Above: Detroit celebrates its 2013 Knight Arts Challenge winners. Photo credit: Knight Foundation.

In an in-depth series on Detroit, the Chronicle of Philanthropy today singled out the art sector’s important role in pushing the city forward.

“Despite the city’s financial woes, Detroit’s cultural life is in many ways thriving—and some hope it is a harbinger of better days for the city,” reporter Suzanne Perry writes in her story, “Innovation in the arts helps spark Detroit’s revival.”

Despite the possibility of having to sell major works from the collection of the Detroit Institute of Arts, the city’s grassroots organizations are booming, institutions like the Detroit Symphony Orchestra weathered the recession and the 7-year-old Museum of Contemporary Art is becoming an important part of the city’s cultural scene.

Perry cites the large number of applications for the Knight Arts Challenge, which announced its first round of winners in September, as a sign of the city’s creative spirit. Knight has committed $19.25 million to the city’s arts sector in the coming years.

“I’m literally obsessed with Detroit,” Dennis Scholl, Knight’s vice president for arts, told Perry. “When we looked at Detroit, the momentum that was there that might give Detroit the opportunity to remake itself was coming from the cultural community.”

Perry also writes about what foundations like Knight are doing to help in the city’s recovery, how nonprofits are working to fight blight, and more. The series is available to the Chronicle’s subscribers.

Marika Lynch, a former journalist, is a communications consultant for Knight Foundation.