The Kentucky Center Blog

THANK YOU for making KY GIVES Day such a success!

THANK YOU to everyone who participated in KY GIVES Day! Over $330,000 was raised to support nonprofit organizations across the state. We are deeply grateful to those individuals who made a donation in support of The Kentucky Center’s Education and Community Arts programs. Thanks to your
generosity, we finished in the top 30 organizations based on donations received, from among over 375 participating nonprofits. Plus we received an additional donation – a “golden ticket” prize – from the Kentucky Nonprofit Network. What a wonderful day! We will definitely put those dollars to good use
serving youth and adults throughout the Commonwealth.

KY GIVES DAY is April 24! Support The Kentucky Center's Education and Community Arts Programs.

April 24, 2013 is KY GIVES DAY, a 24-hr event where people across the state of Kentucky will log onto a single web site to make donations to support their favorite nonprofit organizations and worthy causes.

On April 24, The Kentucky Center for the Performing Arts invites you to make a donation in support of our award-winning Education and Community Arts programs:

Arts in Healing

ArtsReach

Governor's School for the Arts

These programs, closely aligned with our institutional mission, educate, inspire, and improve quality of life for youth and adults in all 120 counties of the Commonwealth.

Click here to make your donation on April 24.

Busy on 4/24? You can follow the instructions below to make a donation in advance - and schedule it to be processed along with other KY GIVES gifts on the 24th.

How to schedule your donation:

Visit www.kygives.org.

Scroll halfway down the page and click on the green "Connect with Nonprofits" button.

Next page: In the "Search for a Cause" box, type in "Kentucky Center for the Arts Endowment Fund." Hit the SEARCH button.

In the Search Results, click our link.

On our page,enter your total donation amount.

From the drop-down menu under "Make This Donation Occur...", select "On A Giving Day."

On the next page, fill out your payment information. At the bottom of the page, above the SUBMIT NOW button, you'll notice the sentence that explains your donation will be processed on April 24, 2013.

Be sure to hit SUBMIT NOW to put your donation into the processing queue.

Kentucky Center Arts in Healing program featured in LOUISVILLE MEDICINE magazine

Photo: Arts in Healing workshop with Parkinson's patients and caregivers, Frazier Rehabilitation Center

Article posted with permission of Louisville Medicine, a monthly publication of the Greater Louisville Medical Society.

 

The Healing Arts

Ellen R. Hale

 

Hip-hop music bounces off the walls of the gymnasium. The teacher, wearing sweats and tennis shoes, demonstrates choreography to the six girls and two boys who stand before her. Step, sway. Step, turn.

 “Just do it confidently,” Safiyyah Rasool encourages the teens. “You have it.” 

Rasool has been teaching this group of patients at Our Lady of Peace in a series of six sessions as part of The Kentucky Center’s Arts in Healing program, which brings visual art, music, dance, storytelling and drama to hospitals and health care facilities. For Rasool, success is seeing them express themselves without fearing how they might look to others – not having them memorize a hip-hop routine perfectly.

 “Dance is a positive form of self-expression,” said Rasool, owner of SafiyyahDance in Louisville. Her dance class is the highlight of the day for many of the children at Our Lady of Peace, the first location for Arts in Healing when the program began in 2009. Since then, the grant-funded program has reached more than 1,600 patients and individuals with 140 arts experiences.

Ongoing programs include the following: 

*Home of the Innocents – music,storytelling and dance in Kosair Charities Pediatric Convalescent Center; all art forms in the Weinberg Academy, the on-site school; all art forms in the Childkind Center, a crisis care unit for abused and neglected children.

*James Graham Brown Cancer Center – music

*Nazareth Home – all art forms

*Norton Audubon Hospital – all art forms

*Our Lady of Peace – all art forms

*Robley Rex VA Medical Center – drumming, visual art and creative writing with veterans in substance abuse treatment; music with hospice patients

*Volunteers of America – songwriting, drama and visual art with women in substance abuse treatment; visual art with men in substance abuse treatment; visual art with those in the family emergency shelter

During a recent program at the VA, a group of veterans from the substance abuse unit sat in a circle, tearing and cutting military uniforms into strips. Drew Cameron, founder of the Combat Paper Project, led them in a papermaking workshop using the uniforms, a cathartic process he takes to veterans all over the country. Cameron oversees the veterans as they use his portable papermaking machine to beat the strips of fabric into a pulp and make a sheet of paper. 

