Kansas City awarded $80,000 from U.S. Regional Arts Resilience Fund

The American Jazz Museum, recipient of a $50,000 grant. // Photo courtesy of the American Jazz Museum

Kansas City’s American Jazz Museum and the Black Archives of Mid-America are new recipients of the Mid-America Arts Alliance’s U.S. Regional Arts Resilience Fund. The American Jazz Museum will be receiving $50,000 and the Black Archives of Mid-America will be receiving $30,000.

The M-AAA is awarding 27 different grantees across 6 states: Missouri, Kansas, Arkansas, Nebraska, Oklahoma, and Texas. Grant amounts range from $30,000 and $100,000. A total of $1,536,000 was awarded throughout the Midwest.

This program was created in collaboration with several other Regional U.S. Arts organizations: Arts Midwest, Mid Atlantic Arts Foundation, New England Foundation for the Arts, South Arts, and Western States Arts Federation. These groups were funded through a $10 million grant from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation.

These awards are a sizable investment to preserving the arts amidst the COVID-19 pandemic and are focused on organizations led by or supporting Black people and people of color.

“We are honored to provide this critical support to these extraordinary arts organizations within the Mid-America region,” said Mid-America Arts Alliance President and CEO Todd Stein. “In focusing on organizations led by or supporting communities of color and rural communities, we reinforce the importance of these organizations and their vital role within our arts ecosystems. The arts have the power to unite, uplift, and propel our region forward, and it is a crucial need to fund these organizations that are often overlooked and historically under-resourced.”

Other Missouri grantees include the National Blues Museum, Prison Performing Arts, and St. Louis ArtWorks, all in St. Louis. A full list of the Midwest grantees can be found here.