ARTS and transcenDANCE unite
By Alejandra Enciso
Dedicated to serving middle and high school youth from underserved communities.
Two nonprofit organizations have become one. “a union” they call it. This fall, transcenDANCE Youth Arts Project will officially join forces with A Reason To Survive (ARTS) and become a single Creative Youth Development organization located in National City. “This is something that has evolved slowly. We have been in partnerships since 2012. The beauty is that, we got to test the waters together over the course of almost five years”. Explained in interview with Vanguard Culture, Catherine Corral, Co-Founder of TranscenDANCE. Initially Cat’s organization was in City Heights and did not count with a long term stable space. An opportunity came in National City, near Kimble Park with a building that the government had and wanted to dedicate to the arts; allowing the services to expand in other surrounding communities like Logan Heights and Downtown. By that point, it was time to talk merger… risks and gains. “The strong mission alignment is what drove the compatibility and really assessing this. If there wasn’t such strong mission alignment, this, would have not worked”.
The obligatory question: Will there be a new name representing this union? Representing the two organizations? There will not be. ARTS will have five departments now: Music, Fine Arts, Maker, Media Arts and Dance Theater. This last one, represented by transcenDANCE. “This will actualize by September 1st. There is a performance in July that not only explains transcenDANCE, it will also unveil a mix chapter with ARTS. It makes even more sense to have transcenDANCE be a part of this, than it ever did before. The restructuring that is happening with ARTS resembles what we have been doing for 10 years”.
Showing the work in July and a big matching campaign at once.
Both entities are complementing each other, boosting a creative process in the youth as well as social change and integration. Another of the goals, is to show this cross department collaboration in an annual event. And… there will be a taste of this in JULY. Showing music and set apprenticeship, the event titled 10Xchange will take place in the Sherwood Auditorium at MCASD La Jolla, from July 14th to the 16th. “This work is worthy of residents of the San Diego County at large, that are coming to see and hear a generation of young artists. And, our biggest champion of transcenDANCE as far as a founder is Danah Fayman”.
Ms. Fayman has been a champion and a funder of arts and culture for a good 50 years, she’s 96 years old. Her late husband was instrumental in co-creating the Museum of Contemporary Art, serving as board chair for many years. After he passed, Danah also served as board chair. “We are going to be honoring Danah on the main terrace of the museum on July 16th”. A matching campaign called UNITE and CELEBRATE 2016, has been launched to honor Ms. Fayman’s long-time support and to help ensure the smooth coalescence of the two organizations. With this campaign, new and increased gifts will be matched up to $50,000. “We are trying to raise the match! It closes July 22nd “.
There are many ways one can contribute to the matching amount. For more information, please click here.
Regarding their core activities, fall registrations open up August 15th through the ARTS website. Classes will start September 17th.