June 23, 2010
Ryman Arts and The Walt Disney Company Establish
Sklar Legacy Fund - Read more in the LA Times!
June 22, 2010
Ryman Arts and The Walt Disney Company Establish Sklar Legacy Fund
Honoring Disney Legend Marty Sklar
(PDF: 20KB)
June 17, 2010
Ryman Arts’ 2010 Graduates Showcase Artwork at the California African American Museum
(PDF: 53KB)
June 2010
Ryman Arts Board Chair and Disney Legend Marty Sklar shares his perspectives on Herb Ryman in Disney Files Magazine, Spring 2010. (click image for PDF 1.4 MB)
January 5 , 2010
This article highlights Tiffany Wang, a current student in Ryman Arts. It is published in the Chinese Daily News, the largest Chinese newspaper published in North America. Click the image below to go to the article.
November 2 , 2009
The fine art of saving jobs
Listen to a piece that aired November 2, 2009 on KPCC here!
Read the story on Los Angles County Supervisor Zev Yaroslavsky's website!
Against the vast backdrop of the federal stimulus program, $420,084 may not seem like such a massive sum.
But to Tiffany Gallindo, it’s huge. It means she can keep her job on the front lines of the Ryman Arts program, working to bring a free visual arts education and college guidance to gifted Los Angeles high school students, many of them low-income.
It means that Samuel Jang gets to continue his work as production manager for the Southwest Chamber Music Society, including helping to put together ambitious upcoming tours to Mexico and Vietnam.
And it means that Kenton J. Haleem of the Hollywood Entertainment Museum can bring back a position recently put on “hiatus”—a program manager in the organization’s media arts training program for at-risk kids.
All three organizations recently were singled out for grants of American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) funds from the National Endowment for the Arts. The cash infusion comes thanks to the efforts of the Los Angeles County Arts Commission and the City of Los Angeles Department of Cultural Affairs, which together were able to preserve 21 positions in 16 arts organizations.
“The arts are a huge economic engine for our whole region,” says Laura Zucker, executive director of the County Arts Commission. “This is an important employer,” Zucker says, noting that the 300-plus arts organizations that are funded by the county employ more than 21,000 people.
And the importance of the organizations can be measured in more than just paychecks.
At Ryman Arts, a small nonprofit using donated studio space on the USC campus, they’re feeling the economic pains of students and recent alumni first-hand.
“Their calls and needs have been more urgent: Can we point them to more scholarship opportunities because they can’t take on more college loans? Can we arrange for them to stay after class to draw, because the electricity has been turned off at their apartment?” the organization said in its application for the grant. “Can we write another recommendation letter for a college application because they don’t have an art teacher at school?”
On the front lines is Gallindo, handling the phones, shepherding student applications, working to bring the aspiring artists and their work into the fold.
“I actually went to an arts high school,” says Gallindo, a dancer who attended Los Angeles County High School for the Arts and had been working at an insurance company before joining Ryman. “It changed my life and it opened doors. To be a part of something that is providing that opportunity to kids today is very rewarding.”
The grant “just gives us a huge sigh of relief,” says Ryman’s executive director, Diane Brigham. “With the downturn, I had to lay off another position entirely… We’re [now] a four-person organization. And I’m really glad we’re not a three-person organization.”
