About Us:
The Alliance for California Traditional Arts promotes and supports ways for cultural traditions to thrive now
and into the future by providing advocacy, resources, and connections for folk and
traditional artists and their communities.
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Funding Opportunities
Second Cycle OF Help Desk/L.A.
Visions from the New California
Deadline:
May 20
Partners in Arts Education Grants
Deadline:
May 26
NEA's Challenge
America Fast-Track
Deadline:
May 27
Bridging Cultures
Deadline:
Jun 1
Fund For Artists Matching Commissions
Deadline:
Jun 18
Native Arts &
Cultures Foundation's Grantmaking Programs
Deadline:
Jul 2
Investing in Artists Round VI
Deadline:
Jul 9
Celebrate! San Francisco: Call for
Submissions
Deadline:
Jul 10
NEA's Access to
Artistic Excellence
Deadline:
Aug 12
Composer Collaboration Awards
Deadline:
Aug 26
View all funding opportunities...
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Current Exhibits
Three
Hawaiian Textile Exhibits Opening at the San Jose Museum of Quilts
& Textiles
May 16, 2010 - Aug 8, 2010
San Jose
Viva M�xico!
Heroes and Artisans at the Mingei Museum
Though- Jan 2, 2011
San Diego
View event details...
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ACTA Launches a
Series of Online Dialogues about Cultural Equity
 What does cultural equity mean from your point of view? What actions need to be taken to change
systems resulting in cultural equity in its broadest sense?
On February 11, 2010, the Alliance for California
Traditional Arts (ACTA) hosted a community forum, Building Cultural Equity through the Traditional Arts, facilitated by Jerry Yoshitomi of Meaning Matters LLC, in Los
Angeles, raising these questions to a group of traditional artists, arts
funders, community leaders, and cultural equity advocates. The result was a rich, broad-ranging
discussion about cultural equity from diverse perspectives. Personal stories and challenges were shared,
along with questions, and ultimately, a call to action.
Building on this effort, ACTA is now working to expand and
deepen this conversation. Over the next
four months, we present four different topics related to cultural equity -- Leadership, Media, Artistic
Marginalization, and Sustainability -- one
each month. We will post comments and
discussion from the community forum in Los Angeles. We
then invite you to think about this topic and post your own comments and
stories. Our hope is to develop an
online community dialogue across California, and beyond -- expanding and
building on this topic.
The topic for May is Leadership. Please click the Read More link below to follow
the discussion as it began in February and post your comments on this topic.
Read more... |
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ACTA Hosts Statewide Informational Meetings & Webinars
Throughout May and June, ACTA will be hosting informational meetings in Berkeley, San Jose, Santa Cruz, Los Angeles, and San Diego. Join ACTA staff for an informational meeting in
your area to learn more about ACTA's programs and other funding opportunities for
folk & traditional artists and organizations.
If you can't make an informational meeting, join us for a webinar (online seminar)! Those with internet and telephone access may join ACTA staff
for a "virtual" informational meeting.
Read more...
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KlezCalifornia: Keeping Yiddish Culture Alive
 Yiddishkeit is the word for a living Yiddish culture.
This past February, 450 people of all ages participated in KlezCalifornia's
Yiddish Culture Festival where they were able to study with Klezmer
master musicians and teachers from around the world, sing Yiddish songs
in a chorus, speak Yiddish at all levels, learn the improvisatory dance
that goes with the infectious Klezmer repertoire, attend lectures on a
variety of subjects including diaspora history, participate in an
open-mic talent show, and explore Jewish interactions with Greek, Roma,
Balkan, Ukrainian and American neighbors.
Read more...
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Los Cenzontles
Composes Ballad to Arizona: Estado de Verguenza (State of Shame)
 San Pablo-based Mexican American folk group Los Cenzontles
recently created a corrido about the new immigration law in
Arizona. Corridos are a time-honored version of breaking news in
Mexico; this corrido expresses the Mexican American community's outrage in response the new Arizona law. Estado de Verguenza was composed by Los Cenzontles founder
Eugene Rodriguez, recorded and put to video within a four day period
earlier this month.
Listen to Estado de Verguenza...
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Advocates for Indigenous California Language Survival Presents Breath of Life Workshops
 In
California, where once close to a hundred
indigenous languages were spoken, now close to half of them have no
living
speakers left at all, and most of the rest have just a few. The
Breath of
Life/Silent No More Language Workshop for California Indians
was designed specifically for
people
who have no speakers
from whom to learn their language. If there are no
speakers,
then you must hope that someone recorded your language or wrote it
down,
because then it can still be revived. There are a number of languages
around
the world that have been brought back into use by learning from
documentation
-- Wampanoag and Miami are two examples
from around the United States, and Cornish in the United Kingdom. And
here in California, languages
like Esselen, Mutsun, Muwekma, Barbare�o Chumash, Tongva, and lots of
others
are all being increasingly brought back into use from a starting point
of
zero speakers!
Read more...
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In Memoriam: Francisco Aguabella
Photo courtesy of FrancsicoAguabella.com
 | Master Afro-Cuban percussionist and NEA National Heritage Fellow Francisco Aguabella passed away in his home in Los Angeles on May 7, 2010. He was 84 years old.
With a career spanning over 5 decades, Francisco Aguabella was not only widely respected for his sacred bat� drumming, but also for his virtuosity in secular forms of Afro-Cuban drumming. His career also crossed genres, enhancing the music of many jazz, salsa and pop
artists.
Read more about Francisco Aguabella in the New York Times.
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Exhibit of Amazonian Traditional Arts
Seeks Fiscal Sponsor
Project Jakon Jati, an exhibition and cultural exchange featuring the
Barin
Bababo Artist Collective, is seeking opportunities for fiscal
sponsorship in
California.
The Barin Bababo Artist Collective was founded in 1999 by a group of
indigenous
Amazonian Peruvians in an improvised studio assembled on the grounds of
the
Shipibo-Conibo village of San Francisco de Yarinacocha in eastern Peru.
Based on the concept of Jakon Jati, the Amazonian philosophy of
harmonious
living with nature, this project would bring Barin Bababo artists to
California
in an effort to promote a greater understanding of Amazonian culture and
its relevance to today's global environmental issues
through
traditional art, music and dance. For more information, read the complete project description or
contact
project director Jasara Rani Calandrella via email.
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