Tuesday, October 20, 2009
The Artist Loan Fund is looking for change…
… and Springboard is looking for your creative input.
Funny thing over here at Springboard. I think I speak for the entire staff when I say that things are moving at a healthy clip around here, as mentioned previously in Thrilled and Daunted. Which is to say that there’s a lot going on at Springboard in addition to our regular programs.
As individuals, community and country, Change has been ringing in our ears at least since Nov. 4, 2008 (but really long before that) and was resonated anew with the challenges presented by the drastic economic shifts that have impacted so many.
Despite the tendency to see only two kinds of change in the world (good or bad), there are many shapes, directions, and gravities to change that often aren’t recognized.
Change due to necessity; Change that has been coming for some time but finally arrives, sometimes a touch early and sometimes a touch late; Change forced upon us and; Change given to us as a gift.
And sometimes there is change due to vision or what I would call the artist’s need to change. Anyone that has not just heard but listened to the creative voice that makes us break routine, asks us to question the status quo, suggests something greater just over the horizon, or just gently come to rest upon our thoughts, will understand how change and creativity go hand and hand.
For Springboard this is true of our Artist Loan Fund. The program works and has worked for over 12 years, making over $800,000 in micro-loans to artists for a wide range of small business endeavors. Yet, for some reason we decided that it’s not good enough that a program merely “work”. It’s not good enough for a service organization to simply “serve”. Springboard makes loans and banks make loans, but Springboard doesn’t want to be just a bank for artists, we want to be more, so we have decided to change. The only thing we ask of you now is for your input and creativity.
As I stated above, creativity and change go hand and hand, so please join Springboard at the upcoming Artist Loan Fund Info Meetings where we will try to work toward a new Artist Loan Fund.
