Thank you to the many people who have been blog contributors to, and readers of ArtsBlog over the years. ArtsBlog has long been a space where we uplifted stories from the field that demonstrated how the arts strengthen our communities socially, educationally, and economically; where trends and issues and controversies were called out; and advocacy tools were provided to help you make the case for more arts funding and favorable arts policies.

As part of Americans for the Arts’ recent Strategic Realignment Process, we were asked to evaluate our storytelling communications platforms and evolve the way we share content. As a result, we launched the Designing Our Destiny portal to explore new ways of telling stories and sharing information, one that is consistent with our longtime practice of, “No numbers without a story, and no stories without a number.”

As we put our energy into developing this platform and reevaluate our communications strategies, we have put ArtsBlog on hold. That is, you can read past blog posts, but we are not posting new ones. You can look to the Designing Our Destiny portal and our news items feed on the Americans for the Arts website for stories you would have seen in ArtsBlog in the past.

ArtsBlog will remain online through this year as we determine the best way to archive this valuable resource and the knowledge you’ve shared here.

As ever, we are grateful for your participation in ArtsBlog and thank you for your work in advancing the arts. It is important, and you are important for doing it.

Creative Economy

We envision a country where artistic and cultural creativity is embraced as a human-based, primary driving force towards impact, empowerment, and economic and social justice in lives across the country.

We believe that creative and artistic solutions are central to building more equitable economies that provide opportunity for all people to reach their individual potential. Americans for the Arts seeks to help communities further appreciate and leverage the full scope of creative, cultural, and artistic-based economic activity to strengthen their communities.

Our Goals

Work related to building inclusive creative economies across the country takes shape in many ways across Americans for the Arts. We strive to help communities build awareness of their cultural assets and how to equitably strengthen, value, and utilize them. Our work aims to guide local communities and national entities to establish and strengthen partnerships between the creative industries, nonprofit arts and culture, and government sectors to increase an equitable flow of resources for the creative economy. We will continue to support equitable policies that bolster the economic activity generated by creative goods and services that drive holistic economic returns and prepare individuals, businesses, and governments for a more just future.

Central to this vision are two primary and long-term goals:

  1. In concert with Americans for the Arts’ cultural equity work, resource local leaders with tools, research, and skills, and build awareness to build interconnected community networks of partners, practitioners, advocates, and policymakers that cultivate and strengthen inclusive creative economies across the country.

  2. Work nationally to bridge the for- and nonprofit arts sectors in partnership to imagine, align, and drive equitable policy creation and resource sharing that builds an inclusive creative economy in the United States.

Read more about our full multi-year plan and its strategies in this post.

How do we define the creative economy?

While there isn’t one single definition, Americans for the Arts uses these four to describe different aspects of the creative economy, and the aspiration of an inclusive creative economy. Click each term to read the full definition and explore our glossary under the “Knowledge” tab for more information.

The creative economy is an economic ecosystem of for-profit and nonprofit creative industries, artists and artist workforce, educators, entrepreneurs, vendors, policy makers and funders that produce and distribute creativity- and artistic-based goods and services.

The creative economy consists of economic activity that depends on individuals and organizations using their creativity to drive jobs, revenue, community resources, and cultural engagement.

We define an inclusive creative economy as one that centers marginalized individuals in the pursuit of economic and restorative justice using creativity and the arts as the vehicle to reach individual and community potential.

Creative economy practices are activities or methods used in policy, research, programmatic, academic, or funding spaces that are designed to amplify and advance the inclusive creative economy in local communities, as is applicable to the uniqueness of each community.