The veterans peruse Cameron’s selection of silkscreens to use for their personal design – there are maps, boots, the U.S. Capitol, a tank. They select dyes to give the images color on the plain paper. According to the Combat Paper Project, the finished works of art can help veterans reclaim the uniform as art and begin to embrace their experiences in the military. 

At the James Graham Brown Cancer Center, local musicians including a cellist, harpist and flutist play twice weekly for chemotherapy patients. “We brought the program to the James Graham Brown Cancer Center because we know that music contributes to the overall well-being of our patients,” said Cesar  Rodriguez, MD. “We initiated a pilot program of music in our Chemotherapy Infusion Unit and the Bone Marrow Clinic, and the feedback was overwhelming. Our patients were enthusiastic in their support of the program.”

The Kentucky Center believes that the arts contribute to a healing environment for patients, families and staff in health care settings. The arts can shorten hospital stays, reduce pain medication, increase staff satisfaction and ensure efficient use of health care dollars, according to The Kentucky Center. Benefits of the Arts in Healing program include creative self-expression, relief from pain and anxiety, and empowerment in an environment where patients and families often experience loss of control.

Note: Ellen R. Hale is the communications associate for the Greater Louisville Medical Society. 

Arts in Healing activities underway at eight local sites thanks to generous donors

The Kentucky Center Arts in Healing program is busy at eight sites, thanks to the support of our generous donors:

*Frazier Rehabilitation Institute         
*Home of the Innocents         
*James Graham Brown Cancer Center         
*Nazareth Home         
*Norton Audubon Hospital         
*Our Lady of Peace         
*Robley Rex VA Medical Center         
*Volunteers of America

We are very grateful for all of the community support that we have received to continue this inspiring work, including support from the many individual donors who keep the program going so successfully. 

Learn more about The Kentucky Center Arts in Healing program.

The Humana Foundation has provided the primary support since the program’s inception in 2009, and is the primary funder for programs at James Graham Brown Cancer Center, Norton Audubon Hospital, Frazier Rehabilitation Institute, Robley Rex VA Medical Center lobby and the men receiving substance abuse treatment at Volunteers of America.  Grants received from the WHAS Crusade for Children and Kosair Charities help provide programming at Home of the Innocents, Our Lady of Peace, and the Family Emergency Shelter at Volunteers of America.  Funding from the Sisters of Charity of Nazareth make the women’s program at Volunteers of America and Nazareth Home possible, while the Disabled American Veterans  Charitable Service Trust has been the primary funding  source for our work in the inpatient units at Robley Rex VA Medical Center.

On March 18, from 5 – 7 p.m., Arts in Healing will participate in an opening reception for Women’s History Month at UofL School of Dentistry. On March 27, from 12 - 1:30 p.m., Arts in Healing will dedicate the “She Served, Too” stone marker carved at the 2012 Women Veterans Open House at Robley Rex VA Medical Center.  It will be placed in the Memorial Gardens until the West Entrance renovation is complete.

Photo taken at past Kentucky Center Arts in Healing workshop at Frazier Rehabilitation Institute involving members of the Mark Morris dance company and patients with Parkinson's and their caregivers

Kentucky Center Arts in Healing: Trey McIntyre dancers entertain at Frazier Rehab

 

Trey McIntyre Project (TMP) and the Preservation Hall Jazz Band performed at Louisville's Brown Theatre on December 8. While TMP was in town, The Kentucky Center Arts in Healing program took them to Frazier Rehabilitation Center where the dancers performed several short pieces, entertaining clients, their family members, and Frazier staff.

Later that day, The Kentucky Center Programming Outreach staff escorted the dancers to Louisville's Youth Performing Arts School where they conducted masterclasses for ballet and modern dance students. Each session included instruction in pieces from the company's repertoire and a lively Q&A session.

Learn more about The Kentucky Center's nonprofit mission and upcoming performances.

Kentucky Center Arts in Healing partners with Brown Cancer Center to soothe patients during treatment

 

As explained in this video clip from WHAS11's "Great Day Live," The Kentucky Center Arts in Healing program is partnering with the James Graham Brown Cancer Center (Louisville) to offer live instrumental music in the infusion unit and bone marrow clinic.

This is the first program of its kind offered to cancer patients in the state.

