THE WALLACE FOUNDATION EXCELLENCE AWARDS
BACKGROUNDER

The Wallace Foundation Excellence Awards were created in 2004 with several goals: to recognize leading arts organizations that are effectively reaching out to engage more people with the arts; to provide funds to deploy and refine innovative practices; and to understand and share those practices broadly. Successful strategies for expanding audiences are shared with arts managers, policymakers, researchers, consultants and others through conferences, publications, and on the Foundation’s online Knowledge Center at http://www.wallacefoundation.org/.

The Excellence Awards build on the Foundation’s longstanding effort to expand participation in the arts, and to share effective practices and ideas that can be carried out by arts organizations, state arts agencies, and other non-profits. Concerns about the aging of the audience for the arts, reductions in arts education, and increased competition for leisure time, underscore the value of improving understanding about how to build participation in the arts.

The Foundation takes a city-based approach to its arts funding to help improve arts participation across whole communities.  In each city, the foundation partners with a local community foundation and a public agency to create a learning network, bringing arts organizations together to share information and experiences.  This local network supports the broader arts and culture community through knowledge sharing, learning opportunities and resource support aimed at building audience appreciation and demand for the arts.  Sites are chosen based on cities’ high concentration and variety of arts organizations and robust collaboration among local funders and arts organizations around informing and supporting cultural participation.

The following organizations received Excellence Awards in 2006:

Boston
The Boston Symphony Orchestra
Museum of Fine Arts
Boston Lyric Opera
From the Top
The Huntington Theatre Company
The Institute of Contemporary Art
Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum

Boston Learning Network Partners
The Boston Foundation and the Massachusetts Cultural Council


Chicago
The Beverly Arts Center
The Black Ensemble Theater
Chicago Sinfonietta
Garfield Park Conservatory Alliance
Hyde Park Art Center
Merit School of Music
Music of the Baroque
Steppenwolf Theatre
Victory Gardens Theater

Chicago Learning Network Partners
The Chicago Community Trust and the Department of Cultural Affairs