs around money. By integrating mindfulness with creative financial planning, it offers a compassionate, empowering approach to building a healthier relationship with money. Participants will reflect on money stories, clarify values, and sketch a vision for financial well-being—encouraging self-care, clarity, and action to move from financial stress to intentional, values-driven decision-making.

Led by: Rhonda Schaller, NJ and Dr. Esmilda Abreu, NJ

2:00 pm CT

Mindful Pause Activities

3:00 pm CT

National Breakout Sessions

We Will Not Go Silent: Building Communities of Care Through Creative Collaboration

How do artists sustain creativity and community in the face of challenge, distance, and change? In this interactive presentation, four members of Breaking Wave Theatre Company (BWTC) - a community-rooted, artist-led organization from Guåhan (Guam) – will invite participants to explore how care, culture, and collaboration can shape thriving creative ecosystems. BWTC ensemble members will share real-world strategies for building partnerships rooted in reciprocity, shared power, and belonging. Participants will reflect on their own creative practices and communities - asking how collaboration can become a form of care, and how care itself can become an act of artistic resistance.

Led by: CJ Ochoco, Breaking Wave Theatre Company, Guam

The Creative Revolution: AI and the Issues at Stake

Description coming soon.

Led by: Douglas McLennan, founder and editor of ArtsJournal

Local Breakout Session

Block Breaker: Facing the wall

How do innovators push through mental, emotional, and creative blocks to reach the full potential of a project? Join us for a craft class with poet laureate, actor, and international artist Cameron L. Mitchell, whose latest book Breaking the Block: Building a Path to Write the Story offers strategies for overcoming writer’s block while nurturing emotional intelligence, mental wellness, and literary craft.

In this one-hour craft talk, Cameron will share practical techniques for overcoming tedious obstacles and unlocking your creative flow. Participants will engage in thought provoking discussion, creative writing activities, and a guided opportunity to share their work.

Led by Cameron L. Mitchell

4:00 pm CT

National Networking

5:30 pm CT

Dine Arounds with art experiences

Breakfast on your own

10:00 am CT

Local Breakout Sessions

Experience the Magic of Group Collaboration through Songwriting

Every day in writers rooms across Music City, thousands of songwriters and artists gather together in groups of 2-4 people to co-write songs. In this session, participants will get to experience the magic of that truly collaborative creative process by writing a full song together in 45 minutes, facilitated by professional songwriter Anne Buckle on guitar/voice. The last 15 minutes of the 60-minute session will be spent gathering reflections from the participants on their experience, hearing insights on the power and magic of collaborating in a group on an artistic project, in this case, doing some Music City-style songwriting.

Led by Anne Buckle

The importance of art fairs, artist markets, and studio tours in fostering community engagement and economic opportunity for visual artists

This presentation will highlight the growing importance of art fairs, artist markets, and open studio tours in Middle Tennessee as traditional gallery and online sale models become more challenging. Drawing on years of experience as a self employed artist, serving on the board of Tennessee Craft, and helping found two neighborhood art crawls, Audry will explain how direct sales events create strong economic opportunities for artists while fostering meaningful, personal connections with audiences. These accessible, community-driven experiences not only break down barriers around art collecting but also serve as powerful advocacy for intentionally handmade art in a fast-paced, AI-influenced world.

Led by Audry Deal-McEver

11:00 am CT

Lunch

1:00 pm CT

National Breakout Sessions

Designing Funding that Nourishes the Artist - Not Just Their Output

What if funding didn’t just fuel the next project - but actually nourished the whole artist? This session centers four community-designed funding models - the BIPOC Artist Fund, Creative West Artist Fund, Cultural Sustainability Program, and Pacific Jurisdictions Artist Fund - that are reshaping the landscape by centering artist well-being, not just productivity. Led by cultural strategist Anika Tené alongside brilliant co-designers, this session dives into what it truly looks like when wellness, pacing, and relational trust are designed into funding from the start - not treated as afterthoughts. Participants will hear how these initiatives rejected extractive grantmaking and instead embedded coaching, wellness stipends, and flexible timelines to reflect the lived realities of artists - particularly those in BIPOC, Indigenous, rural, and under-resourced communities. Participants will walk away with concrete strategies, adaptable frameworks, and inspiration to champion care-centered, equity-rooted funding practices within their own institutions and networks.

Led by: Anika Tene, VA

Changemakers in Civic Spaces – Strategic Advocacy Pathways for Creatives

Artists are catalysts for empathy, innovation, and change. How can creative voices shape civic life and public policy? Changemakers in Civic Spaces explores how artists can move from community-based action to influencing decision-making at local, state, and federal levels. Three dynamic panelists will share real-world strategies across three key pathways: Community Organizing, where creative practice mobilizes neighborhoods and builds collective voice; Advocacy for All, which maps access points for every level of engagement from small, everyday actions to sustained leadership; and Creatives in Office, guiding artists who aspire to serve in appointed or elected roles. Participants will leave with practical tools, frameworks, and inspiration to see themselves as changemakers in civic spaces. They will gain a deeper understanding of how artistic skills translate into organizing, policy influence, and governance; recognize multiple entry points for advocacy regardless of experience level; and build confidence to move from awareness to action. The session fosters connection, empowerment, and a shared vision for sustainable, artist-led advocacy that drives thriving creative communities.

Organized by: Eepi Chaad, TX

2:30 pm CT

Sending Session

3:30 pm CT

Summit ends

Schedule

Times are in Central Time Subject to change. Registered attendees will have access to more details.

Times are in Central Time
Subject to change. Registered attendees will have access to more details.