The music offers a soothing distraction to patients who are often undergoing several hours of treatment per visit.

You can learn more about The Kentucky Center Arts in Healing program by visiting our website.

Arts in Healing celebrates 1 year of partnering with Robley Rex VA Medical Center

The Kentucky Center Arts in Healing program celebrated its one year anniversary of partnering with the Robley Rex VA Medical Center by completing this stonecarving during an Open House for female veterans.

The power of Arts in Healing is demonstrated by compelling patient histories and validated by remarkable evidence-based research. As defined by the National Endowment for the Arts, it is “an international movement that works to infuse the full spectrum of the arts into healthcare settings, including design, visual, performing and literary arts, resulting in programs and healthcare environments that are welcoming and uplifting for caregivers, patients, their families and visitors.”

To participate in or learn more about The Kentucky Center Arts in Healing Program, call (502) 562-0198 or email artsinhealing@kentuckycenter.org.

Shop & Dine in November to support The Kentucky Center's Education & Community Arts Programs

 During the month of November, we invite you to shop and dine to support The Kentucky Center’s award-winning Education and Community Arts initiatives, including Arts in Healing, ArtsReach, the Governor’s School for the Arts, and statewide school programs.

Please make plans to join us by putting these dates in your calendar now! Your support allows us to serve people of all ages, in a variety of settings, across the Commonwealth.

Dine-in or Carry-out at The Village Anchor (Anchorage)
Monday, November 19, 5-10 p.m.

We invite you to dine-in or carry-out at The Village Anchor on Monday evening, November 19. Be sure to mention The Kentucky Center to your server or cashier. The percentage donated as a contribution to our Education and Community Arts programs is based on the total number of orders placed that evening, so please share this invitation with your friends and family.

The Village Anchor is located at 11507 Park Rd, Anchorage, KY, 40223. 

We highly recommend you make reservations to ensure that you have a table. To book reservations, call (502) 708-1850 or reserve online www.villageanchor.com. We’ll see you there!

Shop at Just Creations (Crescent Hill)
Tuesday, November 27, 6–8 p.m.

Just Creations will open the store after hours, just for us, on November 27. A percentage of sales from the Community Shopping Night will be donated to The Kentucky Center's Education and Community Arts programs.

You’ll love shopping at this beautiful store, filled with Fair Trade items from over 45 countries, including housewares, clothing, jewelry, handbags and totes, skincare products, coffee, chocolates, etc. Get a jump on your holiday shopping or take home something lovely for yourself.

Just Creations is located at 2722 Frankfort Avenue, Louisville, KY, 40206.

Oct. 8-11: Veterans invited to participate in transformative COMBAT PAPER PROJECT. Turn uniforms into paper; make art.

The Kentucky Center Arts in Healing program is proud to be in partnership with the VA and UofL in presenting the Combat Paper Project.

The Combat Paper Project utilizes art making workshops to assist veterans in reconciling and sharing their personal experiences as well as broadening the traditional narrative surrounding service and the military culture. 

Through papermaking workshops, veterans use their uniforms worn in combat to create cathartic works of art. The uniforms are cut up, beaten into a pulp and formed into sheets of paper. Veterans use the transformative process of papermaking to reclaim their uniform as art and begin to embrace their experiences in the military. 

Veterans are invited to participate in the "rolling" workshop at University of Louisville, October 8 - 11. RSVPs are required at (502) 852-2518, wlhono01@louisville.edu . On Friday, October 12, there will also be a lecture and demonstration about the project at the Robley Rex VA Hospital, Room D010. 

Kentucky Center Arts in Healing program starts new round of activities at Frazier Rehab and OLOP

The Kentucky Center Arts in Healing program has begun a new series of activities at Frazier Rehabilitation Institute. For the next three months, we will be providing live music in therapy rooms and in the lobby, performing weekend concerts, and visiting patients in their rooms. Staff and patients alike have commented on how uplifting and relaxing it is to provide and receive therapy with live music in the background.

We are also changing our model at Our Lady of Peace to include 6-week residencies by artists in each unit, allowing for larger projects, more skill development, and great access to creative arts for clients.

The Kentucky Center gratefully acknowledges the support of the Jewish Hospital and St. Mary's Healthcare Foundation for providing a grant allowing us to purchase Mountain Dulcimers for use in one of the new residency programs.