Arts Orange County

Productions and exhibitions, including (1) imagination celebration, a month-long festival of Arts for families and children, including dia del nino, a festival of Arts for underserved families and children, and (2) voices: veterans storytelling project, which engages military veterans in creative writing projects that recount their stories of life before, during and after military service. Before the covid-19 pandemic these programs took place live and in person. During the pandemic they were converted to virtual programs accessible online. Since the pandemic, they have returned to being live and in person. (3) poetry out loud, countywide student poetry recital competition, (4) creative writing classes for transitional age youth in Orange County jail, and (5) creative edge lecture was held live in 2023 and featured national endowment for the Arts chair dr. maria rosario jackson.

Arts community building and Arts leadership - building appreciation of, participation in and support for the Arts and Arts education throughout Orange County, ca. During the covid-19 pandemic, Arts Orange County converted its professional development gatherings to virtual platforms, conducting more than 100 online meetings of 12 different cohorts of artists and Arts leaders. Much of the content focused on implementing safety protocols, adapting programs from live to virtual platforms, maintaining regular communications with audiences and patrons, sharing news of relief funding resources and how to access them. Providing expertise in cultural planning and public art project management to local government, including County of Orange, cities of costa mesa, fullerton, irvine, newport beach, brea and placentia, as well as contra costa County. Offered an individual artist fellowship grant through the California Arts council, leading a coalition consisting of Orange, san diego, riverside, san bernardino and imperial counties, offering training and guidance to applicants and re-granting nearly $800,000 to 58 individual artists.

Spark oc, a website providing comprehensive listings of Arts & cultural events in Orange County, ca. During the covid-19 shutdown, Arts Orange County re-designed spark oc to focus upon virtual Arts and cultural programming being offered by the community's artists and Arts organizations. Upon lifting of the shutdown, spark oc promoted re-opening of venues and live events while continuing to include virtual offerings. Spark oc programs include regularly scheduled newsletters, e-mail promotions and social media posts. Spark oc also features a comprehensive countywide inventory of more than 1,000 works of art in public places, with information and locator maps. The inventory is updated monthly to reflect additions and works that may have been removed.