ArtsAVL Staff at Black Mountain Center for the Arts
A Look Back at 2023
December 19, 2023 – Asheville, N.C.| 2023 was a big year for ArtsAVL! With a new year just around the corner, the ArtsAVL team wants to take a moment and recognize the highlights and milestones from 2023. Big thanks to our Board of Directors, members, sponsors, and community partners for your support.
January
We welcomed Rebecca Lynch (she/her) on staff as our full-time Development Director. With two decades of experience working in cultural nonprofits, including roles with Chow Chow: An Asheville Culinary Event Series and the Asheville Art Museum, Rebecca has brought her expertise and acumen to development at ArtsAVL.
February
Ten Buncombe County organizations were awarded 2022-2023 Arts Build Community (ABC) grants from ArtsAVL. This year’s grants, which typically range from $1,000 to $2,500, supported programs and initiatives in areas including music, theatre, craft, Black history, arts education, regional culture, cooperative farming, and more.
March
In March, we hosted a Town Hall Meet & Greet that gathered representatives of local arts organizations with area elected officials, including Mayor Esther Manheimer, Asheville City Council Member Maggie Ullman, Buncombe County Commissioner Terri Wells, and North Carolina State Representatives Eric Ager, Lindsay Prather, and Caleb Rudow. The event allowed attendees to share goals for the local arts sector and followed a 2022 Town Hall candidate forum hosted by ArtsAVL.
April
On April 8, we launched the ArtsAVL Trolley, which runs every Second Saturday from 12-8 p.m. on two interconnected routes in the River Arts District and Downtown Asheville. Trolley days aligned with the vibrant Second Saturdays hosted by River Arts District artists, and riders were also able to take advantage of arts and culture opportunities downtown.
Between April and December, the trolley served over 1,600 riders. Businesses reported over 90% satisfaction with the trolley, with over 80% experiencing a positive impact. The trolley, a car-free way to get around two of the most popular and highest-trafficked areas of Asheville, serves locals and visitors, encouraging connection and facilitating deeper engagement with arts businesses.
Also in April, ArtsAVL once again participated as County Captains for Arts NC’s Arts Day conference, an annual statewide gathering centered around art and action that engages and inspires North Carolinians to learn, network, celebrate, advocate, and unite in support of the arts. Representatives from Wortham Center for the Performing Arts, Center for Craft, Asheville Symphony, Montford Park Players, Playground Stage Company, and Blue Ridge National Heritage Area made up the Buncombe County delegation.
May
Our Creative Economy Report found that the creative economy in Buncombe County was finally rebounding after the Covid-19 pandemic in 2020, surpassing 2019 levels. Key findings from the report included:
- Creative industries sales overall reached over $2 billion in 2022, led by Breweries ($597M) and Historic Sites ($260M)
- Core creative industries made up 23% of overall creative sales in 2022
- Among core creative industries, Motion Pictures and Video Production saw the highest increase with 10 new film projects in the area
- Arts & Entertainment ticket sales, while slower to recover, started to increase
- Staffing continued to be a challenge
We were thrilled to launch new Directory, Events, and Opportunities pages with access for ArsAVL members through their Creative Portal dashboard. The Portal provides an intuitive, user-friendly experience that allows our artist members to share their profiles and news quickly, then get back to what they do best: creating.
June
June’s Board Retreat brought together our Board of Directors and ArtsAVL staff, and included sessions envisioning ArtsAVL’s goals and future vision, a discussion of equity strategy, teambuilding exercise, and more.
Our Executive Director Katie Cornell was named Chair Elect of Arts North Carolina. Arts NC is a statewide advocacy organization for the arts that calls for equity and access to the arts for all North Carolinians, unifies and connects North Carolina’s arts communities, and fosters arts leadership – speaking for the arts wherever there is need.
July
ArtsAVL welcomed six new members of its Board of Directors: Alexa Kincaid, Director of Community Engagement at the YMI Cultural Center; Craig Harris, SVP and Senior Portfolio Manager at Morgan Stanley; strategic consultant Hannah Randall; retired television producer and executive Kaye Zusmann Phillips; attorney and Buncombe County Commissioner Martin Moore; and former NC House Representative John Ager. Ali McGhee, PhD, also joined the staff as the part time Communications Manager.
ArtsAVL was proud to support Leslie Reynalte-Llanco, the recipient of a grant for the first Buncombe County Creative Equity Mural, honoring local Latin pride. Assisted by Gus Cutty and Kathryn Crawford, Reynalte-Llanco painted 12 faces representing Latino community members on the approximately 2,590-ft wall at 94 Coxe Ave. in support of the mural’s message – “Eres un Orgullo Latino,” a.k.a. “You are Latin pride.”
August
Twenty Buncombe County organizations were awarded 2023-2024 Arts Build Community (ABC) grants from ArtsAVL. This year’s grants, which range from $1,000 to $2,500, will support programs and initiatives in areas including storytelling, Black history, musical theatre, arts programming for veterans, comedy, community arts and dance, creative placemaking, programming for queer and trans youths, and more.
