May 23, 2007 | Read Time: 1 minute
Is corporate support for the arts continuing to lag?
Gary Steuer, vice president for private-sector affairs at Americans for the Arts, thinks so.
On the organization’s Artsblog,
Mr. Steuer writes that a new report by the Foundation Center, which says corporate foundation giving rose 6 percent (about 3 percent in inflation-adjusted dollars) in 2006, is discouraging because a study
by his organization issued this month suggests that arts and cultural groups are largely not benefiting from such growth.
Other studies that examine giving by corporate funds and the companies themselves, including donations of products, have shown even more impressive increases, he writes.
Of course, not all of this philanthropy could benefit the arts groups since they can not accept some donated products, such as pharmaceuticals. (“OK, on bad days with major grant proposal deadlines looming, maybe we wish we did have some of those drugs,” he jokes.)
Despite this, he writes, “the fact that the Foundation Center is finding a 6 percent growth in corporate foundation giving, and the arts are clearly not seeing corporate giving growth that is comparable, shows that the problem is still very real and must be addressed.”
What do you think? What can arts groups do to reverse this trend?