Over 400 registered to attend our August Town Hall on the current state and potential futures for Thomas Wolfe Auditorium, held at Harrah’s Cherokee Center – Asheville and preceded and followed by tours of the shuttered auditorium. The event featured a panel moderated by ArtsAVL Executive Director Katie Cornell, comprising Mayor Esther Manheimer; Chris Corl, Director of Community and Regional Entertainment Facilities for the City of Asheville; Stephanie Monson Dahl, Planning and Urban Design Director; Vic Isley, President and CEO of Explore Asheville and the Buncombe County Tourism Development Authority; Daniel Crupi, Executive Director of the Asheville Symphony; and Robert Long, Conceptual Planner for Theatre Consultants Collaborative. The City revealed five multi-million dollar renovation plans for the auditorium, one of which – a patron-driven redesign that would prioritize acoustics, was selected later by City Council for further research.
After a unanimous vote at the August 22nd Asheville City Council meeting, ArtsAVL now administers the new Event Support Grant program, which reimburses cultural and arts-related nonprofit events for certain City fees and charges. The decision came after several years of uncertainty about whether the city’s strategic support of event partnerships – critical to nonprofits who plan our vibrant community events and festivals – would continue. Nine nonprofits were awarded funding in the first application round.
We were thrilled to be voted the #1 Nonprofit that Serves the Arts in the Mountain Xpress’s Best of WNC Awards.
September
Brian and Gail McCarthy, the founders of Highwater Clays and Odyssey Center for Ceramic Arts, were awarded for their service to the local arts community with the John Cram Arts Leadership Award, nicknamed the “Crammy.” The award was presented at the annual State of the Arts Brunch on October 30 at The Orange Peel. The Crammy recognizes outstanding local arts leadership.
October
Eleven artists and arts organizations were awarded the 2023-2024 Arts for Schools Grant. The grant supports nonprofit arts organizations and qualified teaching artists in Buncombe County providing arts-focused performances, workshops, residencies, and field trips for K-12 students in public schools. The awarded organizations, with support from grants like Arts for Schools, ensure that students at underserved schools receive the benefits of vital arts programming.
We held our 2023 State of the Arts Brunch on October 30 at The Orange Peel in downtown Asheville, connecting local artists and arts organizations with each other and elected officials. The Brunch provided a critical snapshot of the current state of our creative sector, as well as an opportunity for the creative community to celebrate and connect. The sold out event included presentations from local arts and civic leaders and brought together individual artists, arts organizations, and arts advocates.
Buncombe County Commissioner Vice Chair Terri Wells and City of Asheville Mayor Esther Manheimer gave remarks on City and County support for arts and culture. “Our natural environment and our arts are interconnected,” noted Wells, who highlighted the County’s dedication to the creative community. Mayor Manheimer expressed the City’s commitment to the arts. “What is a city?” Manheimer asked the crowd. “People and experiences. We want to make sure that people are having an enriched life, and that includes the opportunity to have the highest quality experiences.”
November
The Arts and Economic Prosperity 6 (AEP 6) Report, released in October, shared detailed information about the creative economy locally and nationally. On the national level, the arts generated $151.7 billion of economic activity in 2022. Of that, $73.3 billion was in spending by arts and culture organizations, and an additional $78.4 billion came from event-related expenditures by their audiences. The sector supported 2.6 million jobs, provided $101 billion in personal income to residents, and generated $29.1 billion in tax revenue to local, state, and federal governments.
Locally, Buncombe County saw a drastic decline of 26% since the last report was conducted in 2015. According to this report, in 2022, nonprofit arts and culture organizations and their audiences generated over $51 million in economic activity in Buncombe County – $25 million in spending by the organizations, which leveraged an additional $26 million in event-related spending by their audiences. This economic activity supported over 1,200 jobs and generated nearly $13 million in tax revenue. This decline was partly due to the fact that data was collected in fiscal year 2022 – when the local economy was still recovering from the effects of the pandemic.
Nine recipients were awarded the City of Asheville’s 2024 Event Support Grant. Facilitated by ArtsAVL for the first time, the grant allowed ArtsAVL to reimburse cultural and arts-related nonprofit events for certain City fees and charges. Grants were distributed based on a competitive process to non-profit organizations, which are eligible to receive financial support for events that are free and open to the public and permitted within Asheville’s streets, parks, and outdoor public spaces. The program’s goal is to preserve public arts and cultural programming within Asheville’s outdoor public spaces through the provision of financial assistance for community events that promote cultural heritage, diversity, and the creative arts.
December
ArtsAVL celebrated 43 recipients of the 2023-2024 Grassroots Arts Program grant. The grant provides programmatic and operating support for nonprofit arts organizations in Buncombe County. Recipients include organizations working in fields as diverse as dance, puppetry, choral and symphonic music, children’s theatre, mask making, arts for healing, community radio, and more. Grants ranged from $1,500-7,500 depending on the size of the organization.
Fourteen Buncombe County residents are recipients of the 2023-2024 Artist Support Grant. Buncombe County grantees received $31,769 for projects in disciplines including ceramic arts, music, filmmaking, fiber arts, acting, metalpoint, and dance. Twenty-one grantees in total were awarded up to $3,000 each across six counties designated as Region 17 by the North Carolina Arts Council: Buncombe, Haywood, Henderson, Rutherford, Polk, and Transylvania.Region 17 had a total of $44,000 to award.
The City of Asheville voted to approve an ordinance update for the Public Art & Culture Commission, creating a new designated seat for ArtsAVL. This seat will create an opportunity for ArtsAVL to have a sustained presence in the discussion of public art, supporting the organization’s mission and vision and ensuring there is a clear, direct tie between City initiatives and the arts advocacy with which we are engaged.
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